Roof done <SNIP> threatening behavour

mondeo

Recently, my mother got someone to re roof an extention at the side of the house, Its a tiled roof, old tiles were falling off it and was leaking everywhere so time to get it re done. I was at the house when these lads came up to do the job, soon as I opened the door to them I could smell trouble. Since my mother arranged this over the phone without seeing them and they came up with their gear, I felt we should give them the benefit of the doubt since this type of work is their usual area.
I watched these guys doing the roof, hacking away at roof tiles inches away from my mothers car in the driveway, had to tell him 3,4 times to watch the car and not hit it with their saws! The leader of them all, big fella with a brown shirt and brown trousers kept asking me was I heading away to work or whatever ? I kept saying no.... They were trying to get rid of me, wasn't leaving my mother alone with these lads after what I seen them doing.

After about 6 hours of them out in the garden hacking away, they finished the job. The job they did looked reasonable, abit crooked but fine, I guess. Then the problem started. These guys appeared to be a registered business, logo on their lorry etc which is fine, however they quoted my mother an x amount of money prior to the job which they stuck to, great ! Then they insisted on a personal cheque for the job, claiming that the quote was a cash price... They did not want to give us a receipt for the job. My mother then proceeded to write a cheque in their "business name" since she didn't want to give him a personal cheque, then guess what they did ? He tore it up in front of us..... he said if we didn't give him a personal cheque he would go around to the neighbours and tell them we were trying to con him out of money ! :mad: After some arguing we wrote him a personal cheque just to get him off the ****ing property !

What would you have done ? He is a registered business, I checked his business name online on CRO, I want to report this bastad to the cops for threatening to ruin our name with the neighbours. We have no proof he even did the job because no receipt...What if the roof falls down in a few weeks time ? What come back do we have ? None! If I report these clowns, are they going to come back and do something nasty ? That is what worries me and I don't want my mother who is an OAP getting harrassed by these fckers. These characters didn't give a ****, they just wanted their personal cheque and they were happy threatening our good name with our neghbours to get it.

screamer

If they are registered a call to the revenue commissioner much more painful, and the Gardai might be no harm also

Tow

Revenue are the people to call. But I am surprised they wanted a cheque, if it was a cash job.

antix80

A cheque for a cash job.. strange.
It's possible he doesn't have a bank account in the business name, or maybe he wanted it to go through privately so he wouldn't have to add vat (or something).
As fun as it would be to write to the revenue with the business name and the guy's name and tell them what's been happening, my priority would be to make sure the work was done to a proper standard.
God knows where your mother got the number.. probably a leaflet through the door, or maybe they called to her door previously and used a hard sales tactic, "look, those tiles are loose, one could fly off, we can be here Monday, we'll take all the tiles down, we'll put new this-and-that up, just give me a rough idea of your budget... that's great, you'll get a lot of work done for €5k... that's the cash price, you won't get better, so we'll be here next week and get started, ok?" ... it is absolutely fine to say "thanks for the info and the price, I'll be in touch if I need anything". Then get another 2 quotes. And never get work done without a personal reference from someone you know who used the company before. You can't trust facebook ratings either.

amber2

Your mother can always as ask her bank for a copy of the cashed Cheque made payable to the roofer, personal or not what else would your mother be paying him for, this may act as a kind of receipt should the need arise. If he quoted a price for cash I am surprised he didn’t insist on cash as your mother could always put a stop on the cheque before it gets through the clearing system.

mondeo

These individuals were not your local friendly types, they pride themselves in being a different ethnic group despite being irish like the rest of us. You know what I'm talking about here.

My mother and father being OAP's I didnt want these characters coming back to the house trying to scare them if she cancelled the cheque. If it was me on my own, I would take a different stance to this. Who wants these type of sh!theads coming up to your parents house making trouble over money ? On this occasion I just wanted them off the property and to never come back so we gave them the cheque so they would F OFF! I had a good proper look at the job they did yesterday evening. It seems secure enough so I think the roof won't come down. I said to my mother if she wants anyone else doing jobs on the house ASK ME FIRST, so I can make arrangements on her behalf.

Spanish Eyes

Sorry to hear about this. It is a minefield trying to get tradespeople these days.

Through bitter experience, when needing roof work or other emergency repairs (apart from my trusted plumber and spark who are great), I now ring my insurance company and get a list of their trusted tradespeople. They will supply a list whether you intend to claim or not.

mondeo

Spanish Eyes wrote: »

Sorry to hear about this. It is a minefield trying to get tradespeople these days.

Through bitter experience, when needing roof work or other emergency repairs (apart from my trusted plumber and spark who are great), I now ring my insurance company and get a list of their trusted tradespeople. They will supply a list whether you intend to claim or not.

This is good to know, thanks