Issues with bathroom fitter

powerful_Rogue

Hi,
Just looking to gain some advice from you knowledgeable people.

We got a bathroom fitter around to give us a quote to strip and install a new bathroom. This is what we asked for:

Strip out old bathroom
Plaster walls and ceiling
Lay a granite floor
Install new sink and toilet
Build and install a new bath/shower
Install downlights

This is the bath/shower unit we purchased. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/200881630500

We showed this to the bathroom fitter and also gave him a copy of the instruction manual when he came to give us a quote. He looked through and saw that it required 2 x 13amp plug sockets and he said he would include this in the quote. He said he had built similar units in the past, so that made us sway towards booking him.

This is the quote he sent through to us:

Further to my recent visit I have pleasure in quoting as follows for the fitting of your bathroom.

You will strip out and de-tile the walls of the bathroom.
To fit all new plumbing and wastes to the required positions.
To make good the holes in the floor with new floorboards, and overboard the floor with 9mm plywood.
We will plaster the walls and the ceiling.
We will then allow a few days for the plaster to dry and for you to decorate.
To assemble and fit the new bath and connect to the services.
To tile the floor.
To fit a towel rail and connect to the heating system.
To fit WC and vanity unit and connect to the services.
To fit downlighters in the ceiling and connect to the lighting circuit.
All the Equipment and tiles to be supplied by yourselves as the waste to be cleared from site.

Price £xxxx

Yours faithfully

We agreed the quote and on Monday 23rd July he came round with his team and cleared the bathroom. On the same afternoon the plasterers arrived and plastered the walls and ceiling.

Due to the time it took for the plaster to dry and for us to mist coat and paint it, he then came back with his team on Thursday 3rd July.

Thursday morning the arrived and laid the granite floor, cut the holes in the ceiling for the new lights, installed the sink and toilet and began to build the bath/shower unit.

At about 1715hrs he said that they had sent the wrong screws to construct the very first part of the unit. We said to him that we would pop upto B&Q and get same screws and he said "I wouldnt bother now, were finished for the day. "We'll be back on Monday. As those screws were missing, we'll probably have more problems and may have to charge you extra days"

Before he left, he said that the toilet was leaking and he had to put paper towels down underneath. Said this was a quick fix and would sort it on Monday. He also said he mis calculated one of the ceiling lights and made a hole in the wrong place. He said he would also sort this on Monday.

He also hadnt tiled around this sink, when we mentioned this he said he hadnt brought any of the stuff with him to do this and would do it Monday.

After he left we checked the bathroom and not only was the toilet leaking, when you flushed it, it continued to flush until you took the top of and re-adjusted the stop !!!!.

Anyway, went to B&Q and got the screws and managed to build the part he was having problems with. Infact I didnt stop there, I built the entire unit over the course of two days and had the father in law round to help plumb it in. The FIL also sorted out the issue of the non stop flushing toilet.

The only thing we couldnt do properly was the waste - the way the fitter had put the waste pipe was too high, at too great an angle and would need some of the granite tiles taking for it all to be adjusted.

Fast forward to this morning - fitter turns up and charged an extra £55 for coming out to finish the work. Unfortunately im away for work, left this morning so wasnt able to assist. The missus told him we had been quoted for the bathroom to be fitted - not for a certain amount off days work. Its luckily I actually built the bath and plumbed it in, otherwise he would have charged at least another full days labour.

Im pretty shocked and quite cross by this!There was no way all this work would have been completed in a day. Cant believe he is charging extra on top of what he already quoted.

Ive asked the missus to email him asking for a full breakdown of the quote, ie what each part cost and what the £55 was for this morning.

Ive got a few solutions in mind, however just wondered if anyone knew where we stood.

powerful_Rogue

Heres a few pictures of the finished work.

Wall joining floor





Tiles around sink





Repair to the hole he cut in the wrong place on the new plastered/painted ceiling



Repair to original light fitting



He also forgot to cut down and put the bathroom door back.

Weve sent him an email with the list of defects and also asked for a breakdown in cost of the original quote. Just waiting to hear back.

aggypanthus

Do I read that he worked 2 days?
Yes, it looks very bad.
The electrics werent detailed in the quote..
Yes, B and Q invariably mess up with bits and pieces. Most tradesmen know this!
I dont think you should pay over the quote as it wasnt a daily rate.
Do you want to tell how much he charged?

Why did he go ahead with the floor tiling, if you were unhappy with the wall finish..you state that you painted the walls first so did you complain? Or just paint it!

andyhop

Tiles around sink are shocking, they also look like they have tiled over paint?

9mm plywood on a floor with soft granite is going to end badly, 15mm minimum with a S2 adhesive

powerful_Rogue

aggypanthus wrote: »

Do I read that he worked 2 days?
Yes, it looks very bad.
The electrics werent detailed in the quote..
Yes, B and Q invariably mess up with bits and pieces. Most tradesmen know this!
I dont think you should pay over the quote as it wasnt a daily rate.
Do you want to tell how much he charged?

Why did he go ahead with the floor tiling, if you were unhappy with the wall finish..you state that you painted the walls first so did you complain? Or just paint it!

Thanks for your reply.

Regarding the electrics. When I looked at the manual, it showed the bath to have 2 x 13 amp plugs. Their required to power the lights, radio, whirlpool and steam function. The fitter said he would install 2 x 13 amp sockets that would be complaint with the bathroom.

After he went away and read the manual, it said a 20amp connection was required. He said this would cost extra and we paid £135 for this. It then turned out to be an either/or - either 2 x 13 amp sockets or a 20amp connection.

I believe the 2 x 13 amp sockets would be classed as the "connection to services" in the quite - as without the unit having power, it would be pointless.

We was told it wasnt plastered all the way down to the floor because once the plywood was laid and the granite tiles, it would all tally up - which made sense. So we went ahead and painted being under the impression that once everything was laid, we wouldnt be able to see the imperfections. It wasnt until after the tiles were laid that we ended up with the above result.

He worked 3/4 of a day stripping everything out of the bathroom, then worked 0730hrs till 1730hrs on Thursday installing what I detailed in the original post. They did nip off for an hour whilst the floor was drying to do another job.

andyhop

You can't plaster all the way to the floor. It should have timber skirting or a tiled skirting . Plaster to tile edges will always crack unless the permiter is sealed and tooled with silicone

powerful_Rogue

andyhop wrote: »

You can't plaster all the way to the floor. It should have timber skirting or a tiled skirting . Plaster to tile edges will always crack unless the permiter is sealed and tooled with silicone

We had old skirting in the bathroom and he gave us 2 options:

1 - Remove the skirting and have it all plastered
2 - Remove the skirting and have new skirting installed

When we chose option 1, we wasnt told it would end up looking like it did.

powerful_Rogue

andyhop wrote: »

Tiles around sink are shocking, they also look like they have tiled over paint?

9mm plywood on a floor with soft granite is going to end badly, 15mm minimum with a S2 adhesive

Yes, we mist coated the new plaster and then painted it with a special bathroom paint. As such the new tiles are on the paint - is that a bad thing?

Oh dear, really? When you say end badly, what do you mean?

andyhop

9mm ply is too thin for stone. It could crack and craze. We would always backer board or use 15mm plywood

Tiling on paint is a not great. Tiles are stuck to paint and not plaster. Tiles should have been fixed to primed SBR/Tile primer plastered walls

powerful_Rogue

andyhop wrote: »

9mm ply is too thin for stone. It could crack and craze. We would always backer board or use 15mm plywood

Tiling on paint is a not great. Tiles are stuck to paint and not plaster. Tiles should have been fixed to primed SBR/Tile primer plastered walls

Thanks Andy, really appreciate your help.

Frustrated me even more now, he really seemed to know what he was talking about when we told him we wanted a granite floor. All a bit late now though.

Ruski

Anybody claiming to be able to do all that work in a couple of days is nothing short of a rogue - I'm sorry, but you may have had a hard lesson here - it's fortunate that you and dad have the ability to sort out the stuff.

If £xxx is anything more than £500 then you've been done.
Learn from it, move on and get a recommended fitter to sort out your problems.
Incidentally I would expect new sockets in a bathroom for a whirlpool/steamer to be a Part-P notifiable work. As are the new lights. Is there any extractor fitted - there should be for a complete refurb.
I'm with Andy on the ply floor unfortunately.

Hope you get this sorted.

Don't pay any more money.

HTH
Russ