What is it with builders?
Discussion
I've got some building work I want to do on my house, a dormer extension and replacement bathroom,so I get in touch with 3 builders via their websites asking them to come round and look at the job and quote.( I want 3 quotes to compare price vs competence) Only one turns up. Fair do's, I ask 3 more and one turns up. We go again and 1 turns up. This started over a month ago and so far only 1 has bothered to quote. I even asked them to let me know if they didn't want to put a price in if they didn't fancy the job, none have done this. My take on it is that they all want the nice easy jobs, and as mine involves some roofing work, they didn't want it. I now know why I've been putting it off for so long. It's like pulling teeth. We even emailed one to ask why they hadn't put a price in and have had no reply. A simple,"the job's too complicated for us" would do,despite the 3 partners in the business coming round to look at the house. It's so frustrating. I assume that the building trade is booming and they're all really busy.Time to put the soapbox away.
We had the same thing with painters. Needed the hallway doing lots of doors & woodwork, high ceiling over the stairs etc. Not hard but time consuming.
We had two in the first round. One quote I had to chase for several time before getting.
Two in the second round. No Quotes.
Third one via a recommendation, came, quoted and is doing the job as I speak.
They all turned up to quote when they said they would, even discussed availability, duration and start date. If you don't want the job, just say so.
We had two in the first round. One quote I had to chase for several time before getting.
Two in the second round. No Quotes.
Third one via a recommendation, came, quoted and is doing the job as I speak.
They all turned up to quote when they said they would, even discussed availability, duration and start date. If you don't want the job, just say so.
As above, try and get a recommendation.
I've had some extensive work done recently, got the 3 quotes, one was a joke, more like a fag packet ball park figure, the guy even said that it might be a bit beyond his ability ( fair play) but still quoted.
The other 2 guys were spot on with attitude, but then there were the others who didn't return calls etc.
I've had some extensive work done recently, got the 3 quotes, one was a joke, more like a fag packet ball park figure, the guy even said that it might be a bit beyond his ability ( fair play) but still quoted.
The other 2 guys were spot on with attitude, but then there were the others who didn't return calls etc.
As you say, the construction industry (certainly residential anyway) is incredibly busy, down south it is anyway. I work for an architecture practice and over the last 3 or 4 years we've grown each year, we had more jobs in the first 6 months of this year than the whole of last year and last year was busier than the one before! We're based in Oxfordshire and this county is in a definite bubble though. Also, I don't think customer contact/relations is high on the list of most builder's priorities, it's not like talking to someone in an Apple shop! Not saying that's right or wrong, it's just the nature of the industry.
I may have been fairly fortunate as I've managed to get quotes from three builders for a small extension to my house, but it took months for each one to come back to me. But my parents have had a similar experience to you with getting a small bathroom job priced, builders would't reply or would arrange to come and not turn up!
In conclusion to my first and rambling post, I think builders are just really busy and so are not bothered about responding to enquiries their not interested in. I think you've just got to keep plugging away, find new builders to ask to quote and chase up the ones you already have, ideally by phone.
I may have been fairly fortunate as I've managed to get quotes from three builders for a small extension to my house, but it took months for each one to come back to me. But my parents have had a similar experience to you with getting a small bathroom job priced, builders would't reply or would arrange to come and not turn up!
In conclusion to my first and rambling post, I think builders are just really busy and so are not bothered about responding to enquiries their not interested in. I think you've just got to keep plugging away, find new builders to ask to quote and chase up the ones you already have, ideally by phone.
jezzaaa said:
And you have to be so careful about who you appoint. I own care business, and we've recently commissioned a contractor to put up new bedrooms in a ground floor extension. As you can imagine, the sector is regulated and dictates, among other things, a minimum bedroom size and minimum shared living space per resident for the living room.
So the contractor took the construction plans from the architect/PM...and proceeded to put footings down for something slightly smaller and in a different shape! He then pointed out, when challenged, that the planned building wouldn't fit on the plot, and changed it without consulting the Architect or us. Now having arguments as to why he needs to correct it at his own cost, since he decided to re-design the solution which no longer meets the regulatory minimums, and is therefore useless to us! Grrrrr!
That sound like a bloody nightmare! You have my sympathies So the contractor took the construction plans from the architect/PM...and proceeded to put footings down for something slightly smaller and in a different shape! He then pointed out, when challenged, that the planned building wouldn't fit on the plot, and changed it without consulting the Architect or us. Now having arguments as to why he needs to correct it at his own cost, since he decided to re-design the solution which no longer meets the regulatory minimums, and is therefore useless to us! Grrrrr!
I just thought after I posted, and it looks as though others have suggested this, if you can then try and contact builders which have been recommended to you, if nothing else it'll reduce the stress a bit of you're pretty confident a builder is good based on your friend's/family's/colleague's experience. Word of mouth is a very handy thing.
GFraser said:
That sound like a bloody nightmare! You have my sympathies
I just thought after I posted, and it looks as though others have suggested this, if you can then try and contact builders which have been recommended to you, if nothing else it'll reduce the stress a bit of you're pretty confident a builder is good based on your friend's/family's/colleague's experience. Word of mouth is a very handy thing.
Indeed...thankfully, he'd only done the footings, so it won't be too bad to change it around. Checks and balances by our PM!I just thought after I posted, and it looks as though others have suggested this, if you can then try and contact builders which have been recommended to you, if nothing else it'll reduce the stress a bit of you're pretty confident a builder is good based on your friend's/family's/colleague's experience. Word of mouth is a very handy thing.
There must be something that causes this behaviour. I can only guess that they want to cherry pick the easy stuff and if a job is remotely unattractive they leave it. Explaining this to the punter probably just leads to grief so they don't even respond.
Of course this attitude only works because if there is an abundance of work. Certainly down here in the South East there must be loads of work because it is 50/50 whether a tradesman will even respond with a quote. I am all signed up to British Gas Homecare because tradesmen down here are literally a waste of time.
I am often quite jealous when watching TV shows about people having their own house built and seeing all the trades getting on with it and bending over backwards to keep the customer happy.
Of course this attitude only works because if there is an abundance of work. Certainly down here in the South East there must be loads of work because it is 50/50 whether a tradesman will even respond with a quote. I am all signed up to British Gas Homecare because tradesmen down here are literally a waste of time.
I am often quite jealous when watching TV shows about people having their own house built and seeing all the trades getting on with it and bending over backwards to keep the customer happy.
Call don't email.
Secondly ask for a verbal ballpark figure - then you both know if it's likely to become a job hence they don't mind spending the time to do a quote.
A large builder around here charges £2k for a complete quotation - on the basis then everyoner knows what's included (he tends to only do £100k+ jobs)
He's constantly busy too.
A mate who's a builder spends one day a week purely on quotes.
Secondly ask for a verbal ballpark figure - then you both know if it's likely to become a job hence they don't mind spending the time to do a quote.
A large builder around here charges £2k for a complete quotation - on the basis then everyoner knows what's included (he tends to only do £100k+ jobs)
He's constantly busy too.
A mate who's a builder spends one day a week purely on quotes.
We want to get a conservatory built.
As luck would have it a company was working just down the road and knocked on our door touting for work. We arranged for him to come round a week later to talk through what we wanted and take some measurements. A week later he came back and said they could do the work for £16.5K and that he'd get back to us with some rough plans .... that was a month ago and not heard a thing!
We also had another builder come round a take measurements about a month ago - not heard a thing from him either!
I thought this country was in recession and I thought the building industry was one of the hardest hit industries .... I'm clearly misinformed!
As luck would have it a company was working just down the road and knocked on our door touting for work. We arranged for him to come round a week later to talk through what we wanted and take some measurements. A week later he came back and said they could do the work for £16.5K and that he'd get back to us with some rough plans .... that was a month ago and not heard a thing!
We also had another builder come round a take measurements about a month ago - not heard a thing from him either!
I thought this country was in recession and I thought the building industry was one of the hardest hit industries .... I'm clearly misinformed!
Builders basically don't do email/websites. (They may have a website but rarely do anything with it).
Get a couple of recommendations and call the builder on their mobiles rather than landlines. Leave a couple of messages. It they don't call back, they just aren't interested.
I use email all the time but hardly ever for anything related to my building projects.
Incidentally all 'good' builders know exactly how to play the games if they have to go 'bad'. I had one do that to me 3/4 of the way through a roof job.
To this day I am sure that he fully intended to complete the job when he started it. But as the job drew on they started not turning up, excuses, excuses but no further work. Had to cancel the contract and try and find someone else to complete (not easy) while at the same time water was damaging the house.
Can only assume the job was dragging on and something better came along. They are absolutely ruthless in my experience and the only way forward is to make sure you are owing them money until the job is done to your satisfaction.
To this day I am sure that he fully intended to complete the job when he started it. But as the job drew on they started not turning up, excuses, excuses but no further work. Had to cancel the contract and try and find someone else to complete (not easy) while at the same time water was damaging the house.
Can only assume the job was dragging on and something better came along. They are absolutely ruthless in my experience and the only way forward is to make sure you are owing them money until the job is done to your satisfaction.
swisstoni said:
There must be something that causes this behaviour. I can only guess that they want to cherry pick the easy stuff and if a job is remotely unattractive they leave it. Explaining this to the punter probably just leads to grief so they don't even respond.
Of course this attitude only works because if there is an abundance of work. Certainly down here in the South East there must be loads of work because it is 50/50 whether a tradesman will even respond with a quote. I am all signed up to British Gas Homecare because tradesmen down here are literally a waste of time.
I am often quite jealous when watching TV shows about people having their own house built and seeing all the trades getting on with it and bending over backwards to keep the customer happy.
Cherry Picking clients and jobs was my method when I used to put various building trades into jobs.Of course this attitude only works because if there is an abundance of work. Certainly down here in the South East there must be loads of work because it is 50/50 whether a tradesman will even respond with a quote. I am all signed up to British Gas Homecare because tradesmen down here are literally a waste of time.
I am often quite jealous when watching TV shows about people having their own house built and seeing all the trades getting on with it and bending over backwards to keep the customer happy.
Easy work repeatedly made easy money and was much simpler to cost control - more so than weeks of dirty hard graft or technically challenging building work. Easy simple jobs guaranteed far less potential for grief from either over demanding clients or Prima Donna tradesmen chewing away at my margins too.
Once you’re established you can manage and manipulate client demand by adjusting price and availability to get precisely the plum jobs you want and that you know for sure you can make a worthwhile profit on when you sub contract them out. Having that advantage also leaves all the crappy low margin work for one of your competitors to struggle with.
The other big advantage of managing demand is most tradesmen know exactly what you’re up to and if you choose ones who only want easy work too they'll accept a lower daily rate as they know when working for you they’ll have a simple grief free day at work.
I had full passed plans , structural calculations and building warrant before contacting builders for a quote.
It was a straight forward job with good access and i was fully flexible regarding timescales.
It has taken me 5 months to find a builder who wants the work and will start early in the new year - not what i wanted but i dont have a choice
I have decided that if they dont turn up on the date or try and put it back the whole project is getting scrapped. Its just not worth the stress.
All i have had is bulls
t and broken promises from the start inc so called experts that thought it was acceptable to take 7 weeks to do structural calculations when he said it would take 2
You then have builders that take your plans and spend over an hour talking about it but then dont quote
As it stands the builder i have is very good and i have seen up close his last 3 builds as they were getting done
It was a straight forward job with good access and i was fully flexible regarding timescales.
It has taken me 5 months to find a builder who wants the work and will start early in the new year - not what i wanted but i dont have a choice
I have decided that if they dont turn up on the date or try and put it back the whole project is getting scrapped. Its just not worth the stress.
All i have had is bulls
t and broken promises from the start inc so called experts that thought it was acceptable to take 7 weeks to do structural calculations when he said it would take 2 You then have builders that take your plans and spend over an hour talking about it but then dont quote
As it stands the builder i have is very good and i have seen up close his last 3 builds as they were getting done
Edited by sw67 on Wednesday 23 October 11:50
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