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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To be annoyed by invoice

58 replies

wondabar · 11/09/2022 20:34

Old lady in our village offered gardening services on a local site at £20 an hour. She is not a professional gardener but loves gardening and we were happy to use her services to help us make our garden pretty, planting plants and flowers according to soil etc. she came to meet us initially to talk about what we wanted, then came to measure for half an hour or so. She came back with a list of potential plants/ flowers after the summer which was a print out which she took to a number of other houses who are using her (just names of plants etc).
We received an invoice from her today for 10 hours work. AIBU thinking that this is taking the piss? We only bet her for the initial 'seeing if we wanted to take on her services' meeting, one other meeting and she did a tiny bit of measuring and web research. I now don't think I want to use her as she has charged us for hours that she did not mention she was going to work. I just feel that if we use her, she is going to spring all sorts of charges on us without preparing us.

OP posts:
Mosso · 11/09/2022 22:44

Is it for work she will be doing?

daytriptovulcan · 11/09/2022 23:18

This is verging on a scam. No transparency of fees, them bam...an invoice.

hattie43 · 11/09/2022 23:20

I feel your pain , a lady Gardner quoted me £100 to weed a border and when the work was started an hour later she said she had to leave and would be back . This went on several times , starting them having to leave and after all the to ing and fro ing she sent an invoice for £300.

Georgeskitchen · 11/09/2022 23:40

@hattie43 I hope you didn't bloody pay her. Could you recruit a local teenager to do it for 20 quid?

mondaytosunday · 11/09/2022 23:59

Ive just had my garden designed. The woman is not yet professional, but has taken a course that will result in a diploma that involved working on a Chelsea Show garden (they got a silver). She came and we talked about the garden and she said her fee was £1500. This included measuring, producing a CAD drawing, a list of plants specific to my design (with pics snd links to websites), the shed/pergola/tiles/furniture she recommended, and a breakdown of costs (plants, hard landscaping, shed, planters, turf etc), and her planting the garden, her supervision of the work by others , her accompanying me to buy extra plants etc. I'm not sure if she totalled up the hours she worked, but I was paying for her knowledge, not just her time.

MrsDanversGlidesAgain · 12/09/2022 00:03

I deal with paying invoices. Agree with all the people saying itemised invoice with each item costed and what the 10 hours covers. Does she invoice in advance or arrears is another thing you need to clarify.

AchatAVendre · 12/09/2022 00:18

Wow. What a chancer. She's charged you for a quotation. In fact, forget that, you haven't actually received a quotation. She's charged you for pre-contractual negotiations. You don't have a contract. Ask her when you were provided with her written terms of business, so that you could agree to this contract.

I'd also google her name (especially maiden name if she has one) and see if she has form for this sort of scam.

MrsDanversGlidesAgain · 12/09/2022 00:19

AchatAVendre · 12/09/2022 00:18

Wow. What a chancer. She's charged you for a quotation. In fact, forget that, you haven't actually received a quotation. She's charged you for pre-contractual negotiations. You don't have a contract. Ask her when you were provided with her written terms of business, so that you could agree to this contract.

I'd also google her name (especially maiden name if she has one) and see if she has form for this sort of scam.

Also this. She does have business terms, doesn't she?

Tierne · 12/09/2022 00:29

Maybe she is thinking in shillings

Original poster
wondabar · 12/09/2022 00:37

I did ask her for a breakdown and she said she had spent a lot of time researching the plants. This is an invoice that she has given me for the work that she says she has already done. I could have spent 8 hours Googling plants and come up with a great plan, I'm sure. It is a great shame as I thought she was just what we were looking for, but I'm just not prepared to pay her for doing work that wasn't asked of her. She'll probably start guarding for the time she takes to get dressed etc before going to the gardening centre. And she doesn't have professional qualifications. She had a passion for gardening which we appreciated but apparently also a passion for ripping people off and I'm just not wanting to go down that route with her.

OP posts:
SheSaidHummingbird · 12/09/2022 00:42

I'm in the wrong job.

Gingerkittykat · 12/09/2022 00:54

I would ask her for her business details to make sure she is paying her fair share in taxes. I would also be tempted to share your experiences with her the next time she posts on the local FB page.

My neighbour is a gardener with a proper business and he charges £20 an hour.

milkyaqua · 12/09/2022 04:52

She had a passion for gardening which we appreciated but apparently also a passion for ripping people off and I'm just not wanting to go down that route with her.

That's it, really. She is delusional if she thinks that is the way to behave. I am a bit stunned the measuring and rote printout weren't quoted up front as incurring a cost, if that is they way she means to go - but that sort of thing has been done for numerous jobs around my place, measuring and examining, etc, including by gardeners and garden designers, and it was always done to present a quote, and the time involved was not charged for. It is pretty standard to get the lay of the land before establishing the fees and hours that will need to be involved.

tldr: she's 'avin' a larf.

Aubriella · 12/09/2022 07:09

Pay her for 3 hours.

LMBoston · 12/09/2022 07:28

I’ve just completed my first garden design and plant for a client. I’m a knowledgeable amateur, mid-design diploma, and I did it cheaply for him on the understanding he was a Guinea pig!

£12/hr labour (my usual rate for gardening, I think I need to raise this), and I didn’t charge him for the plan I drew up as I needed to do this for my diploma anyway. I potted up loads of my seedlings/cuttings to save him money, too. Every minute I invoiced him for was accounted for — the date and what I did — and the grand total including £100 of purchased shrubs was £311.45.

She is taking the piss! There’s nothing personalised about your “plan” by the sounds of it, and if everyone pays her for this so-called work she’ll be raking it in…. Pun intended 😂

twoandcooplease · 12/09/2022 07:44

She wants you to pay for 8 hours of online research? Is she mad
I don't know how much a Gardner usually charges but at £20 an hour I would expect someone with some plant knowledge that doesn't need to spend 8 hours on google

Cheeky fuckery

OGLittlePickerWithTheMassiveKnickers · 12/09/2022 08:11

I would categorically be disputing this invoice. Invoicing before anyone has signed anything or any actual work has been completed is outrageous.

OGLittlePickerWithTheMassiveKnickers · 12/09/2022 08:13

And agree with @twoandcooplease - eight hours of googling suggests very limited knowledge.

BringBackCoffeeCreams · 12/09/2022 11:55

My garden is a large south facing garden. I know nothing about gardening. It took me 10 seconds on Google, literally 10 seconds, to come up with a shortlist of the best plants for me 8 hours from someone claiming to have some knowledge/experience is beyond taking the piss. She's scamming people.

FlaminNoraPhyllis · 12/09/2022 11:57

I would tell her where to poke that

BakedTattie · 12/09/2022 12:20

No way in hell I’d pay her.

she is taking the absolute piss

MessyBunPersonified · 12/09/2022 12:30

Shes expecting you to reimburse her for the time she spent researching stuff because she has a business that she knows nothing about.

You wouldn't go into a restaurant and be charged an extra £100 because the chef didn't know how to cook your meal properly and needed time to learn.

washingbasketqueen · 12/09/2022 12:41

A real gardener wouldn't need to spend hours researching plants- they would just know it. You can pay her for her lack of knowledge.

EndTheMonacyNow · 12/09/2022 14:24

I can't imagine that's an invoice for the work she has done so far. I'd message and ask.

cstaff · 12/09/2022 14:58

You pay for labour in these types of matters - they are expected to know what they are doing. She is not a researcher or professor. How much actual work did she do. Ridiculous carry on.