Hired a gardener to work on our large garden which was not in a good state. We agreed it would be a two day job. At the end of the first day he took several car loads of garden waste to the recycling centre. All fine.
On Day 2 he said the work was lot more than he first realised and I agreed to pay a bit more than initially agreed as it fairness I could see it was a lot of work.
End of Day 2 and he said the recycling centre was closed due to his late finish so he would be back at 10am today to take that day’s waste away. He was an extremely pleasant, hardworking man but I honesty had the feeling as he drove away that I would never see him again. I had paid in full via bank transfer as he was finishing up, before he told me he would have to return to get the waste. If I had retained some of the money he’d be back but I doubt it now he’s been fully paid.
Lo and behold today he messaged to say he would be over this afternoon instead of 10am and with a friend to help as he is unwell. No sign of him so far. Rather than chase I’m resigned to the fact he’s pulled a fast one and am looking up how much it would cost to get someone out to move the remaining waste. DP is fuming, both at the gardener but also my defeatist attitude.
I just don’t have the strength to get upset about it. I hate, hate, hate dealing with trades because they always do this. Behave unprofessionally and lie. I almost expected it. I can see the script, I will chase he will reply sporadically but never return. Why waste my time. I found him on a trade site where you can leave reviews but he only has 5* reviews so I suspect the site does not publish negative reviews as he has apparently been hired 130 times but there are only a dozen reviews, all glowing. AIBU to just cut my losses and find someone else rather than chase this person?