to expect some sort of response from these people?

[Greydog]

Briefly - I want some building work done. Only a porch - not a huge extension - but so far I've had one who promised to do the job, took a deposit, and then couldn't do it (I got my money back after some while) and this last two weeks have contacted 2 more builders, one who hasn't called back, and one who promised to call round today and give me a quote. So, at 10.00 I'm looking out of the window and see the builders van - hooray! Nip into kitchen to put the kettle on - and then - nothing. He just drove by, hasn't called, nothing. If he didn't want the job why did he say he'd come round. Just tell me you don't want the bloody job. Why is it so difficult. Thank you for reading this - I feel better already

How are you finding these builders? Perhaps you could ask around and find someone who has actually had some work done and been satisfied with the result and find out which firm they used. I agree that builders can be very frustrating!

I'd go to ratedpeople.com
You can post the details of the job you want and the quotes will come tonyou, you can check the ratings of the builders etc and pick which you feel is the best.

Thanks, both. I've been browsing the local papers, and have only contacted the ones who said they'd give refs! But I'll look at rated See

We've had major building work done recently. Our first builders turned out to be complete cowboys (we're in the south west but they travelled from Builth Wells - just in case you live there I feel I should warn you about them). Anyway, I definitely wouldn't trust rated people or similar. When I tried to post online reviews of our first builders (who left us with no kitchen or bathroom for 9 months) I found it impossible. Builders pay to be listed on these sites and so the sites don't post anything but positive reviews. Beware.

Just post on your local Facebook pages asking for recommendations.

We have had building and roofing work done recently. They were all nightmares. Quotations that never materialised, appointments not kept, eventually found a builder and the amount of managing they took was ridiculous. Roofer just never turned up to do the job after taking the contract on- fortunately we hadn't paid him in advance- so we had to find another one. Plumber, electrician , plasterer, floorer, decorator- all slightly unreliable in one way or another. They just tell lies when something isn't right. In the end it is all lovely but has been incredibly stressful

I wrote a formal complaint about one bit to the building company and to be fair they did reduce our bill by £1000 and accept fault.

Some builders are right pains in the arse, but then again, so are some clients.
Does your local area have a community Facebook page? If so put a post on up there, most will have business Facebook pages where you can see at least a few bits of their work, there should be reviews, and these reviews can often be followed up( might sound a bit odd, but in the past we've looked at profiles of people who have left reviews, people often have pictures up of the work a builder has done)

Or then again, you can ask a friend who may have had building works done recently, or someone you know, must know someone good?
Ps- best bit of advice I can give you is, if someone can start a job right away without any kind of explanation they won't be very good.
My husband tends to only do work on a subcontract basis for a bigger company- he still gets 5 or 6 offers of extra work from people who just know of him a week. Everyone's rushed off their feet at the moment

Check companies house for complaints prior to quotes. I slipped a note through a door once to see if they recommended their builder.