Taking a trader (Ltd co) to Small Claims Court

eve824

Hi,
In 2018 I had some work done to my >60 yr old trailer by an American trailer specialist. I contracted them to repair / weld the partially rotten chassis, replace the axles and hitch to UK spec , replace the floor and replace a couple of exterior panels that were damaged. Total just over £5k incl VAT.

He delivered my trailer as arranged to my storage pitch in November 2018 after completion of the works.

Late last year, we moved the van to a new storage site where we could access it much better (restoration had been on hold until then), and once there we started noticing issues with the work that had been done. It took us a couple of months to investigate in full but essentially he had left us with a totally unsafe trailer. The welding on the axles was appalling and there were huge areas of the existing chassis totally rotted away still, his 'fix' was to weld some small box section to the rotten chassis but that wasn't attached to the axle or the bumper, so was relying on the rotten chassis to hold it all in place. He had made sure to replace a couple of the rear panels underneath so we couldn't see any of it, though.....we had to drill them off to see the work that he hadn't done then covered up. There was also damage to the two replacement panels he had done, clearly done by him as you can tell it was done with the special tool for re-attaching the rivets.
He also lost three of our interior panels and when we contacted him about that he couldn't have cared less and told us we could drive up (80 miles) and sort through the pile of spares he had if we wanted - he couldn't even be bothered to take photos to send over to us so we could see if ours were there. We ended up buying materials and re-fabricating them ourselves.

We set to work correcting the mess that he left us with, and thankfully after a lot of extra hours and help from a family member who is a welder, we now have a safe trailer.
We didn't even consider sending it back for them to correct the works, primarily because there was no way we could trust him again, plus there is no way we could have towed the trailer in the unsafe state it was in, 80 miles to his workshop. It would have had to go on a low loader which would have cost more than the refund we have asked for (below).

We sent him a letter asking for a refund of the amount paid for the chassis welding, damaged replacement panels and the materials for the lost interior panels. Just over £700 which was pretty reasonable I thought considering - we could have asked for a lot more but I wanted to try and sort it amicably. Not asked for a refund for the bad axle welding.  He responded after a chaser and has said we should have brought the trailer back to him to fix, although he probably would have charged us (!!!!). 

Have I ruined my chances of getting anywhere with the small claims court because 1) of the time delay and 2) because I didn't give him an opportunity to rectify?

I want to take him to SCC more for the principal of it all, how anyone can leave someone with such an unsafe trailer is beyond me, and he has dismissed us like it's not even a problem. Also actively tried to cover up where he hadn't done a proper /safe job. I dread to think what could have happen had we not noticed and started using it & towing it all over the country.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

waamo

You have 6 years to make a claim so you are still well within time. It sounds like you gave him one opportunity to correct things is that correct?

If he has had an opportunity to correct the issues and not done so then you have good grounds. 

eve824

waamo - no we didn't give him opportunity to correct the issues. Sorry realise the above is long and wordy so just copied and pasted the relevant part...

"We didn't even consider sending it back for them to correct the works, primarily because there was no way we could trust him again, plus there is no way we could have towed the trailer in the unsafe state it was in, 80 miles to his workshop. It would have had to go on a low loader which would have cost more than the refund we have asked for (below)."

Sandtree

If you didn't give him fair chance to rectify the matter beforehand that doesn't mean you automatically forfeit the case however it can mean that you win the case but he wins the award for costs... so you have to pay for the court fees, his allowable expenses etc - these are relatively minor in the small claims cost - but he still pays you the £X that you claimed.

I'm afraid I couldn't cope with the amount of words in the original post, been up since 3am, how much are you actually suing him for? That will determine the potential maximum costs involved.

eve824

Thanks. It’s not like we just decided not to, there were very serious safety concerns (of which I have photos of) that stopped us returning the trailer to him. 

Actually, we did give him fair chance to rectify part of our claim - find the missing panels. Only £75 of the claim though. 

We are also planning in doing a detailed report to trading standards due to the safety issues. 

It’s just over £700... 

eve824

Well we've reported the issues to trading standards. Still no joy with a refund and so considering our options..

eve824

Can someone please help me. Should we be giving him notice now for the areas that we haven't got around to fixing, before we initiate court proceedings. Where do I stand with the fact we cannot take the trailer back to him at present? Can I request he fixes at my house?

shaun_from_Africa

waamo said:

Why on earth has this been labelled as spam? One solitary report has no effect so I don't get the logic here? 

If it's the return of a certain poster, they used to have multiple ID's so they may end up hitting the spam button a few more times.
Would it worth self reporting your post and in the box where you have to give a reason, write in their that your posts are being targeted and marked as spam maliciously. If the mods are bored, they may well look into who is doing the reporting and do something about it.

waamo

I think you are absolutely spot on Shaun. Tony is back, other people have had the same happen. I'm not that bothered though.

MalMonroe

These two quotes:
"We didn't even consider sending it back for them to correct the works, primarily because there was no way we could trust him again" 
and
"We set to work correcting the mess that he left us with, and thankfully after a lot of extra hours and help from a family member who is a welder, we now have a safe trailer."

 . . .  lead me to believe that you will never get your money back. Firstly because as others have said, you didn't give him a chance to actually rectify anything and secondly you've now had the work completed.  It's a shame that your family member couldn't have just helped out in the first place, you could have paid him/her instead, would have had a good job done and not be in this position. 

Now it's just a case of your word against his. And if you want to take him to court, you'll have to pay to do so. 

I once paid a supposedly qualified workman £1000 (not as much as you but a lot to me) to do some work in my flat. It wasn't satisfactory and I chased him and sent recorded delivery letters and phoned him, but he seemed to have left the country! Nobody could contact him anywhere and I was unable to proceed to court. Much to my dismay I just had to let it go. Never did get it back. And then had to pay more to get the work done properly.

 

Sandtree

waamo said:

waamo said:

If you want to claim for something you have to tell him about it. If you claim for an issue he has no knowledge of then he has an excellent defence. Suggest a reasonable compromise to him. If he declines then go ahead. Such a compromise might be him coming to you or even you engaging someone locally at his expense.

Why on earth has this been labelled as spam? One solitary report has no effect so I don't get the logic here? 

No idea of a "return of a certain poster" but I would wonder if the "this space for hire" has been taken as a serious solicitation and therefore spam