Horrible builders!

[diggadoonew]

I posted before under Diggadoo.

Cunty builders cowboy builders made life hell for 6 months. Threatened us, bullied me, etc. Horrible horrible fuckers.

Anyway. We are still sorting out the mess they left us with. All the sub flooring needs to come up that they did, because it's absolutely shit, substandard and can't be tiled over. Our entire shower needs to come out and be redone as it wasn't waterproofed and leaks through the ceiling! Ceiling needs replacing. Loads of latex levelling compound needs pouring because they've made floors different levels. We need to cut into a wall between an en-suite and a bedroom to actually add the sound proofing we paid for. The incredibly rough and awful render needs a lot of repairs, it started coming off in chunks on one corner the first time there was a mild ground frost. They cracked a pipe and set a coffee jar under it and then bundled all my summer bedding into the boiler cupboard to cover it up. There was a weird musty attic smell in my room (where the cupboard is) that I couldn't identify, and then a decent contractor came to remove a wall and pointed out through the ceiling that my floor above was soaked, checked it out and released the boiler overflow had been cracked, some sellotape whacked round it and a coffee jar put there so we wouldn't notice what they'd done. Decent contractor couldn't believe it! All my summer bedding is ruined, some of which was very sentimental (a bedspread I inherited etc) and several floorboards need replacing.

I contacted the only reasonable one of the cunty builders (blocked the other one after he started harassing us) and provided him with photos of that and videos of the shower leaking through, proof it wasn't the drain and was in fact the installation, got three quotes to fix just the shower and pointed out that the company is liable. Mentioned all the other issues and said they need fixing. He claimed that his brother refused to pay the costs for the shower to be installed correctly and that he would have to do it himself out of his own pocket. I said fine, transfer it to me. He promised he would: since then he's ignored and I assume blocked me.

Since we paid our very last 5k payment to them under duress and on a credit card, WIBU to complete a chargeback due to goods and services being faulty and being unable to get satisfaction from the contractor? It's going to cost about the same as the last payment just to fix all of this!

[Movinghouseatlast]

What you need to do is a Section 75 claim with your credit card company NOT a charge back. A charge back can be reversed.

Your credit card provider is jointly and severally liable for the poor workmanship.

Have a look on the Which? website where you will find all the details of what you need to do.

If you have good evidence you need to submit all of it, including all correspondence with the builders and quotes.

Section 75 would refund the entire cost of the job, not just the part you paid on a credit card.

If you are going to do a Section 75 DO NOT start any legal proceedings against the builder as this can mean that the Financial Ombudsman won't look at your case if your credit card provider refuses it.

I am going through this process at the moment with Amex. They have rejected my claim on a technicality and I have just appealed.

[diggadoonew]

@Movinghouseatlast

What you need to do is a Section 75 claim with your credit card company NOT a charge back. A charge back can be reversed.

Your credit card provider is jointly and severally liable for the poor workmanship.

Have a look on the Which? website where you will find all the details of what you need to do.

If you have good evidence you need to submit all of it, including all correspondence with the builders and quotes.

Section 75 would refund the entire cost of the job, not just the part you paid on a credit card.

If you are going to do a Section 75 DO NOT start any legal proceedings against the builder as this can mean that the Financial Ombudsman won't look at your case if your credit card provider refuses it.

I am going through this process at the moment with Amex. They have rejected my claim on a technicality and I have just appealed.

Ours is Amex. The entire job was £60k, but most of that was paid via bank transfer into their business account. After such bad experiences we insisted on paying the final on credit card due to being confident we would need some protection.

Amex has said they'll need to claim back the entire final payment. I have evidence of correspondence, of faulty materials, faulty installation, bad conduct, everything.

I'm actually afraid that they'll come and cause us problems though

[Movinghouseatlast]

Amex will suggest a charge back because they don't lose any money. They just take it from the builder. The builder can then dispute it and the money goes back.


Section 75 Amex stump up.

That's why they are suggesting a charge back. All the advice is to refuse a charge back and insist on Section 75. It has to be for less than £30k though, so you would need 3 quotes for about this amount to put the work right.

[Movinghouseatlast]

Oh and Section 75 covers more than what you paid on the credit card. It covers money you paid by bank transfer. It is part of the Consumer Credit Act.

Please don't let them fob you off with a charge back.

Our builder has threatened us too, not with violence but with destroying our business.

We called the police who went to see him as it was seen as blackmail.

[diggadoonew]

Thank you,

My husband has spoken to them and insisted on section 75. They said they'd claim back the entire amount paid by the Amex card. We paid over 50k by bank transfer. We have to submit evidence to them of poor workmanship.

[HighlandCowbag]

I'd be tempted to look and see if you can hire some kind of adjudicator for this OP, especially as they have done 60k of work, and have them liase and file a report for AMEX. Have a check of your buildings insurance policy and see if you have legal cover for things like this.

[Brahumbug]

Is your Amex a charge card or credit card? Either way I think section 75 protection will fail as the total cost of the work exceeds the £30,000 limit for section 75.

[Bluntness100]

Op. I think you may not be covered. As section 75 is not just for the portion you paid on credit card it’s the whole bill

And it cannot exceed 30k.

However, if maybe you paid say 29k for some of the work.,,and paid the five k on the card 24 k in balance, then you would be covered....

[Bluntness100]

And you’d get all 29k.

[diggadoonew]

We transferred in bits and pieces. It would probably cost us about 25k to put everything right that they did. The rendering is terrible and could really do with being removed and redone. They did this weird key design down the house that we didn't ask for and hate. It doesn't even match up. And they used a scratch render technique when we paid a lot extra for a smooth finish. It's meant to be k rend and it's covered in cracks. There is insulation missing. The shower is abysmal. We have sloping ceilings, improperly capped plumbing, improperly laid tiles etc. Awful!!

[Movinghouseatlast]

Yes- get quotes to put it right and that is your claim.

We got a structural survey which we submitted to Amex. The cost is added to the claim. They will ask you for more evidence if they need it- a 'specialist report'.

An adjudicator is thousands. We looked into all that.