My F**king Builder.

[PavlovtheForgetfulCat]

He took all his tools last week, after receiving an agreed additional payment (from the final that we owe him) To clear the loft for the final lot of plastering he said. To be able to gain perspective he said. (he did not do this last time he plastered and there is only remedial plastering to do now up there, the rest is on the stairs, hallway etc). He talked to us about this and that, all nice.

After about 30 mins, I became a bit suspicious, again that he might have done a runner as he took everything apart from a yellow bucket. He took is ladder, why would you do this if you were plastering at height? Anyway, I am naturally suspicious. It is part of my job, it is part of my make-up. DH was a bit worried too, but we put it down to being nervous about this job. And I reminded myself of his reassuring conversation about him completing and DH and I agreed we were being unecessarily suspicious.

He was not coming in monday he said, bank holiday, out with the kids, he said.

This morning, he did not show. Did not answer his mobile. DH and I have been panicking. Eventually at 11am he phones.

And he said:

His younger brother has been rushed to hospital, is critical, collapsed lung (he only has one apparantly) and next 48 hours are critical. it had only just happened. He would try to get his plasterer mate to help him out.

Now. I am very cynical. DH said, initially, he appeared genuine. But DH is a very forgiving person and sees the best in everyone. I don't. DH started to doubt whether this was the truth or a blag. But, we are very nervous about whether this is true or not.

I actually want it to be true, so he that it means he has not done a runner with most of our money and left us in a hellhole. Does not make me a nice person I feel But then I also think he is very elaborate with his stories, has been so far and this smacks of some bullshit.

Either way, this week is dead for any work. and I am getting closer to my due date. And now, calm, chilled relaxed DH is starting to pull his hair out.

Sorry. Half of you probably won't even know what on earth I am banging on about but I needed to vent as I am so annoyed and upset and stressed and fed up it is unreal. I have no space. I am not sleeping as I am sharing with a toddler who talks in her sleep and a DH who is smoking too much and therefore snoring.

thanks for the luck - your dp sounds like a great builder. I shall be calling upon his services if ever we are in your area to live .

They are not here yet. They seem to do a 10-6 ish day which suits us fine, as it gives us a chance to get up, dressed etc before they arrive. However i have been sick and could really do with going back to bed! Not a chance methinks!

Glad to hear all is sounding so much better Pav. Well except for the being sick bit obv! New builder sounds great.

Hey Pav.
Just dropping in to see how you are sickness-wise.

Glad to see your building work is going better. Didn't realise you were having such drastic work done.

kathy nor did i initially Sickness comes and goes these days. Was sick this morning, think it was filter coffee related, but not been sick since - last thursday when the floor issue was raised again, stress and anxiety definitely makes it worse.

Have you had that baby of yours yet? You must have, or be really really due? How are you feeling?

Due yesterday. Arrived a week ago last Monday - birth announcement here
Feeling brilliant.

How long have you got to go?

Ooooooh i missed it! I must go and read and post! I am due in 5 weeks exactly, methinks he will be early though. I am working on 3 weeks as DD was 2 weeks early, and I think my dates at hosp are out by 3 days as well.

He will be early

Nearly there now!

Don't want him earlier than 3 weeks though as he needs a room to sleep in! There is currently no room in ours, what with DH and I, DD, all our furniture, DDs toys, and no room in the spare room, what with old computer cupboard waiting to be sold, old sofa, other junk to be sorted thrown away

Can you dangle him from the ceiling in a Moses basket?

We could turf all our stuff out of one of the drawers and have him sleep in a drawer, that is normal for a second child isn't it?

Yes, perfectly normal
The danger is you actually won't be able to find him under all the clutter. New babies are really really small.

i can hear the builders talking about the workmanship upstairs. The front room door was shut and the cat has just opened it, and I don't think they know I can hear.

They do not know how someone can work this badly and still be in business, he said 'i know i can go on and on and on about faults here, but really this xxx is just unbeleivable, I do not know why he has done this, it does not make sense, and look at this? this is in the wrong place' etc.

.

Go up and talk to them about it. Maybe they'll write you a report on the cr*p workmanship.

i am going to get dh to ask them. I cannot really face it any more. its just so painful to talk about now. Daft eh? I also worry about getting them 'involved' in bad mouthing other builders. Although, in this instance they have a reason to, and it is genuine fault rather than just being critical. But perhaps they will write something for us outlining what they have had to change, and what still needs doing in their op.

Such a shame we cannot afford a surveyor to come around

Could you add the cost of a surveyor to the bill you are suing the man who thinks he is a builder for?

FAB, problem is we don't have the money now to pay for it. We are using what we have to pay the new builder. I i could guarantee the money back, i would find a way to beg/borrow/steal it, but the likelihood is, if we win, he will wind his business up/go bankrupt/declare poverty and we will not actually see the money.

That, and time, as we need this loft fixed right this second, we cannot wait another week, we just cannot, the baby is due in 5 weeks at the outside, (possibly earlier) and there is nowhere for him to go currently, until the work is finished. We cannot delay it any more.

It really makes me mad, as ironically if we had more time, we would have fired him sooner and done the court route to get the money back before continuing with the work, so we had the money there to do the surveyor thing.

It is just an awful situation and I hope he gets what he deserves and you get back what you have lost.

fab - right now, i am less concerned about getting back money, more concerned the loft wont ever be right, not really. We have sort of resigned ourselves to the fact we have been financially stuffed.

BUT...yesterday, i drove past the place where the children were abused in the devon nursery. We almost bought a property close by instead of converting the loft. It would have been DD's local nursery. That put this into perspective, yesterday and i must remind myself of that. Whatever happens re: shite builders, money lost, mistakes made by us/poor decisions...our dd is safe.

We will get over this. A steep steep learning curve here. Life is not always easy.

what i meant by mentioning the nursery, in more context is that we chose to convert instead of move as we would have lost about £10k in equity due to the market. We have lost that anyway and we have kicked ourselves, thinking we could have moved into a house after all. But yesterday, i realised the consequences could have been far worse than this if that makes sense.

Oh God, that hurt. .

Those poor poor children. I can't help thinking the parents shouldn't tell the children if they were abused as they hopefully would be too young to remember.

Pav, am going through a similar situation with my (former) builder (a company). Not the loft conversion people, but others. What's so hilarious is that one of them wrote down my instructions and left it in the house, and then he proceeded to do something else. So, it's going to court. Good.

It is a horrible horrible thing and it makes me feel very tearful when i think about those poor children and the parents in particular who trusted her implicitly with their children. They might never know if/the extent of the abuse.
I think also, it could so easily have been us and that is frightening.

ILMD, oh are you?! Good! I really hope you are successful too. Its very stressful isn't it?

We have plans, which have not been followed properly, even now. Our SE is going to write a report outlining what was not done. The main thing for us - the floor, although it was fixed was done badly, and the problems that spun off the floor were never fixed - skylights too high now, the stairs were butchered to fit, stairs were never moved across as far as they could have been, a skylight was moved without explaining it was integral to the location of the stairs and this means the stairs are nowhere near where they should have been, in turn, the bedroom downstairs is much smaller than plans. And, I do not even think he has a copy of the quote he gave us - he asked us for a copy. He has no brain.

The floating beam - that is harder to know who to blame as I think it is the SEs fault. But luckily due to us having a builder who feels sorry for us, and is very experienced, its not costing much to repair.

definitely play the pregnancy card...

Am actually really looking forward to going to court... I explained absolutely everything to their solicitor, even pointing out that I have it in writing what they should have done, and even their solicitor admits they got it wrong.... Talk about a waste of the court's time!

You will laugh though Pavlov when you are all in the same bed in the loft and wonder why it was so important to get more space as you will probably all live within about 6 inches of each other anyway!

Pavlov - could you post the name of the site with trustworthy builders? That would be so useful!

Best of luck with it all.