Just go online to money civil claims. It's basically the small claims court ...MUCH cheaper than a solicitor or lawyer and by what you have said ..the judge will come to help s/her decision in minutes!

Just go online to money civil claims. It's basically the small claims court ...MUCH cheaper than a solicitor or lawyer and by what you have said ..the judge will come to help s/her decision in minutes!

Hi Movingsouth, we didn't get anyone professionally to review the basement waterproofing - we had water seeping through the walls and the floors from day one of moving in, so it was fairly obvious and difficult for our builders to deny!

Libs, I'm sorry to hear about your experiences too.  There is nothing more frustrating than being left with substandard work and having to deal with it, especially after having invested so much money and emotion into your home....and especially in your case where your builder couldn't even be pursued.  How did you get the work fixed in the end?

We thought of commissioning an independent surveryor to review our building company's work but didn't as we were pretty skint on cash after our project...in retrospect, I wish we did!  We just relied on our builders to do a decent job because they are a big company and prominent in SW London, but I suppose there is a lesson in all of this!

Dudette, thank you also for your post.  We withheld a small sum for after snagging but it wasn't enough to cover for all of the problems that surfaced.  I hear what you are saying about naming and shaming - let me see what resolutions/court action comes from this and I will think about it!

I hope your efforts are more successful than mine. We paid a local builder, Rob Corkum,to do quite an extensive project for us. Upon completion it became apparent that there were issues with it. He refused to address them so our insurance company commissioned an independent survey of his work. The resulting report was damning, his work was clearly defective. We would have been able to pursue a legal claim against him but he had dissolved his company.

[quote=LLS post_id=223852 time=1530180278 user_id=47658]
Hi IrenaP, that's a very insightful question. We initially had a good relationship with our builders and even recommended them to our friends (we had some frustrations during the project and there were delays but I thought this was part and parcel of a building project).

Problems began once we paid the final bill and moved into the house. A LOT of things went wrong within weeks of moving in - faulty pipeworks led to flooding in the kitchen and basement, the waterproof membrane in the basement walls was not installed properly and the water leaked through the walls and damaged our wooden floors, the bathroom shower flooded because the angle of the tiling meant that the water flowed away from the drain rather than towards it, our boiler failed on New Year's eve (we could've just been unlucky here but the builders were annoyed that I called them about it over the holidays...we have young children and need heat and hot water in the middle of winter. In the end, we were just desperate and called an emergency plumber), our man hole covers started rusting and staining the tiled flooring, the toilet pipework began leaking, spot lights in our bedroom would just fall out, our PIR lights stopped working... I mean the list goes on. We felt that a lot of the works were done to a substandard level and it took several phone calls, emails and texts just to get a response. And whilst they did eventually fix some of these problems, the builders said most of these were "maintenance" problems and not covered by our six year guarantee, and that we would have to pay them to get these fixed. It made me wonder whether they carelessly did a substandard job and just thought they could charge us more when it came time to fix them. And for some of these problems, we just paid local tradesmen to get them fixed either because of the urgency of the problem or because we couldn't face having to spend weeks/months chasing our builders.

It's helpful to hear from someone in the industry and thank you for asking your builder. Our builders can't get the light bulbs replaced without carving them out of the ceiling and recaulking (as I am told) and redecorating the ceiling either. I wrote them a letter of complaint and they have now responded, refusing to replace/repair the lights (because they see nothing wrong with the way they installed them) and have accused ME of bullying them because my letter said if we can't come to an agreement, we would have no recourse but to take legal action. You're right that these are just bathroom lights but I suppose they are the straw that breaks the camel's back!

If you have any advice from the point of view of someone in the industry, please do let me know! I'm not sure what other options I have now other than filing a claim.
[/quote]

You paid the final bill before you moved in? The usual thing is to withhold the final payment for six months or so, so you can get all the snagging done. Otherwise they’re not interested in fixing anything. I think you should definitely consider the small claims court and naming and shaming would also be helpful.

LLS, who did you have investigate and opine on the waterproofing installation to the basement? I'm looking for someone to do same with mine.

I hope you get a resolution from legal action.

If that fails, I would recommend replying with the name of the company, so that it will be a negative reference / warning for those considering using them. In this day and age, most people will google a company before spending £££ with them.

Are the builders signed up to any ombudsmen or associations (like the Federation of Master Builders)? Might be worth complaining to any associations they're signed up with, to see if you could put pressure that way.

Thank you so much everyone. Three electricians have now confirmed the problem - that our builders couldn't have been bothered to make the right sized holes for the spot lights (the holes are too big which is why our builders caulked in the spot lights, making them impossible to remove when trying to change a light bulb!).
I'm so grateful for all the support and advice from everyone. I was initially unsure about the process, but I've given this a LOT of thought and the more I think about it, the more I agree that this is a disgrace. Not just the problems with the house, but more so the way this building company has responded (or hasn't responded!)...ignoring us, denying all responsibility, trying to get us to pay them to fix their shoddy work, and accusing us of bullying them. I think if they had simply responded and fixed the problems within a reasonable timeframe, I wouldn't even be complaining with all the things that went wrong with the build. It's the lack of professionalism and integrity that is infuriating! We've given them two weeks now to come to a sensible agreement and they are outright refusing to repair the lights. I would much rather this just get resolved but I agree small claims court might be the only answer - it's time to get taken seriously.

Small claims court.

Easy to do yourself and makes them sit up and take notice.

Hi LLS, let me give some thought to this. I will get back to you.

Oh, and try to get three quotes to fix the work before you go ahead because if you only have one quote the original builders may try to argue you could have got it done more cheaply!

Before you let an electrician do any work to repair this make sure you have an appropriate report in writing that you can use as evidence in court. Unfortunately, just getting a builder or electrician out to give you a verbal opinion is no good. Most will run a mile if you then ask them to provide any sort of witness statement on the inadequacies of the previous work and once you have had it fixed you cannot later get anyone to report on the faults!

Some electricians are able to do official inspection reports (e.g. NICEIC registered electricians who can do a Period Inspection Report) which may be worth getting done for a start, partly for your own peace of mind. You may have to consider some sort of report from a surveyor as well to cover other building defects. Unfortunately all these things mean up front expenditure before you even know how big the problems are but you would then claim these costs back as part of your court case if the report (s) confirm the builder has carried out defective work. You are right to have written to them first as you need to give them a chance to sort out the problems before you arrange for anyone else to do the work and start court proceedings.

The list of problems you are describing makes this building company sound like an absolute disgrace. I hope you get it sorted.

Best thing you can do is privately act as a negative reference whenever you see your builder mentioned, and also send the issues you've had to other builders to help them win business away from yours... that's what I'm going to do.

Hi IrenaP, that's a very insightful question. We initially had a good relationship with our builders and even recommended them to our friends (we had some frustrations during the project and there were delays but I thought this was part and parcel of a building project).

Problems began once we paid the final bill and moved into the house. A LOT of things went wrong within weeks of moving in - faulty pipeworks led to flooding in the kitchen and basement, the waterproof membrane in the basement walls was not installed properly and the water leaked through the walls and damaged our wooden floors, the bathroom shower flooded because the angle of the tiling meant that the water flowed away from the drain rather than towards it, our boiler failed on New Year's eve (we could've just been unlucky here but the builders were annoyed that I called them about it over the holidays...we have young children and need heat and hot water in the middle of winter. In the end, we were just desperate and called an emergency plumber), our man hole covers started rusting and staining the tiled flooring, the toilet pipework began leaking, spot lights in our bedroom would just fall out, our PIR lights stopped working... I mean the list goes on. We felt that a lot of the works were done to a substandard level and it took several phone calls, emails and texts just to get a response. And whilst they did eventually fix some of these problems, the builders said most of these were "maintenance" problems and not covered by our six year guarantee, and that we would have to pay them to get these fixed. It made me wonder whether they carelessly did a substandard job and just thought they could charge us more when it came time to fix them. And for some of these problems, we just paid local tradesmen to get them fixed either because of the urgency of the problem or because we couldn't face having to spend weeks/months chasing our builders.

It's helpful to hear from someone in the industry and thank you for asking your builder. Our builders can't get the light bulbs replaced without carving them out of the ceiling and recaulking (as I am told) and redecorating the ceiling either. I wrote them a letter of complaint and they have now responded, refusing to replace/repair the lights (because they see nothing wrong with the way they installed them) and have accused ME of bullying them because my letter said if we can't come to an agreement, we would have no recourse but to take legal action. You're right that these are just bathroom lights but I suppose they are the straw that breaks the camel's back!

If you have any advice from the point of view of someone in the industry, please do let me know! I'm not sure what other options I have now other than filing a claim.

I have asked my builder about this. He said that the fittings are probably a little fiddly given when they were installed and the type. He seemed to think this was a common issue. However he said that any decent builder would come back to show you how to do it. UNLESS they thought you were being difficult. Did you have a poor relationship with your builder before this? I know this is a strange answer but being in the industry myself I think there is some give and take in reality unlike other industries and perhaps a different approach is worth taking before you go to court about a lightbulb.