Plumber Has Failed To Return My Front Door Key after almost ten months.

clarity35

My boiler broke down last November and I needed to find a reliable plumber urgently. The owner of my local carpet/tile shop recommended a plumber called Hassan. who was available the following day. I trusted his recommendation and had no reason to doubt his as he had been helpful in the past. 

I had a call from Hassan to say the labour would cost £1,200 plus the cost of a new Valliant boiler which was £1,300. He would arrange the purchase and delivery from a local trader that he worked with. He arrived promptly a day later with two other men and they worked throughout the day.  I was relieved to be able to have warmth again. A couple of days later damp patches appeared on the ceiling of my living room and some water was dripping from a corner. I called him and he arrived the following day and repaired the leak, 

In April this year I had a flood in my kitchen from a pipe leading up to the new boiler. My lovely oak floor boards had become dislodged in the kitchen and the hallway. I called out Pimlico Plumbers who are horrendously expensive but this was an emergency. Pimlico said the floorboards were beyond  salvaging and they spent two days removing the flooring and drying out the floor in the kitchen and hallway. Typical of the cowboys that they are they worked incredibly slowly.  So after two and a half days I told them I had found someone locally to lay the new floorboards.  I was billed for £3,000 I do not know how they justify that figure but I was desperate at the time to get the work done asap. 

The flooring engineer arrived and continued the drying out process and laid some boards which were nowhere near as nice a quality as the previous one which had been damaged. The bill for the two days work including the materials was £3,500. 

One of the Pimlico plumbers informed me that the leak had been caused by a pipe behind the washing machine which was a couple of inches from the boiler, he said the original pipe would have been copper and been strong enough to have never leaked in this way. He put the blame on the plumber who had installed the new boiler.

I also had the problem of  that plumber failing to return my front door key despite many calls he always had an excuse, the key was with one of the other guys, he had flown to his  home country for Christmas etc. 

Do you think I should take this guy to the small claims court for shoddy workmanship and the cost of the repairs following the flooding of  my kitchen? Also should I call 101 and report him for not returning my house key?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. 

pbartlett

You can take him to court for the expenses of rectifying the damage, but the court is likely to ask for an independent professional report that the damage was, in fact, caused by the boiler installation AND that Hassan knew, or should have known, that the pipe he installed was not strong enough for the function it was supposed to perform. It is all about what a reasonable professional should have done. 

Hassan is not going to return your key, so change the locks and add that to the bill.

Before you go through all this it would be wise to make sure he has assets, otherwise even if you do win you won't get anything.

PS: you could claim for the damage on your house insurance of course.

macman

I'd have thought the non-return of your front door key is the least of your problems, but what exactly do you expect the police to do about it? He didn't steal it, you handed over to him of your own volition.
If he was going to use it to burgle your house, I think he'd have done it by now.

JJ_Egan

Might be worth sending him an LBA letter before action/ claim .Pointing out the amounts you are taking him to the small claims court for .

As above regarding the key its a Civil matter nothing to do with the Police .

Norman_Castle

clarity35 said:

In April this year I had a flood in my kitchen from a pipe leading up to the new boiler. My lovely oak floor boards had become dislodged in the kitchen and the hallway. I called out Pimlico Plumbers who are horrendously expensive but this was an emergency. Pimlico said the floorboards were beyond  salvaging and they spent two days removing the flooring and drying out the floor in the kitchen and hallway. Typical of the cowboys that they are they worked incredibly slowly.  So after two and a half days I told them I had found someone locally to lay the new floorboards.  I was billed for £3,000 I do not know how they justify that figure but I was desperate at the time to get the work done asap. 

The flooring engineer arrived and continued the drying out process and laid some boards which were nowhere near as nice a quality as the previous one which had been damaged. The bill for the two days work including the materials was £3,500. 

The emergency was to stop the flooding. Pointless using emergency plumbers to remove a floor.

£3500 for a kitchen and hallway floor seems expensive, more emergency rates?

After 10 months most people would have changed the lock. If you cannot do this yourself get quotes, remember, its not an emergency.

bris

Why didn't you get the home insurance provider involved, this is what you pay them for?

You have a duty to mitigate your losses, that's what insurance is for.

You have gone about this all wrong. No quotes from different tradesmen, just straight to the dearest of them all, you have failed to mitigate the loss at every stage.

Copper pipes fail, plastic pipes fail who knows why it happens, but it's insurable, there I mentioned insurance again use it.

As for holding the installer to blame 5 months down the line, well that wont be easy as it was ok for that time how do you prove you didn't accidently bump it to cause the leak?

macman

Norman_Castle said:

clarity35 said:

In April this year I had a flood in my kitchen from a pipe leading up to the new boiler. My lovely oak floor boards had become dislodged in the kitchen and the hallway. I called out Pimlico Plumbers who are horrendously expensive but this was an emergency. Pimlico said the floorboards were beyond  salvaging and they spent two days removing the flooring and drying out the floor in the kitchen and hallway. Typical of the cowboys that they are they worked incredibly slowly.  So after two and a half days I told them I had found someone locally to lay the new floorboards.  I was billed for £3,000 I do not know how they justify that figure but I was desperate at the time to get the work done asap. 

The flooring engineer arrived and continued the drying out process and laid some boards which were nowhere near as nice a quality as the previous one which had been damaged. The bill for the two days work including the materials was £3,500. 

The emergency was to stop the flooding. Pointless using emergency plumbers to remove a floor.

£3500 for a kitchen and hallway floor seems expensive, more emergency rates?

After 10 months most people would have changed the lock. If you cannot do this yourself get quotes, remember, its not an emergency.

Not with PP charging £120 per hour, or £156 per hour for evening or weekend rates. Easy to run up £1K a day on that basis. Their rates are eye-wateringly high, but completely transparent.
https://www.pimlicoplumbers.com/rates