This is going to be long - sorry. Just had our bathroom re-done. Plumber/fitter had done work for three friends. Agreed price verbally and paid a chunk of money for materials. He said when he gave a price that would be the price we would pay. Hit problem on day two when we didn't want to have a false ceiling fitted and stuck to our guns - had already said we didn't want it and painted ceiling prior to work commencing. Seemed that was to avoid him having to cut tiles to fit ceiling curves. Anyway all sorted and some plastering had to be done instead.
We asked him to take one wall back to brick because he started plaster boarding to square it up and it took a ridiculous amount off an already small room. There had been no consultation on this btw and he knew space between bath and shower was already tight.
Anyway, very last job was fitting skirting boards. Piece by the door jutted out by about 1cm. He took a chunk off the door instead of asking what we would like done/trimming the skirting board down properly from the back, which presumably needs a circular saw which I suspect he doesn't have. Waited over a week for it to be fixed except he hasn't fixed it - it's now a different bodge although the door has been repaired. I said how disappointed I was when everything else is looking fantastic and that what he'd done wasn't what we discussed.
Was told he'd done all he was going do on this job. He said he'd bent to my every whim (!) and he wasn't doing anymore. He'd send me his bill and he hung up on me.
He's now texted me a list of additional charges - including for items I thought were included in his quote such as tiling window recesses when fully tiling the room. There were things he was definitely reluctant to do - anything that involved cutting tiles it seemed - but we worked things out and it was amiable. Or so I thought. No mention of any extra charges at all.
He has texted I won't get my keys back until I've paid him. To say I feel threatened is an understatement. I've changed the alarm code, but he knows I'm on my own during the week which is worrying. I feel this is intimidation.
DP has totally backed everything I've thought as the job progressed and we have got what we wanted apart from this bit of bloody skirting. We were going to give him one last chance to put the skirting right or say we were going to deduct the cost of fixing it properly from the balance due to him. But he texted extra charges before I had the opportunity. Now I feel I am dealing with a bully who didn't like being asked to do what the customer wanted instead of what made life easy for him.
I can't get hold of DP, but I guess we can deduct the cost of changing locks from the bill if he holds onto the key. Think I'd want to change them anyway now.
What the hell can we do?