Contractor lying to me about price of materials

[Stouffer123]

Is it normal practice for contractors to lie about the price of materials? I’ve got a contractor putting up some fencing for me, it’s costing a large amount in total. The agreement was I would buy the materials and get them delivered to me and then I would ‘own them’. He ordered the materials through his trade account and he gave me the price but when I rang up the merchant to pay, the price was significantly lower (about £300). I queried this with him and he said it was an ‘error’ but when I rang the merchant back they told me it was a trade discount. I wasn’t aware of this so feel a bit silly. I just paid it because I didn’t want to cause a fuss, but am I being unreasonable to feel that he lied to me about the price? Is it normal for contractors to do this or is it normal for them to pass the saving onto you. Just want to know if I’m being taken for a ride.

Sounds to me like you could have paid the lower price. Sounds like you talked your way out of the discount he'd set up.

This

She’s paid the price he told her.

Making up numbers:

He said it’s £800 for materials and she agreed.
She phoned up to pay and was told it’s £500.
She queried with the builder and he said merchant was wrong, it’s £800.
She phoned merchant back up who said ‘I was wrong, it’s £800.
She paid the £800 that was agreed upfront.

No no no. If he wanted to add extra for his time or whatever this should be included in the total price. He's trying to extort extra money from you and its not on. Get him told.

Need more info though... does his total price include the extra 300 or what is the deal

Yes, this is the only thing that would make sense?

is this what happened OP?

in which case he has done nothing wrong, the merchants quoted you trade price in error which you are not entitled to.
presumably if you had tried to go ahead and pay the lower price they quoted you, the mistake would have become apparent anyway because they would have asked for details and realised you aren’t a trade account holder!

If you think he's avoiding paying tax report him to HMRC.

Did you ask him if you could supply or did he ask to order? I know he asked you to go through trade account. I only ask because if you said you wanted to provide materials it then he is loosing out on his profit which I can understand it going into his trade account but if he insisted you buy then seems cheeky

I work in construction but for commercial and I would expect that there was a min 15% mark up on materials as it’s one area they can make money. Those offering trade discount on I expect the discount is hidden in other ways such as a slightly higher quote for labour.

if he’s given you the info to call up and pay, it’s hardly deception, just an error. Did he ask you to pay him directly and you chose to call the merchant?

It varies between tradesmen really. Some of our builders let us use their trade account with the discount which is great. I think though it’s common practice for materials costs appearing on invoices to have had a margin added (for procurement I suppose) but there have been times when prices are so inflated I ask for receipts…. which can be awkward when they don’t want to provide them. Then there’s the tradesmen who just flat out lie about materials costs or use your job to kit themselves out with supplies for the next 6 jobs and don’t expect you to notice the excessive amount of supplies they are proposing to use.
I think in your position you just needed to check the price of the materials against what you could pay elsewhere and decide if it was the best place to buy. If you’re paying I’d def want a receipt/invoice from the supplier and if they can’t provide that I’d cancel the order.

The way trade accounts work is that there is retail price, open to the general public.

trade discount is applied to trades people who set up an account and are more likely to do repeat business.

the benefit to the company selling the materials is repeat business. The benefit to the trades people is that they make a bit extra on the materials ordered without the customer (you in this case) being charge more than the standard retail price open to the public.

the bit where there was confusion, is that some trades people don’t “keep” the difference between the retail and trade price and instead use this as a USP to provide lower prices to customers for materials. Other trades people will keep it and won’t pass it along, but there is nothing to say they have to pass along the discount, so nothing dodgy is happening.

It sounds like company selling the materials incorrectly thought that this particular trades person was happy for the discount to be passed along to you because as I’ve said it’s a mixed bag as to how trades people use/pass on their discount.

but it is highly unlikely you will have been charged more than retail price. It’s a bit confusing system if you’re not familiar with it but it is extremely common and not at all a swindle.

hope this helps!

Could you have got it cheaper elsewhere? I think that’s the bottom line. If it had cost me more to get him a discount I’d be annoyed

My husband is a builder. He mainly does commercial work, when he does smaller jobs or residential, the amount of questions he gets about how he calculates cost, what a day rate is, wanting discount if he completes the job early - he’s given them a price for the job to be done and an estimate of the time it will take, if he finishes it sooner they want a discount for the day they believe they’ve paid for….just endless. It’s good to be sensible and ask the right questions but the way people behave with builders they wouldn’t dream of with other goods and services.

This is exactly correct plus when you purchase the materials and sell them back on to the customer there can be a vat added on to this . There was no need for the contractor to lie in this instance when he was pulled up on it he should have explained however my one concern is he wasn't the one paying for the goods, op was so in this instance op needed to be charged the correct price because payment came directly from from the customer.

The builder won’t get ‘credit’ added to his trade account, so he actually hasn’t benefited from you paying directly - that’s not how it works!

He didn't stop you doing anything. He advised and you accepted it.

Sorry but the fencer is just making a profit which is whole point in him being a fencer for a living. Absolutely no successful business does things at cost otherwise that’s called a favour not a job.
Every single thing we do as business incurs a profit margin otherwise we don’t do it. We’re in it to make a living not to do favours. Sorry but you are being unreasonable.

When you are finally finished and you don't need him again, tell him oh you know the £300 materials quibble, well that cost you a 20k job. ! But it is what it is....
He will fume for ages ...

Seems cheeky to me. And to all the people on here saying well it takes time to do the order etc etc, this is why trades justify charging so much for their hourly rates. I get it they are self employed so need to add on a bit to cover sick leave and annual leave and background admin and insurance but not 300% over and above a decent 50k/year wage rate surely 😂. Maybe I have a skewed view becaise my pay hasn't gone up in years. I'm genuinely considering sacking off my career to become a tradesperson because it currently seems like it's in demand. I've learnt the hard way from struggling to find any available tradespeople and then getting eye watering quotes! I've been surprised at my abilities tbh when I've had to do things myself and now only use trades if you need a qualification

I think it’s the lack of transparency that is the issue here, and that’s fair enough.

It’s my only issue, but people seem to be missing the point.

So if you had just paid the£300 less figure you would have got his trade discount??
My partner is a plumber and he would just give his details for you to order but if you queried it with the company they'll charge you full price.
Unless I'm wrong you are just costing yourself extra nothing to do with the fencer.
To people who say he will kick himself if he loses the job, he won't as most areas right now the trade can pick and choose...

Has he lied though, or just made a genuine mistake and given you the trade price instead of the RRP? In many trades (particularly where hourly labour rates are undervalued by consumers), it is standard for suppliers to buy at the trade price and sell to their customers for the RRP. I think it was unreasonable to expect to be able to buy things as a consumer and get a trade discount, but you've said it's the lack of transparency that bothers you. I wouldn't expect a tradesperson to tell me what discount they get; nor would I expect them to pass it on to me, so that bit in and of itself is not odd. What I find strange is the fact you are paying the merchant directly and yet the contractor won't let the invoice be issued to you. I don't understand what benefit he gets from this.

Also, I may be wrong, but reading between the lines, it sounds like there may have been a potential issue over the supply of materials - it generally does you no favours in terms of shopping around for materials yourself and, depending on what it is, I can see why a tradesperson may not want to work with whatever you supply (it's a total pain in the arse if customers want to source their own materials, as they inevitably give you stuff that is completely inappropriate for the job, regardless of instructions you may have given them).

How exactly do you think his trade account works? He’s gained nothing .. the merchant doesn’t give him your ‘extra’ £300 🤷‍♀️

I assume you mean he's told you a price in total say £1000. The materials you paid for were £300 (you expected to pay £600) but he still wants £700 balance because that's the price he quoted in total. So you know he's just made £300 thro if b not giving you the discounted price.

That's pretty shitty but if you agreed to the total price you can't really now expect to pay less. In future you do shop around before you agree to buy materials from where they want you to.

My experience of this has been that I've had the discount on this situation. At Howdens the builder was getting 40% discount which was on the quote from Howdens and I was going to pay them direct. When we got the garden done last year, I was quoted a total for the job, I then had to pay the builders merchant directly and the skip on delivery, the balance was then paid for the labour/job.