Tradesman just made me cry

[Fluffyelephant]

I know it’s probably silly to be so upset but I’m really shaken up.

Having a nightmare with our house renovation. People cancelling, not showing up.

Finally had a guy in today (recommended by another tradesman). Long story short I was in the room next to where he was working and could hear him getting angrier and angrier in there: ‘FFS!’ every few minutes and slamming things more and more aggressively.

Eventually heard him say to himself ‘that’s it I’m finished’ and he started moving his tools. I went in, job was about 60% done and he was so angry. Like “I’m finished. Not doing anymore. People effing changing the job. Changing the date. Wasting my time. This b&q stuff you’ve got is shit.” It was so horrible. Then he stormed out. I told my partner what had happened and started crying so my DP ran out to the van outside and I was shouting ‘Don’t! Dont!’ The guy threatens him and then drives away.

Agh. Absolutely horrible. Really shaken up. Just feel like I’m cursed with this renovation. Feel like it was my fault for not making the details of the job clearer.

Not sure what the point of this post is. Just wondering if anyone else has ever experienced similar. And if so how do you keep it together?!

It wouldn't be Mumsnet without the added on drama, hysterics and over-embellishment of a scenario.

Could you find a female painter decorator?

I had a plumber out the other week and the amount of times he said fuck was unbelievable.
Every other word out his mouth was fuck.
Now my 2 year old says fuck.

I wish I had an answer! I’m in the same boat and feel the same way as you do.

On the bright side, it’s just added more confirmation for me that DP is a great man. He was immediately ready to go outside and challenge the man (verbally not physically!) about upsetting me, even though I said not to. And now he’s doing his best to just take control of the situation as he can see how upset I am. He’s been on the phone to various handier friends and family members and wants for him and them to give it a go themselves, and says not to worry anymore about it and he’ll sort it.

I had someone like this too! Who did our boiler, was it someone from boxt ?

OP, you did nothing wrong. I'm shocked at the amount of people that won't believe women, about anything. The amount of internalised misogyny in some of the female posters on here is astounding. Why do women always doubt women and make out that we're lying or exaggerating? This is 2024, for goodness sake.

I did manage to find a femaie plumber recently and she was fab and it felt so different having a woman working in my home. She was also exceptionally good, punctual, hard working, pleasant and charged a reasonable rate. Needless to say I have recommended her to all my friends.

Yeah - my housing officer was a good friend at that time, and she did let on that he had rather a long list of jobs marked 'aggressive dog in property, couldn't complete' that following my 'caught on cam' experience she rather doubted the truth of!

I suspect it was a mix of 'gets me out of work' and 'I am a man and cannot possibly admit I have a phobia'. Who really knows though eh!

I'm a spark, and confess to as we call it in the trades "throwing a few fucks into the job" when things get tricky or frustrating.

I've never walked, but people buying crap from B&Q / Screwfix etc is a bugbear, to the extent that now I'll only work with materials I've agreed the spec on.

Considering he was shouting 'Don't!' as the guy was leaving it's surely likely he was going to reason with him and try to convince him to stay and finish the job?

I expect the red mist descended because the tradesman was aggressive and upset his (female) partner- I'm sorry this isn't a scenario that you can imagine

The poor guy came to fix a leak another plumber had made worse, turns out this guy I had round was more qualified and was thinking of going into business with the first guy that came round as they were mates - I think he felt like he needed to fix the problem. Kept saying what a nice lad the other guy was - which he was - he just made a mess of the fix but he was new.

Sounds like he was in bad mood and then got cranky it wasn’t a 2 minute job. Not your problem, despite the fact he tried make it your problem by not finishing it or tidying up. If he surfaces asking for money then l would tell him to go fuck himself, he needs to sort his bad temper and flouncing out

Not surprised! They are ten times worst when dealing with single women! I never put up with their nonsense!

Relevance? Is that seriously an attempt at justifying this man acting aggressively in the OP's home? Wtf is going on with posters rushing to blame a woman for a man's aggressive behaviour? Jesus.

I find the first few replies a bit odd, but often a couple of posters say something and agreement flows from there.

A man acting like that in my home would absolutely have shaken me up as well OP. The fact that he then threatened your DP demonstrates that he was NOT a good guy. No idea why people are trying to blame you.

There's also a bunch of posters up in arms that your DP ran after the guy. Why not? He presumably wanted to catch him for an explanation before he drove off. He wasn't running after him with a baseball bat. There's absolutely no reasons whatsoever to think that the DP was about to do anything physical at all. And that's all before the OP made that clear.

People are really weird sometimes on here, or maybe they all live with people who throw punches as a greeting. God knows. You got a pile of unhelpful replies here OP, hope you're okay.

My conclusion from this thread is that we need a lot more girls learning trades. If I ever come into a lot of money I'm going to provide grants at my local college purely for girls.

Sorry you had to deal with such a prick OP, the builders we've had have been lovely (probably because I'm good friends with the main man's wife) but car mechanics are another story, I let DH deal with all car stuff now.

And I agree with a pp, marrying someone who is good at DIY and crucially who finishes each job is like winning the lottery.

My husband was threatened by a tradesman last year

We were having some ground work /hardstanding done, and the job was to take four days
We provided all the kit needed, so no financial outlay was needed from the tradesman, just turn up and work

After they left here on day 1 - the guy rang my husband and demanded full pay. This was (obviously) never the agreement, - he started screaming saying he had bills to pay and when we objected he screamed RIGHT IM ON MY FUCKING WAY BACK TO DO YOU THEN. It was terrifying.

We will never use tradesmen again

This. If a tradesman we were due to be paying started swearing, getting physically aggressive within our property (even if it were towards inanimate objects) and then stormed out in an intimidating manner with the job only half done... too right would my partner be out there to confront the individual on their conduct and professionalism too.

My sympathies OP - some tradies are vile aggressive shits. As they are in short supply at the moment, a certain type of bloke feels able to be thoroughly unpleasant and unprofessional. Obviously there are great tradies, but they are very hard to come by at the moment, sadly. I blame Brexit,

some really weird posts on this thread, but then there's this odd sort of reverse-classism on MN at sometimes in relation to tradespeople who are apparently beyond reproach and anyone who expects even basic customer service and professionalism is some sort of out of touch elitist - and before anyone jumps in I've got mechanics/leccies in the family

Yes it must be frustrating when a job is more awkward or time consuming than you'd planned for or been told but isn't that something that happens in EVERY SINGLE JOB EVER?
I know it happens in my boring office job - I don't jump around swearing and then storm off, I just get on with it. Would people think it's perfectly justifiable for a surgeon in the middle of open heart surgery to start swearing and walk off if the operation suddenly got more complicated?

He sounds completely unprofessional and verging on unhinged, and of course it was completely normal for your DP to go out and ask wtf was happening if you've agreed to pay someone to carry out a job and all of a sudden they've stormed out swearing and your partner is standing there crying! It would be weird if you didn't ask what was going on, it doesn't mean he was storming out ready to lamp him one!

I’ll never deal with tradesmen for this exact reason. I let DH get the quote and sort it out.