I called a plumber I found online to fix a kitchen sink that wasn’t draining. It was urgent because I have short-term tenants in the house (I’m abroad). He was amenable and fit me in the same day. He told me his price beforehand of 75/hour which is about average for London I suppose, not sure. We both imagined it wouldn’t take more than an hour, but I was prepared for it to take 2. He ended up being there 2 hours and not fixing the problem at all, he couldn’t find any blockage and left after pouring acid down as a last attempt, which did nothing. He replaced some pipework that had been glued shut and this ended up leaking.
I got another plumber who tightened where the leak was (not a big deal) and identified the drainage issue, which is that the pipe is basically horizontal instead of having an incline and after 10 years it’s silted up. He will come back tomorrow to clean the pipe and change the angle.
In the meantime the first plumber has sent me an invoice for the 2 hours at 150 quid, the price we agreed on in advance, but I feel pretty annoyed that he did nothing except cause a minor leak (nothing serious) while the second guy figured out a solution in 10 minutes, and will likely fix it in under 2 hours (and has a lower hourly rate, but I know that is not really relevant). AIBU if I ask the first one to give a bit of a discount? He was nice, I don’t think he’s a cowboy and the tenants confirm he was there working for 2 hours, but he clearly lacks the experience of the other one. Can I reasonably do anything here?