This man is a liar and a thief
This man is a liar and a thief. Throughout he has lied to us about the job he would do, used images of other builders as his own, and pressured us to pay him before a job is complete and often before a job was even started. Any job he has started, he has done a terrible job, with multiple other builders telling us how bad it is with one telling us "that's the worst brick laying i've seen in my 40 year career".
He complained multiple times about his own chosen career choice, speaks about other customers like they don't matter, as long as he makes money out of them. One time even stating "f@ck em".
He cuts corners and is constantly looking to bodge to save money. He doesn't have a clue how to even cut out a doorway. I had to explain to him that using a disk cutter rather than just a hammer is very important to stop cracks forming. He layed a concrete floor without dampproof membrane, costing us thousands to rectify. Built the inside and outside walls so close together that in some areas, there was no cavity, meaning no insulation could be added at any point, even though it was his job to add the insulation. He purchased dirt cheap wonky second hand, underground bricks of the wrong size when I specifically asked him to try to match the bricks on my house.
He half built the front wall of my garage conversion without a spirit level, insufficient brick ties, no cavity gap. He wasnt even capable of lining the wall up with the bricks above the lintel of the original opening meaning the whole thing had to come down, which he then tried to charge me extra for.
The half built wonky and leaning brick wall at the back of the garage, which i saw he wasn't bothering to use a spirit level to build, also has insufficient brick ties, no cavity and he didnt even bother to take out the fence post where he was planning to build, and decided to build around it, so if i hadn't pointed that out, he would've happily left me with a fence post stuck into the corner of my brick wall. When i asked him what he was planning to do with that, he said "i havent got all day." He only showed up an hour earlier. After cutting some of the post down, he then continued to build the wall with half of the post sticking out the wall. The word lazy doesn't describe this guy quite well enough.
We asked him to replace our soil pipe as we wanted to add a shower that would feed into it on the ground floor. For one, he thought that connecting in higher than the shower trap would work, not even realising that water flows downwards. For two, he didn't replace the soil pipe, but instead charged us for replacing it all then cut a section out, using parts that are not usable for the direction of flow, shoving as much silicone into the gap as possible, resulting in our soil pipe leaking for the past 2 months. He has since blamed us for the leak, stating that we've been "wiggling" it... I remember him literally telling us "it wont leak, im a professional" then watching as it leaked before his eyes. I would've laughed if he hadn't stolen so much money from us.
His partner thought that he would keep the skirting board in at the bottom of the doorway he smashed out telling me "do you not want that there?". Well no, its a doorway.
He guilt trips you and pressures you into sending more and more money. When you ask why he's asking for more money at this stage without his previously agreed milestone even nearly met, he shouts at you, insults you and walks away when you do this a second time, when he realises you wont pay him more until the previously agreed milestone had been met, he takes your money and never returns.
I had previously asked him to supply and fit the windows for the garage conversion. He told me to buy them, which i did. I then asked how he was planning to fit them. He told me "surround it with expanding foam and it aint going nowhere". This man won't even use screws if it means saving some time
He told us that he would have the job done in 2 weeks and laughed at my partner when she asked if this was feasible and then lo and behold, he still hadn't even nearly completed the job after 4 weeks.
We had a structural engineer give us a survey of our garage after we were worried about his work and he confirmed that the work he had done was structurally unsafe and would not pass building regulations.
We have received multiple quotes from builders, proving how costly this cowboys incompetence and deceit has been.
This guy is a complete and utter cowboy who promises everything and delivers nothing finished or to an acceptable standard with the sole aim of retiring as early as he can, no matter the impact he has on his customers, who trusted him. It's hard to state enough how much we would not recommend him. He's a danger to himself and his customers. We are pursuing him in court and will redeem the amount he has stolen and the damage he has caused.