Ripped off by tradesmen

[Watercolorbird]

Can anyone offer any advice on how to deal with what is essentially theft by a tradesmen. All I have is a company name on Facebook. They promote themselves on my local areas Facebook page.

My DH stupidly paid them in full halfway through the job because they asked him to to have a weekend away in a caravan to watch the euros match. They were ripping us off anyway with the price but we’ve struggled so badly for a year trying to get someone to do the work we were desperate. They’ve never returned to finish the job and we’re out of pocket by probably a grand. Now I’m asking for a refund they’re ignoring my messages. I saw a thread a while back explaining about an Act that they’ve violated and you can recoup your money but I can’t find it. Can anyone offer any advice?

I think you can take them to the small claims court. You aren’t alone. It happened to me - a plumber - and has probably happened to half the people on here.

Small claims court.

Do you have any contracts in writing?

Thank you. I have screen shots of a Facebook messenger conversation and an invoice. Do I need to get a lawyer? Will it not cost about as much as I’ve lost anyway? Or will he have to pay my fees? Although I’d rather spend that money on someone’s hard work to help me than his piss up at a caravan for football at our expense.

You need an address to serve a claim to if you issue through the small claims court and to avoid wasting more money in court fees you would need to be able to enforce a judgment- do they have any assets or do you know their bank account details.

We do have his bank account details saved! Will that be enough to track him down?

Get a friend to contact them about a job, get them to go as far as the quote and then get them to send a text asking for the guys address to drop round with payment. See if he gives it out.

Or, is it a ltd company? Look them up. They’ll have an address on companies house.

If it is a company, you can get their address from Companies House. You need to sue the company rather than the individuals.

You don't need to know the legislation and you shouldn't use a lawyer. As this would be a small claim, you will not get your legal costs from them if you win. You can, however, add the court costs to the claim.

The Court dont trace their address for you, you would need to do this yourself, you can hire tracing agents but that would cost you

You need to get the name of defendant 100% correct. If it is a limted company you dont name an individual. You can have Fred Bloggs trading as Bloggs Plumbers

Look at leaflet 321 on the gov.uk website which explains the various ways you can enforce a judgement, if you did successfully take him/them to Court but they still didnt pay up. There are various leaflets on the gov.uk websites which explain the processes. Unfortunately even if you win a court case actually getting the money can be very difficult.

Thanks so much for all your advice. How frustrating. Perhaps it wouldn’t be worth all the stress in that case. So so infuriating though! But a lesson well learned. :(

One last idea which is free, you could contact the Trading Standards Department in your local council. They can give advice and maybe he is already known to them.

You sound like you've given up before youve started, the suggestion above to get someone else to contact them is a good one, you could even set up a second Facebook account and do it yourself

How big a place do you live in? Do you know anyone who's previously interacted with their Facebook page? I bet you could track them down with a little detective work. Did they have a liveried van?

@DreamW3aver No they had a plain white van. I’m not sure what to do even if I did manage to track them down. I can’t force them to get out their phone and go on online banking and do the transfer there and then can I? He’s probably just get back in his van and drive away. I’m also a little scared that they know where we live. If I get aggressive with this they retaliate. I’m also disabled and I’m struggling with work and a baby anyway so I don’t have the energy to embark on a big legal project where I still
can’t enforce the payment even if I did win in court.

Contact citizens advice. They were very helpful for me .