Hi I hope someone has some advice please!
Late last year I got a man in to put in 3 new ariel points and detangle/demistify my TV which was giving me problems (a smart tv that was connected to so many other boxes it took 10 minutes to turn on/wouldn't turn off etc). He solved this by just removing everything that was attached and now I have lost the pause feature. I think even I could have worked out how to do this myself!
I imagined that this was a very simple and straightforward job which would take an hour or two and so didn't ask for a quote... Gave the chap lots of tea and coffee and he looked at other things that I thought might need updating. He arrived at about 8am and left at 4 saying he hadn't enough cable or got his laptop in his van and would come back another day.
Had to nag him to come back - another whole day - no coffees this time as I was starting to think this was ridiculous. Before he left, with him thinking he might mosey on down for another whole day and with only 2 of the three ariel points in place he told me that he was charging me £35 per hour and I nearly had a fit. The hardware was £120 - fair enough. He said if I was in London he'd be charging me £40/hour so felt he was doing me a favour.
Bill came in very quickly for £732. Followed by frequent 'reminders'. Got my daughters boyfriend to call him up and they agreed that I was just some rather stupid woman who had no idea about technology and that maybe he had been a slow worker, and that I should just pay what I think it is worth and he wasn't going to bother writing me out another bill or come back to finish the job or chase me for payment. Also that he had started the work without giving me a quote of how much it was likely to be and I was paying for the time spent investigating if that makes sense.
So I paid him £500 which I think was way too much but wanted to meet somewhere in the middle. Got a new bill for £232 and emailed saying that I had paid what I thought fair and echoed what had been agreed. No response and I thought that it was over...
Today got another bill with 'Overdue' written in red capitals felt tipped all over it.
Don't want to pay it and don't know what I can do about it. I know I was very stupid not to get a quote upfront. Wont do that again. But feel taken advantage of as clearly Im a woman on her own. He was recommended by the electrician who I thought didn't want to do something so piddling but whose bills are very reasonable.
Legally what can I do and what can he do to me? Thanks for any advice.