Take a builder to court?

Cliveclive13

Hello all again

Thank you for the various replies.

AdrianC wrote: »

That is not going to help you one bit if you do take the legal route. As soon as the builder stands up and says "But NHBC say this is to standard, and here's their confirmation", that's it. Case over.

3) If this is a pipe in your flat, rather than part of the building's shared infrastructure, then get it fixed yourself.

The piping is in boxing in our flat but services other flats, so I believe is part of the communal building i.e. not work we can just have done ourselves. It's a soil pipe.

eddddy wrote: »

So...

• presumably you have a two year builder's warranty, and you are trying to claim under this warranty, but...

• the builder and NHBC are saying there is no problem, and/or the problem is outside the scope of the warranty

If you want to persue this, I would do the following...

• Instruct an RICS accredited buildings surveyor to investigate the problem.

• If the surveyor agrees there is a problem which should be covered by the warranty, forward a copy of the surveyor's report to the builder

• If the builder disagrees with the surveyor's report and still refuses to fix the problem, you'll need to think about paying another builder to fix the problem, and claiming the cost back from the original builder. Probably in the small claims court and using the surveyor's report as evidence.

Thank you for this - this is helpful.

AnotherJoe wrote: »

I had a similar problem though not noise related where NHBC said ut was up to standard and I had to push very hard to get them to change their minds. So I woudl focus on that. My experience was that NHBC seemed to be more an organisation for builders than consumers.

How did you get them to come out again? The letter I've received (which matches the guidance in the leaflet) suggests that arbitration is the next step if we disagree with the findings and that they suggest you get legal advice before proceeding with that.