Builder overcharging vs quote given

[BankFodder]

Firstly, I am not certain that the fact that it has been headed quotation has any particular status in law .

 

It should be taken on the basis of guidance rather than a firm rule, in my view.

 

I am only looking at this from a telephone and it is difficult to follow your very long solid blocks of text .

Do I gather that the price quotation was not given to you until the work had actually been completed?

 

[BankFodder]

It is a little more clear I think we will help you work at it.

Firstly, were you contracting on your own behalf privately or is this a trade/commercial venture?

Secondly, despite what you say, the court nowadays employs a pragmatic approach and I think that it is broadly accepted that once building work begins, there can be new developments or new understanding of the work site which could lead to extra work and unexpected increases in costs.
I think what is interesting here is that they apparently said that they would carry out the work "in line with" the original quote. Already we see an indication that the quotation is meant to be flexible and you have agreed with that.

This is not unreasonable, in my view.

A hundred years ago, the contract was everything and would have been treated as gospel. Now the courts tend to take a more reasonable and balanced view.

 

I gather that in effect there were two contracts. One for the original work which was quoted for. A second one was for the additional works which was not quoted for you to circumstances.
They have now sent you a single bill in respect of both contracts combined but I gather that the additional works are itemised on the bill and that they appear to have build you a new summer for the additional works which in fact you say had already been taken into consideration in the original quote.
If this is correct then you are saying that they are double billing you for one element of the work. Is this correct?
 

[BankFodder]

And I don't seem to find that you have given us the name of the company that you are dealing with. Is there a reason for this?

[BankFodder]

This thread is now starting to drag on with unnecessary narrative.

It's clear that you desperately want the quote to be firm and you want to base everything on that. We disagree.
We think that a quotation is reasonably fluid depending on circumstances.

However, you have suddenly disclosed one new fact which is that apparently the builders have admitted that they failed to read or to understand the original architects specification correctly.
Do you have evidence of this?

Secondly, you have now said that the builders have been making threats against you. What are the threats that they have been making and you have evidence of this?

Finally we have no idea of the value that we are talking about here.

Frankly I think we are still trying to unravel this and I think it would be helpful to know the value of the initial quotation, what is the final bill you have received and it will probably be a good idea if you posted up a copy of the final bill in PDF format.

Also post up a copy of the initial quotation in PDF format.

One thing you can be certain is that if you want to challenge anything here, then you will have to get at least one independent inspection with corroborates your position

[BankFodder]

If you want to get into semantics, then the word "price" would probably give you more certainty than "quote".

However, even if your discussions had referred to a price, I can imagine that a judge would still be interested in considering the fluidity of a price in a building contract where it was clear that it wasn't possible to ascertain all of the conditions until the site had been investigated.

I notice that in the documents you have supplied above, they refer to "prices" but it still seems to me to be open.

However, what is interesting is that they go on to reserve certain exclusions and they have reserved to themselves some flexibility there. That might reasonably be said to infer that all the figures above the exclusions are fixed.

I think that that gives you some leeway to argue - – the fact that they envisaged that they would be uncertainties and they refer specifically to those, thus excluding the possibility of uncertainties in the preceding part of the quotation.

The reason for the fluidity and the quotation is precisely because of the exclusions in which they have reserved flexibility.

You spoke earlier on of there being an overlap between the additional works and the items contained in the original quotation.

I haven't had the time to go through and try to identify them. Maybe you would be kind enough to do so as I am sure you are familiar with it all


 

[BankFodder]

I notice that there is about £3000 outstanding.

Are you withholding all of this or are you putting your hands up to some of it?

 

Also, I asked you if you evidence that they had not interpreted the architects and correctly – and you haven't responded.

Also, I asked you if you had evidence that you had received threats from them – and you haven't responded.

[BankFodder]

Well, I think that you should put down your concerns in writing- concisely .

Explain to them the problem that you have about the final bill.

You can do two things. You can either come up with your own calculation and give them a detailed account of how you have arrived at that figure and pay it to them immediately  And then tell them that you invite the comments as to the outstanding balance, but that you have no intention of paying anything more and they must decide up on what action to take.

 

Or else in your letter to them, having explained your concerns, you can ask them to detail their calculations and to propose a reasonable figure .

I suggest that the former approach is better

 

 

 

 

 

[BankFodder]

No, I didn't say that you should accept their bill .

I think you should accept the principal that there is flexibility in building contracts.

 

However, we hadn't seen the structure of the quotation and that made me think that there was an arguable case at least in terms of the first part of the quoted work.

 

In terms of the additional work, section 15 of the supply of goods and services act 1982 says that where no price has been agreed then a reasonable price will be implied .

 

I think that this sets a good working basis.

 

The objective now is to whittle down the disputed amount to as small sum as possible .

 

This will have the effect of making them wonder whether it is economically worthwhile pursuing it.

 

If they decide to pursue it, then at least by reducing the amount to the minimum, if you lose then the costs you will incur will be far less .

 

Also, if you can show a court that you have bent over backwards to reach out and to discuss sensibly and openly with the other side then this will stand in your favour

 

 

 

 

 

 

[BankFodder]

Do you have evidence that they threatened additional costs?

 

You should be keeping a close detailed verbatim note of all telephone calls – date, time, duration and who said what to who.

 

You should really record your calls.

Read our customer services guide

[BankFodder]

 

 

1 hour ago, unclebulgaria67 said:

Late payment fees ?  Yes they could add reasonable amount for late payment.

I have a feeling that late payment fees only apply in business to business dealings.

 

3 hours ago, BSBWest said:

I am nervous that if I rub them up the wrong way, they will act on their earlier threat and look to add even more costs to the final bill. Does anyone have any experience to suggest there is any substance in this statement? 

 

Don't be fazed by threats of this kind. If possible try to get evidence of them, record calls and make notes.

I'm not sure that late payment fees do apply to consumer contracts and so any additional costs would have to be manufactured in some way and I think that this would leave the company rather vulnerable in court if this could be proven.

[BankFodder]

customer services guide

[BankFodder]

If you look at our customer services guide, you will see that I have already referred to the fact that Apple have hobbled the iPhone in terms of call recording .

 

If you want to record a call using an iPhone then the best thing to do is to get a TP8 from Amazon

 

[BankFodder]

There has been a considerable gap between the original explanations and your post today.

I am trying to understand exactly where we are.
What I do understand is that they say that they want £3500. You seem to be saying that they owe you £383. Is this correct?

Also I can't figure out where the 3 1/2 thousand pounds comes from. Is it the additional works? Does it relate to the original quotation? I'm afraid that I have fallen out of the loop on this for the moment.

The threatening message which they have sent you is extremely useful. Make sure you preserve it well. If this does go to court then the judge will be less than pleased. It is also potentially a police matter.

Are you prepared to forego the £383 if the whole dispute stops?

Are there other issues which I have not referred to here?