What to do? Builder gone AWOL.

[Oigetoffmylawn]

2 years ago this week (March 2021) the builder we contracted to do a kitchen extension broke ground. It was a full start to finish contract. It's been frought with issues throughout but we eventually moved in to it in April 2022, with only a few bits of work to complete including some electrical work and things needed for building regs sign off.

Most of this was finished in October 2022 and the building did a visit and identified only 2 outstanding items: the electrical installation certificate and vents on the extension roof.

We spoke with the builder and he agreed to complete these 2 items by Christmas. We've heard nothing since.

I've emailed, called, text and WhatsApp and it's been totally ignored. We can get the vents done by a third party fairly easily however the electrical installation certificate is much harder. We've tried contacting the electrician directly but he's also blanking us.

We can't get building regs sign off until these are done. WWYD? How would you approach this?

id start going all out on social media for a start .

Our sparky recently said something along the lines that it's illegal for him not to sign something off that he's worked on - in the context of if a builder didn't pay him, could he hold the certificate to ransom. Maybe that's what's happened? I'd pressure the sparky some more if it were me

So I presume you have not paid the full amount yet?

No we haven't. But that doesn't seem to be helping.

We've tried, but he's not answering any calls (withheld or not our numbers) or texts, we have no other contact details for him, he's employed by the building company.

Explain to the building inspector the situation, how you’ve tried to contact the builder; suggest/ask nicely to the inspector if you could do an EICR in leu of the electrical certificate.

We are in a similar situation OP.

We have an outstanding electrical certificate and our builder isn't responding to any communication from us. We paid our final bill and 'poof' he disappeared.

Eventually I managed to get in touch with the electrician who had done all of our work. He works as a subcontractor for the builder, and we didn't choose him or have any communication directly with him before now.

Luckily the electrician has been honest and told me he has been struck off the register of his official body due to having no fixed address due to a divorce.

He was registered when he began the work in Feb 2022, but was struck off in June 2022 and carried on working on our property (and others) until it was finished in November 2022.

The electrician has showed me emails from the builder proving that the builder was fully aware of the situation and told the electrician to just carry on and it would be ok.

So both the builder and electrician share the blame as far as I am concerned.

However, unfortunately according to our building inspector it is our own responsibility to make sure our electrical work can be certified. He accepts that the builder has been reckless but seems powerless to do anything about it, and has been clear that technically it is down to us to sort this.

I have discovered that it is illegal for another electrician to certify someone else's work on a part P certificate, unless they have supervised the work from the beginning. It seems that some electricians do this under the radar but it is risky.

Eventually our building inspector has agreed to allow us to get a full electrical survey done in lieu of a part P certificate. If the survey is ok then he will issue us with a completion certificate.

Our building inspector knows the original electrician and is confident that his work is sound- I think this partly influenced his decision to allow the electrical survey as an alternative option.

I am really angry with our builder. He was expensive but we thought he was reliable and capable but we had countless awful issues which I won't bore you with. Sadly he appears to have removed the 'review' section of his Facebook page so I can't warn anyone else about him.

I hope that helps a bit OP.

You can call another electrician who can sign it off after inspection, we have done this.