Contractors not turning up

Son arranged with a landscape gardener to do his garden. Price agreed and date arranged. Son paid around 40% as a deposit….

Doesnt turn up as agreed, backwards and forwards eventually turns up, does a trifling amount of work then doesn’t come back etc. Excuse after excuse etc.

Bottom line is how does does he go about attempting to get his money back?

How long has it been going on ?  My mate struggled for 18 months to find someone that would ’tile’ his patio and do some landscaping. Eventually he got someone.

Depending on the amount (i.e. is it less than £10K), send a “letter before action” recorded delivery, followed by small claims if necessary. The process for that is easy, just stick to the facts and state it as clearly as possible.

See

https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/law-and-courts/legal-system/small-claims/making-a-small-claim/

Cash he has paid is around £3k (against my better judgement!) been going on for around 2 months.

Thanks @multi21

Also, keep it civil, don’t beat about the bush, letter before action is the way to go however, don’t slate them or have a dig on social media until afterwards. It would count as harassing them.

Seems to be a thing with trades / contractors.

Been messed about by roofers, scaffolders, decorator, solar installers.

Quite a few different trades have either not turned up as arranged to quote for work or just never come back with quotes. This seems to be common behaviour from speaking to friends.

We dont chase them any more – if you can’t be bothered to send the quote it doesn’t bode well for you being organised to actually carry out the work.

Thankfully we found some really good roofers after binning the 1st lot and a decent plasterer.

Still searching for a good decorator as the one we’ve tried is rubbish at turning up / telling us he’s not turning up!

I’ve had countless tradies agree to do work and then you never hear from them again. The weird thing is if you find someone decent around here they instantly get a load more work. I’ve got a great roofer working at the moment, when he finishes the scaffolding gets moved to next door. He’s already worked on 5 neighbouring houses plus the six houses that a neighbour owns. Same with a plumber I found, he went from my place to next door and then on to next door’s daughter and so on. I think some people end up ‘self-employed’ because they can’t keep up with commitments and responsibilities. Get a good one and everyone’s happy.

I think he has (or should have by now) given up on him doing the job so really its about getting his money back. My BIL (his uncle) is a barrister so hopefully we can get at least a good “letter before action” drafted and take it from there. He only has a small house their garden is important space for them and their 4 year old plus another on the way in September. Bloke is an absolute arse.

Too late now, but paying upfront is a big no for me, if they want it for materials, either I offer to order it direct and pay the supplier, or I ask why they don’t have a trade account which allows payment in arrears

I’m trying to get people to look at a patio job so far no shows.

At this rate it would be quicker for me to teach myself

I find it hard to believe folk will give a deposit that size so don’t have too much sympathy. I know where has to be a mutual trust but why not £100 then if there is a delivery on site come to an agreement then a bit more to cover some of the cost

Quite a few different trades have either not turned up as arranged to quote for work or just never come back with quotes. This seems to be common behaviour from speaking to friends.

Yep.

Find it quite weird when they come around, spend quite a bit of time here, then no quote! I mean, I get why you may not want the work having been around, but why spend so much time here in the first place?

Agree though, it does make it an easier decision. eg the bloke that fitted our bathroom was so paranoid that we might think he was ‘one of them’, that when he smacked his knee and couldn’t start actually sent us a picture of his knee. He turned out to be (and had been) one of the good ones so I’m sure it was indeed his own injured knee.

I find it hard to believe folk will give a deposit that size so don’t have too much sympathy. I know where has to be a mutual trust but why not £100 then if there is a delivery on site come to an agreement then a bit more to cover some of the cost

I think that’s unfair tbh. If you were buying a car you’d expect to leave a deposit, if you were having something made to order you would as well.

It never ceases to amaze me how much is acceptable as just ‘normal’ with trades – failing to show up for quotes, failure to communicate, failing to provide quotes after a visit, failing to show up for jobs etc. But this is all just accepted by many as just ‘how it works’. It’s crap.
We’ve now got some really valuable trades we use for stuff time and time again. And our friends do as well because word of mouth sells better than anything else. But we now need someone for a small landscaping job and it’s a bloody PITA. No show after no show. Don’t want the job? Fine, just tell us, that’s no bother at all, but any just string us along.

I find it hard to believe folk will give a deposit that size so don’t have too much sympathy. I know where has to be a mutual trust but why not £100 then if there is a delivery on site come to an agreement then a bit more to cover some of the cost

It’s fairly normal for 10% up front to discourage customers from cancelling last minute as trades still need to be paid. I’d never pay 40% (unless covering materials that can’t be reused and never to someone not worked with before) smacks of someone with cash flow issues usually because they don’t have much work in the pipeline so are hand to mouth. Anyone who can start straight away (unless they have a cancellation) is a no go ever.

I find it hard to believe folk will give a deposit that size so don’t have too much sympathy

It wasn’t sympathy I was after it was some practical advice/experience but thanks anyway.

So many contractors/builders get tarred with the same brush as the chancers that are basically crooks ,fraudsters , imposters

Fraud is the most common crime , I never take a deposit from anyone

We take a deposit, unashamedly so. Never had an issue. We’ve been knocked before in the past and as a small business, really struggled to stay afloat.

Theres scummy traders, and scummy customers, unfortunately. Sorry you’ve been caught out by a bad one.