Lousy trades.

[CUSO]

- Do better research on available various trades I did the research, he is qualified for medigas, and does plumbing for Seagate contract, and Parmas Development. Recommended by superintendents of these companies.
- don't ask that friend for any more references I never said the references were from friends.They were colleagues.
- never ever let a minor cost issue get to a point of a claim on clients title That's easy to say, but he would not even consider negotiation. He jumped the gun immediately.
- contractual clarity on issues like travel costs and parts pickup He made it clear that he charges one way, then changed his ways. Do you really think that he would say that he charges 2 ways, and needs 2.5 hours to pick up a p-trap and 2 compression fittings? I expect them to be efficient.
- never allow client involvement in your negotiations with subs, that's why he hired you ​Client was informed, not involved.
- never ever ever advertise or let it be known that There may have been a breakdown in your job management So let them be surprized? I have an honest open book agreement with most of my customers.
- consider seeking trades that you can create a relationship that includes some incentives for them if completed on time within monetary expectations, with a promise of consistent future work They are not puppets, and don'tt need hero cookies. They are supposed to be professionals and know I expect nothing short of excellence. I told him that I need a good, reliable, honest plumber to do installs for quality high end (up to $150,000) kitchens, they are fully aware that it isn't the cheap seats.
- never forget , it takes years to create a reputation of being a competent reliable General, only takes a couple jobs, your fault or not , to cause speculation and doubt in consumers mind, and they always have lots of choices in front of them. All my work and customers are based on referral. I do not advertise.

I'm sure there are lots more that others can offer, or that disagree with my suggestions , but long term , solid, wide spread reputations are earned from jobs that go smooth , and as soon as you say things like ,the client was on your side (but the lien was placed) and the client understood, etc, IMO, the damage has already been done. When he's asked by potential clients how it went , he's gonna say things like , well it went well except for the this and that , that's not a good reference , doesn't matter if it wasn't your fault.

What damage? Both of these customers are on board and understand. I create a close relationship with my customers, they totally trust me, and I have gotten nothing short of their total respect from all of them. If I withold any info, the trust is breached.

It's too bad that you have no idea of what I do, and never will..

... But thanks for your opinions.

 

[LennyR]

What damage? Both of these customers are on board and understand. I create a close relationship with my customers, they totally trust me, and I have gotten nothing short of their total respect from all of them. If I withold any info, the trust is breached.

It's too bad that you have no idea of what I do, and never will..

... But thanks for your opinions.

First to answer your question above, the damage is caused by not maybe this client who probably understands the situation, but to all the potential clients that hear about this, they won't have the benefit of all the info, the only part they'll hear or remember is your clients property was leined over a few dollars, plus, it's easy to tell you're new at this, your loyal client may not be being totally upfront with you about his opinion, he has a personal stake and agenda in this situation. All may not be as it seems.
Whats to to bad is that you think that you're re-inventing the wheel. Some of us have been doing what you do and similar to what you do for years, have enjoyed success and failures, but lucky for you, you already have it all figured out. Well, except for the part about your clients property getting leined for an amount of money you'd probably spend on fuel on a weekend. Sounds to me it was nickel and dime, compared to,the negative impact it had, or will have.
And if you knew all the answers, why'd you ask the original question ?
Client retention and reputation are one of the biggest challenges, especially in any type of contract work, especially if you think you already know it all.
Good luck , it's a tough business.

 

[Pinner]

As a home owner how do I stop a trade from gouging me?

 

[niner]

As a home owner how do I stop a trade from gouging me?

Have a very detailed included/ not included list. Be honest with the trade as the job progresses, don't wait till the last day to bring up issues. If you've had problems with other trades don't treat the new trade with animosity wasn't his fault the last trade wasn't very good.

 

[doorfx]

Well very good info, I am a plumber/gasfitter and also a contractor on many jobs, I also agree with that we can not see what is in the walls, but it is not hard to find a problem and take pics adapter and get in touch with the general and discuss with him what you have found and decide a plan and cost to fix. This is what I always do and have never found a contractor/general that will not except the extra cost to fix or make it right. I have been asked by many to quote the job and also do cost plus. I have only had one problem with a home owner and put a lien on his house and had him track me down and told me he will track me down and kill me, and I felt he probably would, so I walked away from 20g. So now I seldom do many jobs with out tons of research. I also hate to hear of these problems and pisses me off there are people like this still, but agree with that I would never ever let it get to having a lien put onto customers house. You say the customer agree with you, but what do you expect them to say, they really don't want to piss you off and have there house left undone right. From what I have read we are talking about few hundreds not thousands, so yes pay it and will loose more money from not getting anymore work from you or referral either, I wish I was around your area and would do all your work for you, lol the funny thing is if you are good and are honest you would always have work from only a couple contractors to keep very busy. View attachment 197296 Well look at this, I got call to a house as I was referred from another customer, I get there and home owner had a contractor do a complete bathroom Reno and cost home owner 7k plus to give them the bathroom they have always wanted, weeks later the bathroom ceiling downstairs is dripping water and they realized the shower was leaking, so for months they have tried to contact the contractor and guess what, no where to be found, so they stopped using shower and taped up the drain as they had sewer smell coming through, so now they also hoped that nothing else was done wrong, so here we got a contractor that was to cheap to hire a plumber as no way a plumber would have done this, so to fill you in on the big prob is that all showers have a 2inch outlet connection and the pipe you see is a 1 1/2 inch pipe and they realized it was to small in the shower hub so they filled with silicone and spray foam to hope it won't leak, the next problem is there is no P-trap at all. So now sewer gasses are getting into the house, so owner taped up the drain. So my point is that not just some trades are bad out there, but also bad contractors also, so after all your problems or my problems we should never make it the home owners problem. So do your homework and make the customers happy, all I know is once I fix this sort of little problem, I will get referred by so many as tomorrow night they will be happy and using there shower,,,,,, jobs jobs jobs after this fix,,,,,good luck and be honest and fair......
Darren

Darren is currently working on my garage heating. He has been great to deal with !! Very honest and upfront. Thanks Darren !!

 

[mareshow]

What damage? Both of these customers are on board and understand. I create a close relationship with my customers, they totally trust me, and I have gotten nothing short of their total respect from all of them. If I withold any info, the trust is breached.

It's too bad that you have no idea of what I do, and never will..

... But thanks for your opinions.

I think you handled it correctly. Construction, particularly renos can get nasty real quick (like you said the walls have secrets). This kind of upfront honestly is something a lot of my customers (especially out of country ones) really appreciate. Its this type of honesty that sells, people aren't looking for stories or that everything is "fine" they want the truth.

 

[CUSO]

Thanks for the answers,

I thought about this many times, even asked the plumber for a breakdown on what was involved.

He has been known to many on the job site as the "angry plumber"

I am new to the "business" thing, 3.5 years. construction, 25 years. Project management, 10 years.

I still think I encountered a bad apple, and will move on. I just wish this guy, out of the 20 I use yearly would have been more of a communicator and would have told me that he wasn't able to do my job on his timeline... instead of sending me the "fwk-off and go away" invoice. I think I know how that works.....

With an open book, honesty approach, I am only as good as my subs. it's on my shoulders.

 

[puddle]

I'm in the trades and I've seen this before. When business is good and busy, no one really scrutinizes their bills as they know there is always another job. You almost short invoice yourself because the work is plentiful and everyone stays happy. The phone always rings.
When the market gets slow the subcontractors try to bleed you for everything -as they too are hurting.
It is backwards thinking. Now is the time to throw freebies to the contractors as they too are fighting to stay busy.
It always comes around.

 

[Mach1]

Darren is currently working on my garage heating. He has been great to deal with !! Very honest and upfront. Thanks Darren !!

Thanks a lot Merv and I know you will enjoy the outcome, a guess all run business different and what ever they think is the right way, and what works for them is there option, I know what I would and would not do and at the end of the day I will run my business the way I do. Good luck and hope it all works out.

 

[gmac]

Every thing that I hire a contractor for gets F'ed up, it doesn't matter who they are. I have given up and will just live with what I have rather than deal with these low life pos. I work for a large construction company building subdivisions and the a holes that do the work on the new houses are just bums with a pickup, trailer, loud radio that look like idiots, drive 100 mph through the site.

 

[lilduke]

Yeah fawk these loser tradesmen, why can't fabio show up in a limo, work for minimum wage and get things done the second I want. Pos oxygen thieves I tell ya

 

[crow]

It's unfortunate all contractors are painted with the same brush there's lots of good contractors out there that can schedule and keep everything in accordance to the original quote. For me I do everything by email or text and it's black and white I have a record of everything that was said. For me I use the same trades all the time, so before I give the homeowner a schedule I talk to my trades get their schedules and have all my ducks in a row before I present to the homeowner, but ultimately at the end of the day it's my responsibility to make sure it gets done for the quote that I gave them no matter what the cost.

There's lots of guys out there and industry is very big but it becomes very small when you got a bad reputation word travels fast

But that being said it's not always the contractor's fault there is lots of instances where the homeowners change their minds and try to sneak in different changes and different products that they hadn't picked originally, hence me having everything in emails so there's no discrepancies

 

[gates559]

Every thing that I hire a contractor for gets F'ed up, it doesn't matter who they are. I have given up and will just live with what I have rather than deal with these low life pos. I work for a large construction company building subdivisions and the a holes that do the work on the new houses are just bums with a pickup, trailer, loud radio that look like idiots, drive 100 mph through the site.

Maybe you should start working for yourself and show everyone how it's done.

 

[gmac]

I'm a hd mechanic and it's done right every time, and I still have to sort out other guys mess and fu&k ups.
It's like a guy throws a ladder on a pick up and he's some sort of trade.

 

[rzrgade]

To turn him loose after one job was the mistake here ...
it takes longer than one job to build a working / trusted relationship . He hooked you on the first one .... And the OP bit .
Takes along time to trust your name out there ... with 2 or 3 jobs that is a huge risk to put your name on the line after the first job . Should of been one small job at a time untill he is proven to be credible .
poor mamagement decisions ... Here

 

[CUSO]

HUH? Not sure what point you are making..

I tried out a new plumber, he was great on the first job, he had good recommendations, Second and third were disasters.

Apparently he took on too much work and couldn't say no. Instead, he "stuck it to me. He said it could take 6 hours to hang a pedestal sink...LOL

He did one job at a time, and they weren't really big ones. He submitted both invoices at once. They were a few days apart.

Update:

Owner # 1 appreciated my efforts, She just agreed to pay and told me to tell him to fawk off.

Owner# 2 Wasn't happy about it, I originally couldn't get ahold of them, because they were in Europe for 3 weeks. When they returned, I showed them all my correspondence and explained it all. That decided to deal with him themselves.
They were on my side totally, and since their son is a lawyer, they asked me what I thought was a fair number to propose. They offered a halfway point from my proposal, he refused, and said he would accept nothing short of full payment. They left the ball in his court.
The angry plumber has 180 days to take it to court.. I even said it would be a waste to go and argue for the amount, to waste a half of a day on this, but they want to do this on principle. Good for them..

Should be interesting to see what happens, it is almost entertaining.

To turn him loose after one job was the mistake here ...
it takes longer than one job to build a working / trusted relationship . He hooked you on the first one .... And the OP bit .
Takes along time to trust your name out there ... with 2 or 3 jobs that is a huge risk to put your name on the line after the first job . Should of been one small job at a time untill he is proven to be credible .
poor mamagement decisions ... Here

 

[Cyle]

That's awesome they don't want to put up with it and got a lawyer in the family. He could avoid lawyer costs and sue in small claims, or court of queen's bench himself, but if the lawyer knows his stuff it won't work out too well. Either way he's a idiot for not being willing to negotiate. The cost/hassle of going to court even if he does it himself isn't worth it at all. If he goes the lawyer route, it would cost him more then he is owed if it's only a few thousand.