Joiner damaged carpet

[Fianceechickie]

A joiner hired by our Builder was putting new door on today and has somehow made a bald patch on our lounge carpet (pictured) but is denying it. What would you do? If I can get him to admit it, should I ask to be compensated? Carpet is quite new and wasn't cheap.

You can get carpet repairs (retufting and reweaving) - its not cheap but will save the carpet.

You could threaten court but depends on whether you can be bothered. It's worth just presenting him with the bill and seeing what happens.

Suspicious chisel shaped mark has —definitely— probably been made by the joiner when he fitted the door. But I think the asking for compensation thing is probably why they won’t admit it.

It’s unfortunate but not sure if there is much you can do about it?

Then again I have no legal background and don’t know their policies.

If the joiner was hired by the builder then your person to complain to is the builder as he contracted out the work so has a responsibility that the person he hired does the work correctly (and does not damage your home).

As the joiner is denying causing the damage it makes me wonder if he has Public Liability Insurance.

Thanks all yes @Woobeedoo I wonder that too. It's slightly complicated by the door in question being an extra one we asked the Builder to get for the lounge at our additional expense as it wasn't part of the extension project. He's also cut too much off the bottom at one side so door is ruined as well. This guy has done most of the joinery and there are mistakes all over the show. Am trying not to get stressed about it but it's the end of a very long process and I've had enough.

It’s a small mark, probably not worth worrying about

That definitely looks like a chisel mark to me. They are often used to lever doors up into their frames as you hang them (I'm a carpenter), although obviously care is normally taken not to damage the floor covering! Definitely complain about the damage to the builder as well as providing a snagging list of the other bits you feel are substandard. Accidents happen occasionally, but you should not be the one paying to put this right.

I would be annoyed by that OP, regardless of the size of the mark. Looks like you has a real shoddy workman there. Definitely complain to the builder - why should you have to pay for someone accident or carelessness?

Thanks. The joiner has told the builder it was already like that and he's sticking to that! Reckons it was covered by the old threshold but it wasn't. There's been no threshold there for days while floor went down and it definitely wasn't like that!

You have proof that he is a back workman-just point outcall the other things he has done wrong and tell the builder that he is lying.

My dh is a floor layer. He also cuts down doors if need be. If he had seen that before hand he would have pointed it out to save his own back. If your unhappy with all his work I would do a snag list and present him with that rather than complain in dribs and drabs. He may well see the list and offer to sort the carpet out. I think he needs an overall picture of what your not happy with. Tell the builder also.

That's a mess OP. It's soul destroying when you're trying to improve things and end up with more problems. We had so much of this during a self build project.

I would definitely pursue it via your builder. Send him a pic of it. No one can deny that is a clean scrape and it would have had to be a wide threshold to cover that.

I think the least I would accept is a carpet fitter cutting out the small patch and replacing. It won't be visible as the pile will hide it. Shouldn't be too expensive.

Not all carpets can be joined or patched. Can u ask the shop that supplied the carpet if it's possible ? I'll send a screen shot to my dh see what he says x

Thank you so much everyone! DH saw builder this morning but joiner didn't come. Still not admitting anything. Really quite annoyed. DH pointed out other botches which he's apparently going to sort out. Goodness knows how you sort out a door you've already cut too much off?! I guess I'm going to have to try get a quote for repair if possible and present him with it. By denying it, he's basically calling us liars. Who would damage their own carpet to try and get a few quid off a builder when we've had months of upheaval already?! Doesn't make sense. Its not like it's an old knackered carpet and I'm trying to get a free replacement!

After years of having stuff done, we've come to the conclusion that you have to expect most tradesmen to leave some kind of damage to something else. Of course there are some lovely tradesmen who take a lot of pride, they are just few and far between. It's just not worth the hassle and bad feeling trying to get everything fixed. I can count on one hand the tradesmen that we would recommend to anyone else.

Self build was like a domino run. All the tradesmen blamed each other and in the end, we had to let a lot of things go as we couldn't keep up the fight. We never loved that house because of all the costly mistakes we had no control over.

In your case, I would let the builder do what snagging he can, get the carpet sorted yourself and send him the bill, without high expectations of him paying it. It's very annoying, but really not worth the stress, IME anyway. Good luck OP.