Tradesman question.

aliasojo

When you go to the Doctor, you are sometimes asked if you mind if a student Doctor is present also. The student is there to learn and doesn't actually participate in your treatment so can't do anything wrong and you are not negatively affected in any way. You also have the right to refuse their presence.

So how come, when you hire a tradesman, you invariably end up getting the trainee on your job too, with no regard to how you, the paying customer might feel about it?

I've been in this house for 24 years and have had a lot of tradesmen through the doors during that time. Most of them have had a trainee in tow and they always end up actually doing some of the work (and it's usually not of a good enough standard for me).

When we started the whole house refurb, we stated at the outset that we only wanted experienced, qualified workers because we were fed up with trainees due to past experiences with shoddy work. That gave the tradesmen the opportunity to either agree or walk away and not take the job.

It never worked out like that in reality however and the 'qualified, experienced tradesmen' that arrived from one firm were a joiner, his 16 yr old son and the company boss's 17 yr old son, both of whom were learning the ropes and managed to cut through my window frame and also cut short an expensive piece of oak amongst other things.

That's only one example, I've had loads of incidents like that. I've now got a joiner, a plumber and an electrician who I usually stick with as they are on their own and are good at their jobs.

My usual joiner wasn't available at short notice so I recently got someone else who was recommended to me as being very good. He is self employed and on his own. Only when he turned up and started the work, half an hour later a trainee turned up too. Cue joins in my oak that are less than good shall we say.

So tradesmen, serious question for you all...why, when a customer hires you to do some work, do you often bring along a helper who does some of the actual work? I realise people have to learn and hands on experience is needed, but why is the customer never asked if they mind if a trainee does some of the work too, given that they are paying for the job?

My lad is a welder, obviously he had to go through years worth of training and testing. He wasn't allowed anywhere near an actual job until he had completed x, y or z to a set standard. Why is it not the same for all trades?

I'm far from being alone in my thoughts, I know many people feel the same way. My experience has been that most tradesmen will be quite annoyed if you ask who will be doing the work, they seem to feel that if you hire them to do something, then they do it their way, which involves them choosing who does what. Which is fair enough, only will they be happy to redo the work if the customer feels it's not up to scratch?

Posted on this board simply because of the greater likelihood of getting replies from tradesmen themselves.

MaggieBaking

A doctor has to hear private and personal information, and might have to give you a physical examination hence why they ask about students being present. Fair enough most of the time it might be "my ear hurts" but sometimes people would feel uncomfortable knowing that there was more than one person to be embarrassed in front of.

When you have a tradesman in to work on your house - your pay is to him, in order to get the job done to your satisfaction. It doesn't matter if an employee of theirs does "shoddy" work, as it is their responsibility to fix it, and any costs incurred through a fault should not be your responsibility.

If you are letting apprentice's into your house and you are unhappy with a join, it is up to you to make sure that the tradesman knows you think the work is substandard and needs rectifying. Perhaps he assumes it is "good enough". Quite often people in the trades use an apprentice for the grunt work, meaning they get more quality time to work on your house. IE - Carrying buckets of plaster, knocking bricks out, measuring and cutting bits of wood. This should mean the tradesman is able to spend more time on the craft, rather than the menial things.

I'd be cross if I requested no apprentice's and one turned up but then I would go and speak to their boss and say "I thought we had an agreement, can he please leave?"

If he cuts a piece of oak too short and it cannot be used anywhere - then you should ask to deduct the cost of it from your bill.

If you notice a join you're unhappy with you should ask for it to be redone. I really can't see the harm. Even the best tradesman will make an error or two and it's your responsibility to check everything over before you pay.

aliasojo

MaggieBaking wrote: »

Even the best tradesman will make an error or two and it's your responsibility to check everything over before you pay.

Of course. And I completely accept that no-one in this life is perfect 100% of the time.

I just feel it's wrong for me to employ tradesman A and end up getting some of the work done by tradesman B, iyswim. Especially if I was not aware trademan A was not going to be doing all of the work himself.

I never used to be as focused on this situation, I was much more laid back years ago. Years of 'issues' have tipped the balance.

Hugbubble

aliasojo wrote: »

Of course. And I completely accept that no-one in this life is perfect 100% of the time.

I just feel it's wrong for me to employ tradesman A and end up getting some of the work done by tradesman B, iyswim. Especially if I was not aware trademan A was not going to be doing all of the work himself.

I never used to be as focused on this situation, I was much more laid back years ago. Years of 'issues' have tipped the balance.

But surely you are paying a price for a job to be done. I would have thought it was at the discretion of the tradesman how it gets done. As the other poster said, it is unrealistic to expect the main contractor not to hire junior help to do some of the grunt work.

aliasojo

Hugbubble wrote: »

But surely you are paying a price for a job to be done. I would have thought it was at the discretion of the tradesman how it gets done. As the other poster said, it is unrealistic to expect the main contractor not to hire junior help to do some of the grunt work.

I don't mind the 'grunt work'. It's the junior doing the actual finished article that I'm not too happy about.

I see what you mean about paying a price for the job, rather than the tradesman but if I'm paying tradesman rates (which are obviously much more than an an inexperienced learner would get)then I expect a tradesman to do the job.

I also expect this to be the case if I specify upfront that I only want experienced workers on the job and I don't want trainees or juniors doing any of the finishing.

bobhawke

aliasojo wrote: »

I don't mind the 'grunt work'. It's the junior doing the actual finished article that I'm not too happy about.

I see what you mean about paying a price for the job, rather than the tradesman but if I'm paying tradesman rates (which are obviously much more than an an inexperienced learner would get)then I expect a tradesman to do the job.

I also expect this to be the case if I specify upfront that I only want experienced workers on the job and I don't want trainees or juniors doing any of the finishing.

If the apprentice is doing some of the finished work it is work the tradesmen knows they are capable of doing on their own or they are doing it under direct supervision of the tradesmen in which case it is as good as the tradesmen doing it. They have to learn somewhere, if you don't like it then explicitly tell them you don't want any apprentices there but expect to pay twice the price for another fully qualified tradesmen to do labouring and or expect to pay extra in "moaning old fart added tax"

LargeWrench

If everyone had your attitude how would all the apprentices get trained up? You don't just suddenly become fully trained, everybody has to start from the bottom and work their way up.

baldelectrician

I have an appretice to pay at all times

If I am on site he is there, if he is at college he still has to be paid-so my rate is the same

Look at it this way- my apprentice is now better at many tasks than a lot of tradespeople I have worked with- would you moan if the labour time was decreased by 40% due to his input?

I have had him over a year and he is really good, but he needs to do the work to learn
Today I did a replacement consumer unit and I did this for a fixed price. As he did the work (while I stood within feet of him and supervised) the job took longer. He also did the 'dead tests'

This was a win-win situation as the customer was not charged extra although the job took longer than expected and the apprentice gained valuable experience

I did the final supply connections to the isolator and checked the work, labelled the unit and did the paperwork.

If someone tells me they don't want an apprentice on site I tell them to look for another contractor, as I prefer to pass my skills on to the next generation- if everybody did this then the skills gap would be massive

I understand your quality issues, but quality issues should be addressed anyway- it doesn't matter if the tradesperson or the apprentice did the work you are unhappy with, the tradesperson is responsible

keystone

aliasojo wrote: »

I also expect this to be the case if I specify upfront that I only want experienced workers on the job and I don't want trainees or juniors doing any of the finishing.

So next time you have a problem with your BT landline you'll expect Ian Livingston to turn up in the Openreach van to fix it for you then?

Cheers

nickj_2

aliasojo wrote: »

I also expect this to be the case if I specify upfront that I only want experienced workers on the job and I don't want trainees or juniors doing any of the finishing.

so how do you think the experienced workers got their experience , they didn't just wake up one day and were experienced , no they had to pay their dues , doing all the rubbish jobs and learning their trade

aliasojo

baldelectrician wrote: »

As he did the work (while I stood within feet of him and supervised) the job took longer. He also did the 'dead tests'

I did the final supply connections to the isolator and checked the work, labelled the unit and did the paperwork.

Now if that were the case, I'd be happy with that. My experience (with joiners) has been 'you go do that room and I'll do this one', so the trainee isn't supervised and is left to get on with it.

nickj wrote: »

so how do you think the experienced workers got their experience , they didn't just wake up one day and were experienced , no they had to pay their dues , doing all the rubbish jobs and learning their trade

I do realise that.

I'm just sick to the back teeth of shoddy work done by laid back tradesmen and their trainees. I wouldn't feel the same if I'd only had the odd issue, but it's taken 20 years to find a good set of workmen. We do seem to have a high percentage of those with the laid back approach up here and at least 80% of those issues have been caused by trainees/inexperienced workers.

It wasn't my intention to upset or annoy with my comments. I'm just genuinely fed up with not getting what I pay for....a good quality job done by the person I expected to do it.