Impartial dispute resolution advice wanted:

confused_landlord

Hi there,

Just hoping for some impartial advice.

Basically I informed a tradesman that electricity was not reaching the pump in my house. I confirmed a price of £60 for him to ensure that electricity reached the pump. I explained to him that I did not know if the pump was working or not, I just wanted him to make sure electricity could reach the pump.

He went to the house and my tenant phoned me to inform me that miraculously all was working well anyway, and I was happy to pay the tradesman the £60.

Not sure what happened, but I then got a message from the tenant saying that it was no longer working, and the tradesman was working on it. 

Clearly the problem was more complicated than first appeared and so and without discussing with me (despite I was easily reachable on whatsapp) he went ahead and fixed the problem by putting a cable to the nearest bedroom....

He is now charging me £200 for all his work, or he will remove it all and charge me £60 for the investigative work. I was under the impression that we had agreed a flat fee. I don't understand what the £60 is for, if I was the one who told him the electricity was already not reaching the pump...

I just want to know, what is the right thing to do. Do I pay the £200 or insist we stick with the quoted price of £60. 

Thank you

jrrowleyws

Did you actually expect the electrician to do something for £60?  You may get them to tighten a connection perhaps or something else very simple in the callout fee. You're never going to get someone to install new cable and perform associated testing for £60. £60 call out and £140 for fixing it sounds like a good deal to me. 

I wouldn't bother calling that electrician again though. I doubt they would be interested in any repeat business from you!

rabbit_runner

confused_landlord said:

H I confirmed a price of £60 for him to ensure that electricity reached the pump. I explained to him that I did not know if the pump was working or not, I just wanted him to make sure electricity could reach the pump.

I don't understand what the £60 is for, if I was the one who told him the electricity was already not reaching the pump...

There's a little contradiction there. It seems £60 was the callout to investigate. I highly doubt it would be a "fixed fee" for everything.

That said he should have called and asked, but all in all £200 doesn't seem too bad if it fixed the problem and if it took a couple of hours. Maybe its one of those things that may not be worth the hassle of challenging. 

Maybe in future upfront be very clear that you want to be informed if there is any additional work required that requires extra charges above the £X.
To be honest I find tradesmen pretty tricky, there's a lot of bad business practices knocking around, scope change without agreeing etc. But in the scheme of things, maybe take it as a lesson learned. At least if fixed the issue.

rabbit_runner

If you're really concerned, I think you'd be within your right to ask for a breakdown of the fees... labour vs materials and what was done. Then at least you can see if it seems reasonable