Small plumbing job dispute

Yamenja

How long should it take a competent plumber to change the cold water inlet valve for a washing machine, cap off the hot water valve, put the old machine outside and connect up a replacement machine? I'm in dispute with a company that sent a very inexperienced young plumber to carry out 2 simple jobs for me and a 3rd remedial one correcting  errors of a heating installation by the same company. He wasted a lot of time while here and they are trying to charge me for that. 

SaverRate

1 hour + travelling time?

maisie_cat

Lots of trades have a minimum charge for good reason because they are in the business of making a profit.
So regardless of how long something takes in the house they do have to cover travelling time as the opportunity cost of not be able to do more lucrative work.
That is why small jobs like that appear to be disproportionally expensive, and probably why that sort of simple work is so often DIY.

Yamenja

HarryDavies01 said:

1 hour + travelling time?

Thanks, Harry.

Yamenja

maisie_cat said:

Lots of trades have a minimum charge for good reason because they are in the business of making a profit.
So regardless of how long something takes in the house they do have to cover travelling time as the opportunity cost of not be able to do more lucrative work.
That is why small jobs like that appear to be disproportionally expensive, and probably why that sort of simple work is so often DIY.

I was aware of the charges before I requested the work, that's not what I'm disputing, my issue was with the plumber being inexperienced and wasting a lot of time on the phone and shuffling the old machine around, etc. and my being charged for longer than it should have taken.  Essentially he was not given the support he needed from the company. Also the double price for the first half hour seemed harsh as he was also carrying out remedial work that more of the company's young engineers failed to carry out properly when they did a much bigger job for me. They have been unsympathetic throughout, and I only asked them to do the extra work for me because they had to be here anyway and agreed to give me a discount on the new jobs. DIY wasn't an option as even AO's engineer said it needed a qualified plumber because the old valves were seized up (but actually just needed a suitable spanner). 

giraffe69

I'd pay their invoice but deduct a suitable amount for the wasted time and lack of skill and explain why. After all I be they pay a relative beginner less than their best plumber. The trick is making it enough for you to feel better and not enough for them to wish to take action! Of course, if you follow this path you won't be using them again.

Yamenja

giraffe69 said:

I'd pay their invoice but deduct a suitable amount for the wasted time and lack of skill and explain why. After all I be they pay a relative beginner less than their best plumber. The trick is making it enough for you to feel better and not enough for them to wish to take action! Of course, if you follow this path you won't be using them again.

Thanks, Giraffe. I had toyed with this idea and seeing someone else say it is causing it to grow on me!  If they were to take action, I think I might be awarded damages rather than have to pay more, but of course I just want to pay what is fair, rather than be exploited any more by them, and put the whole thing behind me and I was wondering how long the washing machine job would have taken if someone competent had been sent to do it. The assessor I queried it with has always been an unsympathetic character and the company owner outright lied to me in a previous conversation, so not using them again would be no loss on my part.

TELLIT01

You think you might be awarded damages?  On what basis.  The job was done, albeit not as quickly as you thought it should be done.  How long was he on site for, and what was the total bill?

Yamenja

TELLIT01 said:

You think you might be awarded damages?  On what basis.  The job was done, albeit not as quickly as you thought it should be done.  How long was he on site for, and what was the total bill?

The damages would be for the issues relating to the heating installation job they were essentially coming to address when I ordered to the two small extra jobs, I asked them to come and put right pipework that wasnt lagged and which caused loud knocking noises when the radiator in question was used (making it unusable until corrected), but they also misplaced 3 of 6 radiators, and lied to me about work relating to that, and which I didn't demand  was remediated according to my original specifications when the job was first completed ( I dont think my reasons for that are relevant to the current issue unless there was a legal dispute). My question today was simply how long the washing machine swap would normally take.

TELLIT01

With respect, you raised the point about being awarded damaged in your post so it's not unreasonable to ask about it.  As it's not relevant to your current issue it only causes confusion when you include it.

Yamenja

TELLIT01 said:

With respect, you raised the point about being awarded damaged in your post so it's not unreasonable to ask about it.  As it's not relevant to your current issue it only causes confusion when you include it.

I did refer to their previous negligence and the fact that they were primarily there to correct some of those errors, but thanks for your concern and your time, anyway.