Is it horrendous having work done at the moment?

[MsAnnFrope]

I keep hearing horror stories about delayed supplies, extortionate prices and unreliable contractors for having work done on the house because of COVID/Brexit.

Is this the case? Has anyone found it noticeably bad having work done? We want our kitchen remodelled, we have a professional design and a couple of quotes but are wondering if we should wait until next year?
I’d be grateful for anyone’s experience of this.

@Sugarandtime a lot of merchants are restricting sales to preexisting trade accounts only. They are basically not wanting to piss off the guaranteed repeat trade for one time sales because they don't have enough supplies to go round.
I would say the quality of the timber available at the moment across the board is not great.

[quote wonkylegs]@Sugarandtime a lot of merchants are restricting sales to preexisting trade accounts only. They are basically not wanting to piss off the guaranteed repeat trade for one time sales because they don't have enough supplies to go round.
I would say the quality of the timber available at the moment across the board is not great. [/quote]
I went to a different timber merchants previously and that one did say that the reason most things showed out of stock online when they had hoards of it when I was standing in their yard was as you say, they were reserved for trades.

The timber merchants that I actually used was the same one as the fencer who I used obtained very good timer from only a week previously.
Everything was available to order by anyone online but they obviously know who has a trade account. Probably explains the negative reviews online.
I certainly won’t used them again which is a shame as I’ve used them many times before with no issues.

We are having a shocker this summer and its only minor stuff. Everything is out of stock and builders don't turn up when they say they will.

We have proper extension work planned next year and are paying out the arse for it to ensure its decent spec and on time. Its a v expensive abd well known builder in our area.

I've ordered a specific induction hob and because of lack of microchips it won't come until February ! but aside from that our renovation has been going ok !

I have just had a kitchen done and it was mainly fine (all done in three weeks including worktop templating) but I had one person coordinating all the other contractors. I wouldn't have liked to have done that myself. There were lots of appliances out of stock - I'd planned to buy Bosch for everything but ended up having to get more expensive Neff and Siemens versions. I would add appliances to my shopping basket online and they would go out of stock as I went to check out - it's crazy. If you've got the space to store, I'd recommend ordering appliances well before the installation is due to start.

Our small utility knockdown and rebuild started in the middle of August. The cupboards won’t be on before November at the earliest as the floor, windows and carpentry all have long waiting times to get a measurer booked and the cupboards then have 11 week lead tjmes.