arbitration

[notebookguy]

Hi, can anyone help with the following?

I hired a builder to do works on my house. He said he would need 4 workmen including him to do the work. It would take them 4 to 5 days to complete the works. He also said he needed scaffolding. He quoted me £4500 as a fixed price.



In the end he did not bring any extra men to the work, he completed the work by himself in 1.5 days, and he did not need the scaffolding!



Although the price was fixed can it be right that he is allowed to rip me off by quoting for all this extra workers and days to complete it, but then take all the money for himself? Its just so unfair.



We are now using an arbitrator. Can any help me understand a few things?

1. Does an arbitrator consider the consumer rights act in their decision making?

2. Would an arbitrator have to award it to one side if the other has behaved illegally. In my case the builder was unable to give me a receipt for materials he purchased. He admitted he paid with cash (clearly to increase his profit). However he still had the gall to charge me VAT on the item he did not pay for himself!

3. How am I able to prove why it was reasonable for me to be ignorant that the quoted and agreed price was an act of ‘purposely taking advantage’.

[atticus]

1. The arbitrator should consider all relevant law to which his or her attention is drawn.

2. It depends on the nature and extent of the illegality and how much it relates to the matters in dispute.

3. Things are proved with evidence. Your own statement, any documents, letters, emails etc.

Why is this dispute being dealt with by arbitration?

[notebookguy]

thanks for the response. It is being done via arbitration because we used escrow (transpact). It was agreed by the two of us that we would do so should we get into dispute.

The illegal part of it is that the builder has admitted that he paid for materials with cash (paid no VAT) but yet on his bill he is charging me VAT!!

Can an arbitrator really just ignore VAT dodging?

[notebookguy]

the arbitrator has asked that I answer the following points:

I was overcharged substantially over market rates. It was reasonable for me to be ignorant of this overcharge when the contract was drawn up. The builder purposefully took advantage of my ignorance.

Can I please get some help with how to answer this? I plan to state the following:


On receiving a quote of £4250, I asked the carpenter some further questions. From his answers I was informed that he would require 4 tradespeople (including him), and the work would take between 4 and 5 days. On seeing this information, I checked https://www.priceyourjob.co.uk/tradesmen-day-rates/ to see what the average carpenter day rate is. The website states that this is between £130-£170. I therefore took £150/ day as the sum that the builder would be charging for each tradespeople/ day. Over a period of 4 days, that sum came to £2400. About £2000 was left from the remaining quote to cover things the builder stated he needed, such as scaffolding, steel beams, bolts, decorating work. This seemed like a reasonable price.

However, the builder substantially overcharged me. The contracted works were completed by the builder only, and he never once used the labour of 3 other men. He took about 1.5 days to complete the entire project. Even if I take the upper limit (£170) for a carpenter’s day rate, as stated on https://www.priceyourjob.co.uk/tradesmen-day-rates/ that still means he should have only charged me £255. That is a difference of £2145. Or an 841% increase over the current market rate. Or even more astonishingly £1600 a day for labour.

Furthermore, the builder quoted me for scaffolding and never used any. According to https://householdquotes.co.uk/scaffolding-costs/ scaffolding a semi-detached house costs about £1000/ week. The builder also made a mistake (as admitted through his messages on WhatsApp) with the order of steel beams. This mistake wasted an additional £480 (according to his WhatsApp message on 7/7/22). In total these two items cost an additional £1480. Had I known that the builder was quoting me for an extra £1480 for items that were not needed, again, I would never have hired him.

The reason why I hired him without getting quotes from other tradespeople was down to the builder's understanding of the project. Other carpenters that came to look at the work, did not seem to understand it in the same way as him. Also given the builder was desperate for the work, and due to his persistent WhatsApp messages with me, I decided I would give him an opportunity.

Therefore, in total the builder has charged £3625 extra for tradespeople, equipment and materials he did not need. This is massively over market rates.

I have no experience in house building. I also have no fundamental understanding of the issues regarding the work the builder was hired to complete (flitch beams and restraint straps).

As stated above, I did everything possible to determine whether the quote was fair. Had the builder quoted me to do the said works for the contracted price of £4250, over 1.5 days, by himself, I would never have agreed to it. It is an obscene amount of money to charge for 1.5 days. I would have regarded the cost as excessive and coming from a very greedy individual.

The builder knew what he was doing. He knew that if he said the works would be completed by himself in 1.5 days, the price of £4250 would have been unjustifiable.

Have I made a fair argument? Have I answered the points asked? Any help would be appreciated.