Is it a Bad Idea or dodgy to offer a tradesman cash in hand?

[peggotty]

Are thinking of offering someone who has quoted us to lay a patio cash in hand as he has given us a estimate a hundred £'s or so over the very top of what we can afford - is this vv dodgy of us?

yes, mainly because if he messes up it will be hard to prove it was him doing the work and no recourse to recoup the money back/sue for damages etc. It could end up costing you even more in the long run.

Yes, there is that aspect... He has worked for my neighbours a couple of times and always done a good job for them. He might not want to accept ash in hand I suppose. Is it illegal?

cash in hand!! Maybe ash if he was in iceland!!!

HMRC are watching building contractors like hawks nowadays. It is not worth the risk for them to do it any more.

he's a garden services sort of person, not a builder.

It is not legal for you to pay for work by cash no. It is his responsibility to declare it, so if he chooses not to, and he gets caught not declaring it, he will be fined etc.

Sometimes, if they have good regular work, they can fit in a bit of 'cash work' and it might go unnoticed by HMRC as they have steady work that gets declared.

But for me, the issue would not be that, as that is his choice to take that risk. I would have no recourse for any faults. He might be great at his job, but you never know what can go wrong,his fault or not, problems laying it that he did not expect, he might hurt his back half way through the job and be unable to continue, just leave you to it?

it is not illegal i meant to say. it is not illegal.

ok, thanks Pavlov.

(i say this from experience of having a loft conversion go badly wrong, and paying the guy large sums of cash, luckily for me, we kept receipts and made him sign for the money so we have been able to prove payment in court but it was a horrendous experience).

Oh god, yes I remember your thread now! You definately speak from bitter experience!

I pay tradespeople in cash quite often, but only if I know them.
I don't think its dodgy of you (its very common around here) and if you think he is decent and will do a good job then its worth a try.
Its not like he is doing a big building/renovation project for you where there would be big repurcusions if he messes up...

Bad idea for reasons mentioned above, but also you are facilitating tax evasion. We are in a recession and public services are being cut, partly because tax revenues are down. Sorry, but you would be contributing to this.

I've paid people I trust small amounts in cash on occasion - for example, I paid a builder in cash to do an extra job on top of some work he was already doing (slightly weird situation - I felt it was an emergency repair to a listed building, he thought it might count as a renovation and so need permission, and didn't want to have his employer's name on any work that had been done without permission - in fact, I was right and it didn't need permission). As it happened, the work went wrong, and he could have backed out of fixing it, which he didn't - partly no doubt because he knows that we then wouldn't spend any more money with his employer.

I wouldn't pay cash in hand to a random bloke for an entire patio.