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Builder abandonment - how to protect myself now if it goes to court?
Hi all,
First time poster and really hoping someone might be able to give some advice please as this is brand new territory for us! Sorry if this is too long...
Our builder abandoned our project on July 1st after we paid him 80% of the costs of the original quote (>£30k) having completed significantly less than 80% of the project stating that we had delayed the project by delivering materials too slowly. We also paid him another £8k - £9k on top of this for further works discovered during the project as he had threatened to walk off site at the time if we sought quotes from other companies before paying him. He never provided us with a formal contract with terms and conditions but only a list of works with quotation prices. We don't believe we caused any excessive delays and have evidence to back up our claim (email correspondence etc).
We sent him a letter by recorded delivery informing him that he was in Breach of Contract and demanding that he return to the property within 10 days to continue with the project. He replied today via email stating that he would only return if we paid him 10% of the original quote + VAT to compensate for delays. In his email were numerous other complaints (many of which we have addressed before) regarding delays, having to carry materials up the stairs, painting walls white because he'd assumed we wanted white walls etc. All rather bizarre and many of which we'd discussed with him before.
Citizens Advice have told us just to send him another letter stating that his response is an unreasonable course of remedy and that it's irrelevant to the rights on offer to us and that we should inform him that we're seeking 3rd party offers to complete the works at their expense.
My view is that if this case goes to court, surely it's in our favour to show that we've tried to reasonably resolve this with our builder by addressing his complaints as much as possible? Even if it's repetitive and we've already responded to them several times? At least it shows that we want to try to reach a resolution with them. In any case, trying to communicate with him is a better path than actually going to court. However, Citizens Advice told us that we'd just be wasting our time if we did that and just to send the letter, nothing more.
What is everyone's advice? I know Citizens Advice aren't trained legal advisors so I'd really appreciate any input from people who understand the court process, particularly with regards to small claims as we'll probably be claiming £10k, given the quotes we've received from new builders so far.
Thanks to everyone in advance!
First time poster and really hoping someone might be able to give some advice please as this is brand new territory for us! Sorry if this is too long...
Our builder abandoned our project on July 1st after we paid him 80% of the costs of the original quote (>£30k) having completed significantly less than 80% of the project stating that we had delayed the project by delivering materials too slowly. We also paid him another £8k - £9k on top of this for further works discovered during the project as he had threatened to walk off site at the time if we sought quotes from other companies before paying him. He never provided us with a formal contract with terms and conditions but only a list of works with quotation prices. We don't believe we caused any excessive delays and have evidence to back up our claim (email correspondence etc).
We sent him a letter by recorded delivery informing him that he was in Breach of Contract and demanding that he return to the property within 10 days to continue with the project. He replied today via email stating that he would only return if we paid him 10% of the original quote + VAT to compensate for delays. In his email were numerous other complaints (many of which we have addressed before) regarding delays, having to carry materials up the stairs, painting walls white because he'd assumed we wanted white walls etc. All rather bizarre and many of which we'd discussed with him before.
Citizens Advice have told us just to send him another letter stating that his response is an unreasonable course of remedy and that it's irrelevant to the rights on offer to us and that we should inform him that we're seeking 3rd party offers to complete the works at their expense.
My view is that if this case goes to court, surely it's in our favour to show that we've tried to reasonably resolve this with our builder by addressing his complaints as much as possible? Even if it's repetitive and we've already responded to them several times? At least it shows that we want to try to reach a resolution with them. In any case, trying to communicate with him is a better path than actually going to court. However, Citizens Advice told us that we'd just be wasting our time if we did that and just to send the letter, nothing more.
What is everyone's advice? I know Citizens Advice aren't trained legal advisors so I'd really appreciate any input from people who understand the court process, particularly with regards to small claims as we'll probably be claiming £10k, given the quotes we've received from new builders so far.
Thanks to everyone in advance!
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