Advice please on some plumbing work done.

[midas]

Some posters have suggested the plumber was incompetent which leads me on to a broader subject when employing tradespeople or any other professional I guess.
I've learnt over the years from employing tradespeople that although they all may be qualified, the expertise and quality of work can vary dramatically so focusing simply on what somebody may charge per hour can be a red herring.
I had a situation recently where I had to call somebody out for the first time to fix my LPG boiler. A neighbour recommended a long established firm that they had used for years. Two engineers, one the boss of the company, three visits, lots of part changes and about 6 hours of labour couldn't fix it. They were very good about it and didn't charge me.
I ended up going direct to the manufacturer (which I wanted to avoid thinking it would be very expensive). It took the engineer 20 minutes to fix it and he only charged me £35.
Similarly I've had a string of heating engineers service / repair my oil boiler over the years and being the cheapskate that I was used the firm that charged the "best" price for servicing. Both my neighbours recommended a guy but he was charging £100 for a service instead of £75.
The oil pumps on my boiler never seemed to last and it wasn't until I got my neighbours guy round that he explained to me why. I won't go in to detail but the previous guys just didn't get to the root of the problem and simply changed the pump.

So my point is, maybe the guy who worked for my mother wasn't a crook but I strongly feel he wasn't the most competent which ultimately cost my mother a lot more money.

End of rant.

I'm out of here.

Thanks for all who responded.

 

[ServiceNumpty]

Moral of the story - don't do any work on the 'smaller' type jobs that customers think will only take 5 mins as they can and normally bite you on the ass. If you do it in minutes and charge £50 your ripping someone off, if it takes you 4 hours and charge £270 your ripping someone off.

I love my mum but I hate doing work in her house because everything is boxed in, decorated over several times, tonnes of gloss paintwork everywhere, valves that have seized and generally hasn't been changed since the 70's.

So a 30mins tap change could result in a drain down, airlock, cracked sink. But don't worry it's onlyyyyyyyy a tap change. The plumber must be incompetent if he can't do that in 30 mins and only charge £35.

 

[Agile]

I honestly can't believe someone wouldn't know where the stop cock is, or the consumer unit for that matter.

If I rent a holiday cottage I tend to look and see, I also look for smoke alarms and have a think how I'd get out with the kids at night if I heard it.

I would say that over 10% of the homes that I go to have a mortice lock which they always keep locked with a key which is not kept just beside the door in case of fire.

400m away from me here, six people died in Sonya Gardens when a Beko freezer caught fire in the hallway.

The Palestinian father, had locked all the windows in the rented house and locked the back door so that his wife and kids all died of smoke as they were unable to get out or open any windows! That's madness!

There was a smoke alarm, but when people panick, they can make irrational decisions and fail to get out when doors and windows are locked. With a family that size they should have had several smoke alarms and to have practiced evacuation.

Tony

 

[midas]

Moral of the story - don't do any work on the 'smaller' type jobs that customers think will only take 5 mins as they can and normally bite you on the ass. If you do it in minutes and charge £50 your ripping someone off,

I would never ever consider that being ripped off. Yeah so maybe somebody else could do it for £30 but I wouldn't be bothered. I don't expect tradespeople to come to my house for free and only charge me a tenner if it only takes 5 minutes.

 

[Dextraneous]

I don't think anyone objects to paying the going rate if the job is done well. It's when the tradesman messes up and the customer ends up paying for incompetence and unnecessary time wasting that it's objectionable.

 

[Dan Robinson]

And who determines this?


Keyboard warriors on a DIY site?

Taps can be an absolute barsteward of a job. Especially when service valves are hidden and the owner is too ignorant of their own property to point the tradesman in the right direction.

Bunging the tank is usually the solution, btu not every tank can be bunged with what is to hand.

 

[Dextraneous]

Fair enough point Dan. 4 hours to fit a tap does seem a little excessive though, imho, especially for a pro

 

[Dan Robinson]

I agree it is longer than most, but we are no in full possession of the facts. And having changed more than a few sets of taps over the years, I know what problems can occur and just how selective customers can be in their recollection of problems and events.

Have one at the moment where the customer is moaning like stink over the time spent on site dealing with problems.

They are ignoring the fact that all of the problems are caused by a third party and our presence wouldn't be required otherwise. Also that some of the work carried out by us was AGAINST my direct recommendation, and as I had suspected was a waste of time.

For all the belly aching members of the public do about tradesmen, they forget that we see more of them than they see of us and there are far more PITA customers out there than there are dodgy tradesmen.

 

[Dextraneous]

Okey dokey Dan. As you point out, we can only speak in general on here. This means we come to different conclusions based on what we read and our imagination/experience which, in the field of plumbing you have a darn sight more of than me.

Am happy to agree to differ on this one

 

[hazetimesfive]

I quote to change taps so I don't charge by the hour, I don't think a custard would permit me to start without knowing how much it will cost?

not to mention changing a house to mains fed because of an air lock sounds fishy, especially if the hot is still gravity.

 

[Agile]

I don't like so many things go wrong.

But I do it at a fixed price which I quote in advance.

But before I calculate that price, I always ask where the stopcock is and importantly when it was last turned off!

Tony

 

[midas]

I don't like so many things go wrong.

But I do it at a fixed price which I quote in advance.

But before I calculate that price, I always ask where the stopcock is and importantly when it was last turned off!

Tony

Now that's the kind of plumbers we need

 

[FiremanT]

I ended up going direct to the manufacturer (which I wanted to avoid thinking it would be very expensive). It took the engineer 20 minutes to fix it and he only charged me £35.
.

You meant the MANUFACTURER only charged you £35?! Frankly, I don't believe you. Do you actually mean that the engineer cancelled the job and back pocketed £35?

Was the service valve discovered as a result of ripping out timber or cladding in order to change pipes? The point being is that it is by no means certain that service valves exist, and spending an hour to find a non existent one generally winds up the bill payer, so at some point you have to make a decision to get on with the job. Bunging a CWS is sometimes straightforward, and sometimes a bitch. The tank can be in a difficult to access area, and often in a loft with no flooring, the joists being obscured by a foot of insulation. And if the valve that was discovered is a basic 22m off the CWS, then I rarely turn them, unless they are a decent make. Too many break internally, causing further grief and expense. A water system does not "normally" air lock, but it can happen, and is a system fault.

The plumber may or may not be skilled or useless - but there is no way of knowing, as you will never get the full facts off the OP.

 

[midas]

I ended up going direct to the manufacturer (which I wanted to avoid thinking it would be very expensive). It took the engineer 20 minutes to fix it and he only charged me £35.
.

You meant the MANUFACTURER only charged you £35?! Frankly, I don't believe you. Do you actually mean that the engineer cancelled the job and back pocketed £35?

Maybe I wasn't clear enough. I called the manufacturer and they gave me the nearest authorised service agents which I called myself and yes he did charge me £35.

 

[flameport]

I honestly can't believe someone wouldn't know where the stop cock is, or the consumer unit for that matter.

Believe it.

Half of the properties I go to have no smoke alarms, and plenty of those that do only have ancient battery operated things that should have been replaced years ago. Probably with no batteries in.

Plenty of people have no idea where the consumer unit is, or even what it's for.

Stop cocks which when eventually located have not been operated in decades and are totally seized, or have failed internally and are useless.

I have been called out several times to various electrical items not working, only to find that the 'fault' was due to piles of junk and other waste under the stairs falling against the consumer unit and switching off one or more circuits. Same with microwaves and other worktop appliances shoved against switches, causing the washing machine or whatever underneath to stop working.
Then there are those people who claim things were working perfectly and suddenly failed only yesterday, when it is obvious from the condition of it that it has either never worked, or it broke 10 years ago.