Over the period Thursday 8th September to Saturday 10th my wife’s nephew Mr MG was staying with us. Mr MG is regularly contracted by my company to produce web design work and had visited the house on a few occasions previously during the course of the works to discuss websites.
On the Saturday morning 10th September we awoke to find a great deal of water on the floor of the new kitchen and dining room. It appeared that following a heavy storm the night before water had been entering the property through a joint between the new kitchen/dining room. The water had tripped the electricity supply so that there was no electricity in the house at all. There were large water stains on the ceiling with water dripping continually through cracks in the plasterboard which was warped. We all helped clear up the water and I tried unsuccessfully to reset the RCD which kept tripping out.
My wife tried on at least two occasions to contact The Cowboy before he answered. He eventually called at around 10 o’clock.
At that time I was upstairs getting changed and my wife was downstairs with Mr MG and my seven year old son.
I began to hear The Cowboy's raised voice so I went downstairs to see what was happening.
The Cowboy was fiddling around with the spotlights when I came down. The Cowboy was in an extremely aggressive mood and was swearing a lot. He was saying to my wife that he had told her before that he couldn’t do anything until Monday.
My wife said that this wasn’t good enough and we had to have electricity and suggested that we find an emergency electrician and roofer.
At this point The Cowboy ‘exploded’ and started ranting and swearing.
I was having a cigarette by the back door and trying to boil a saucepan on a camping gas heater that I'd got from the shed when The Cowboy turned on me and said aggressively ‘well what have you f**king got to say about it?
I said ‘S**** I can’t talk to you….What do you expect me to say? There’s water pouring in, we’ve got no electricity, there’s a swimming pool outside the backdoor, broken doors and loose wires everywhere and you’re not offering any help.’
The Cowboy then jumped down off the stepladder and said ‘Right that’s f**king it, I ‘m out of here – you can keep the money you owe me!’ and he started off towards the front door.
I followed and laughed in disbelief. I said to him ‘Fine – but I think you mean the money you owe me! I've paid you £21,000 up front and you haven't completed anything’
He shouted back ‘F**k Off ‘and slammed the front door behind him.
My wife then tried to telephone around for a roofer and electrician to come out no avail.
Later that day around lunchtime I went out to purchase tarpaulins, tape and temporary flashing from St Anne’s builders merchants to patch up the roof.
When I returned my wife was with Mr MG and Mr MB of B********* Builders ( My wife had called him to see if he could help as he only lives up the road) who informed me that The Cowboy had returned to the property (probably because he had seen my car wasn’t there) had overheard MG and MB outside the rear of the property discussing the state of the works, stormed in and had become very abusive again, insinuating amongst other things that my wife must be on drugs.
Mr MG and I spent the rest of the afternoon attempting to make the roof secure.
Whilst on the roof we noticed that there was a gap of about two feet between the wall and the new extension. There was simply no covering at all, neither tiles nor flashing and the felt had just been tucked into the roof void. There were also large holes in the existing building above the RSJ that he The Cowboy hadn't packed.
I also attempted to try and reset the electricity RCD on many occasions, but on each occasion it would trip out with blue sparks shooting from the box.
From Saturday until Tuesday when an electrician finally called we were without power completely. Not a good situation with a two month old baby to care for!
It was another week and a half before we got power finally restored to the downstairs circuit.
Next post - High Noon - The cowboy returns and we call for the Police!
Sunday, 25 February 2007
The Hole in the Wall gang - defective and incomplete works
The Cowboy arrived to start work on the extension on the 9th May 2005.
I informed The Cowboy that we’d submitted the building regulation forms.
The Cowboy said he’d call the building inspector to arrange a site visit for that week once the footings were dug, and then we could go ahead with the ready mix concrete foundations for which he needed some cash. I later paid him £5000 cash
During the first week The Cowboy replaced a damaged sewer pipe he had broken which led from the objectionable neighbours property underneath the old lean-to and connected with our sewers. I and my wife agreed to pay for this damage even though The Cowboy negligently broke it and The Cowboy quoted us £100.
On the day of the building inspectors first visit The Cowboy told me that it was probably better if we stayed out the way and he’d deal with him. After the building inspector had left The Cowboy told me that the building inspector from Rochford District Council was his ‘mate Len’ and he was more than happy with the excavations.
The Cowboy did say that the building inspector was not happy with the size of the proposed French doors at the rear of the old kitchen as he thought the wall /pillar in between the kitchen and old dining room which would have to support an RSJ was not big enough. The Cowboy said he’d suggested to the building inspector that he retains some of the old dining room wall as support for the RSJ and only puts a single door in the kitchen. This meant a change to the design of the new kitchen with brick pillars on either side of the room. I agreed to The Cowboy changes as they actually meant less work. I did not ask him for a refund for the replacing the proposed double doors with a single door. At no time did The Cowboy mention ‘soft spots’ or any other problems as The Cowboy later claims. The Senior Building Inspector Mr Len Martin later confirmed to me that he had not requested any special foundation requirements and was happy with the excavations. Mr Martin also later told me that although he had seen The Cowboy vans around the area, he had never before met The Cowboy or inspected any of his work.
On Friday The Cowboy arranged for the Ready mix concrete to be delivered which set over the weekend. At this time The Cowboy had four workers on site.
On the following Monday 16th May The Cowboy began laying bricks and had blocks and materials delivered. The Cowboy asked for a second payment of £5000 which we gave to him.
From this point onwards we started to have problems.
The Cowboy started to lay the first course of bricks himself without the aid of a plumb line. Around lunchtime The Cowboy unexpectedly left site and took two of his workers Joe and Danny with him. The Cowboy left on site John an inexperienced 17 year old labourer laying bricks, and Darren, The Cowboy's labourer foreman and school friend, who knocked up cement all day long.
On Monday evening The Cowboy returned late to pick them up and didn’t inspect their work.
On Tuesday The Cowboy dropped of his workers early in the morning and we didn’t see The Cowboy again until the evening.
On the Wednesday The Cowboy appeared during the day and had a fit of rage at the work that had been done, threw tools around, shouted and swore at Darren and John, knocked down some of the brickwork and started to redo it himself. The Cowboy stayed on site for the remainder of the week.
By the end of the second week the foundation brickwork had been completed and The Cowboy had partly laid one course of block work around the base. At the end of this week one of The Cowboy's workers Danny left the job.
The third week was much the same as the second regarding The Cowboy coming and going. The first two days he left John and Darren to carry on the block work up to the level of the window base. However when The Cowboy returned on the Tuesday evening and inspected their work it emerged that they had forgotten to put the damp proof course in on the far side and laid two courses of blocks too many. The Cowboy flew into a rage similar to the one on the previous week. On the Wednesday The Cowboy approached me and apologised for his behaviour the previous evening and asked as the roof was about to go on, could he have the third payment of £5000 in cash.
After I paid him I remember joking with my wife 'computer says no' when she asked me if I’d got a receipt, as I had been given the broken computer excuse again.
For the remainder of the third week The Cowboy employed John and Darren on ceiling and plaster removal in the dining room whilst he prepared the existing back wall to put the RSJ in place and continued with the block work.
Sometime during week three DG from DG Kitchen services visited with a copy of the kitchen layout plan for approval. He noted the progress of the works and said he’d call again next week.
During week four commencing 30th May, The Cowboy fitted the RSJ and completed the block work and put in a temporary sewage down pipe from our upstairs bathroom to the main sewers.
On the Thursday DG called over with the final kitchen units plan and met The Cowboy and they discussed the layout. Before he left, DG told me he thought it would be at least another month before they would be ready for kitchen fitting.
My wife and I expressed our concerns to The Cowboy that the work wasn’t going to be completed on time. The Cowboy admitted he was a ‘bit behind’ but assured us he’d complete on time. That weekend The Cowboy offered to work through and employed a Mr DA who he knows from the school gate to help him design the roof and cut the timbers. By the end of the weekend a basic timber structure was in place.
During week five commencing 6th June, The Cowboy called the building inspector to inspect the RSJ and I believe that the roof construction was also discussed. When on site, The Cowboy spent most of the week working on the roof timbers and installed some copper pipework.
At some time during the week I returned in the afternoon to find The Cowboy and two of his workers removing tiles from my garage conversion roof and inspecting a Velux window installation. I asked The Cowboy ‘What’s going on?’ to which he replied he was just checking to see how the Velux window fitting had been done to make sure he had enough timber support for the new kitchen Veluxes which were bigger. I told him to make sure he put the roof back securely. Later The Cowboy appeared to have trouble fitting three ‘Fakro’ windows into his roof construction and spent two days fitting and refitting these windows.
In Midweek around the 8th June, DG Services called with the final plan and pro forma invoice. DG walked around the block work with The Cowboy discussing possible installation times and marking the block work where electricity points and plumbing were required.
Before he left DG told me that he didn’t think the building would be ready on time and against his advice, The Cowboy had insisted that he fit the units over a long weekend on Friday 24th June, which was the weekend before our baby was due to be born.
Sometime later that day I again approached The Cowboy again and expressed my concerns that we wouldn’t have the new kitchen ready before the baby was born. He assured me that the works to the dining room and new kitchen would be complete and we’d have use of the new kitchen. The Cowboy stated that he could then work on the old kitchen / toilet and on the outside without having to disturb us in the main part of the house. I asked him how much longer that would take and he told me possibly two or three weeks.
Over the weekend The Cowboy employed an electrician who ran the wiring out to the new kitchen and dining room and fixed wall boxes. I asked The Cowboy if this electrician would be able to supply us with the electrical certification required by the building regulations.
The Cowboy told me that he had used the electrician before and he was fully qualified and had got out of college a year before. ( It turns out later in court that the 'electrician' wasn't qualified to do the work and the installation was illegal)
During week six commencing 13th June The Cowboy and two workers John and Joe, commenced the felt and battening of the roof and with the help of a ‘plasterer’ put a plasterboard ceiling in through the new kitchen dining area. The labourers and the plasterer then put a plaster undercoat throughout the whole dining area.
On the Saturday morning The Cowboy and Darren came in for a few hours and laid a concrete screed floor in the new kitchen area.
During week seven commencing 20th June the plasterer completed the plastering.
On Friday 24th DG Services arrived and fitted the unit bases over the weekend. There were no windows or doors fitted at this stage and The Cowboy kept blaming suppliers. The Cowboy put temporary plastic over the window and door holes to protect the kitchen and the appliances from the elements. DG services couldn’t fit any appliances as no electrical points had been installed. They arranged to return the following weekend however this was later deferred as The Cowboy was unable to get another electrician for a fortnight. It became obvious to me at this point that the kitchen would not be complete by the time the baby was born and I confronted The Cowboy who was apologetic.
Throughout the next week we hardly saw The Cowboy at all. It appeared to me that from this point onwards The Cowboy had given up completely caring about timescales to complete the job. On the Thursday one of his workers John told me he’d been fixing fences at The Cowboy's house and that The Cowboy was up at the school erecting a marquee for the school fete the following day. On the Friday afternoon of the fete my wife started to go into labour. I drove to the school to tell The Cowboy I had to go to the hospital. The fete was in full swing and I met the Mrs Cowboy Builder who offered to look after our son for the duration.
Our daughter was born on the second of July 2005 by which time the works should have been completed.
The Cowboy returned to our house on Monday 4th July. The Cowboy told me there wasn’t a lot more that he could do that week as he was waiting on windows and doors to be delivered and the electrician to come at the weekend, and that he had an emergency at one of his tenanted properties. The Cowboy left one worker Joe at the site all week, who he instructed to give the whole interior of the dining room / kitchen bare plaster one coat of trade white emulsion. I didn’t see The Cowboy again that week until the Thursday when he confirmed that an electrician would be coming at the weekend.
On Saturday 9th July The Cowboy arrived with a different electrician.
The Cowboy told me that the previous electrician had worked for this one but had been given the sack when he was caught having sex with this electricians daughter. This electrician whose name I cannot remember (and funnily enough wasn't in The Cowboy's court statement and like the rest of the Cowboy's workers didn't make statements to support him!) spent the weekend putting in wiring both inside and out and fitted an external floodlight. He also ran some wiring for the cooker and added an additional fuse box (which was later condemned and removed). The Cowboy fitted all the spotlights, light switches and the plug sockets in plain white plastic (which we later replaced at our own expense). Some of them were fitted upside down and many looked used with paint and dirt on them. When I complained to The Cowboy he said that they were just temporary.
During the week commencing the 11th of July The Cowboy arrived on Monday morning with tiles for the roof. The Cowboy laid the top few rows of tiles and then handed the job to John and Joe his workers. I assumed that they were nailing the tiles. They completed most of the job that week until they ran out of tiles leaving the edges and ridges and a large gap of about two feet next to where the extension should join the house. The Cowboy completed the edges himself with some different tiles he obtained that week. On the Wednesday he pulled one of his workers off site and was entirely pre-occupied with preparing his field for the children’s party he was hosting on Saturday 16th July, in particular a giant waterslide contraption, a scaffold zip wire construction and erecting marquees. Consequently very little was done to our property.
DG Services returned on the day of the party to connect the electrical appliances and complete the unit installation. They explained to me that they had had trouble fitting some of the units as the walls were not straight and the plaster uneven. Likewise they had to make many adjustments to the height of the units as the floor screed was very uneven and pitted. DG arranged for the worktop company Abbey Marble to come in later that week, who subsequently fitted the marble worktops to a good standard.
On the week commencing 18th July, The Cowboy was on site with two workers John and Joe, on the Monday and Tuesday sawing off roof timbers, refitting some fascia and one piece of soffit. On the Wednesday and Thursday Abbey Marble installed the worktops.
On or around the Tuesday morning I asked The Cowboy what he was going to do about the remaining existing patio (440 sq ft) which by this stage had been completely ruined.
The Cowboy suggested that I extend the patio over an additional area of approx 330 sq ft up to where the old tree stump was and that I have a small retaining wall and some steps up to the lawn. This area was completely trashed and The Cowboy said he’d have to build a Soakaway in this area anyway. I asked him how much extra this was going to cost and he told me he’d have to work it out.
Some time later that day The Cowboy suggested to me that the existing patio bricks, some of which his workers had stacked would look bad compared to more modern bricks and suggested that he drive me round to see a driveway in Little Wakering which he had done with more modern bricks. He drove me to this house and I agreed the bricks looked good. Whilst there he then suggested that we drive to Builderbase to look at bricks for the patio and the wall, which we did and I pointed out some bricks I liked.
Later that day The Cowboy who told me that he’d spoken to a block paver he knew who told him the going rate was around £17 per sq metre and that with digging out the area and building the wall would cost £6000 pounds.
I asked ‘what about the making good of the existing patio?’, to which he agreed after some discussion to reduce the quote by £1000 to £5000. I accepted his quote. I asked him about a price for putting fences around the new bit of land he was using for access. He went and counted the fence panels next door and told me he’d get back to me with a price which he did later that week, of £1600 which I accepted.
(Incidentally, when I later visited the owner of the house in Little Wakering, he told me that he’d never heard of The Cowboy and that a local paver from the same road had laid his drive)
Later that week the windows arrived and were fitted. During the week The Cowboy spent one morning removing clay from the patio area with a digger and dumped it on what was left of the garden. When I complained about this The Cowboy said it would save on skips and was the best way of getting the garden level and that he’d rotovate it. He also dug a small hole for a ‘Soakaway’ and laid some pipes which we later discovered were not connected to the ‘Soakaway’ but the main foul water drains.
Neither my wife nor I are ones to complain. Whenever we had spoken with The Cowboy we had been polite. Throughout July however we both were becoming increasingly concerned at not only the quality of work but also the time it was taking to complete. We raised the issue of completion on many occasions concerning the job as a whole and individual jobs. Each time we were given no assurances as to how long The Cowboy would take to finish and regarding the state of individual jobs we got the usual ‘ don’t worry, it’s only temporary’. My wife told me when she’d asked about the lack of flashing, tiles and ridge tiles, The Cowboy had told her that he was ‘testing the felt’. When I later asked him about the same thing he replied ‘what are you worried about – it’s not raining!’
At the start of the week commencing Monday 24th July (week 12) The Cowboy started fitting the doors. I can only describe these doors as ‘short’. On the inside the frame was installed six inches above the floor level and on the outside there was a fourteen inch drop. I approached The Cowboy and told him that I thought the doors were too short and presented a tripping hazard and that we wouldn’t be able to get a pushchair in and out. He told me that they had to be that high due to building regulations and that all we needed was a step. I spoke with my wife and we both decided this was not what we had expected or wanted. I went back to The Cowboy and asked him to look at the door installation in our garage conversion. He became very aggressive and started swearing and told me that the conversion didn’t meet building regulations.
I told The Cowboy that I either wanted the doors installed correctly with no step or I wanted new doors that fit properly. I also said that we would like doors which were not broken – as was the handle and lock on the French doors and a cat flap hole cut too large on the single door. At this The Cowboy flew into a fit of temper and said words to the effect of ‘that’s f**king it – c’mon lads were off!! And he marched off site taking his bemused workers with him . For the rest of the week we didn’t know if he was coming back or not.
On the Thursday night or Friday morning The Cowboy called and said ‘What’s going on then?’ I said to him ‘You tell me ’. He then said that it was becoming difficult to him to work with my family around and that as we were going on holiday that weekend he had arranged for the electrician to come and that he would come in and finish the inside floors while we were away and also get the patio laid. I asked him what he was going to do about the doors and he told me he’d lower the lintels after he’d seen how high the patio bricks were going to come up the wall outside.
On the Saturday he arrived with the electrician and they went through the boxes of slate floor tiles saying some were of a different thickness to others and they might have difficulty getting the floor even. I went off to the tile shop to change around six boxes of the tiles to ones of the same thickness as the others. I also purchased the bedding cement and adhesive.
On the Sunday we were late leaving and The Cowboy arrived at lunchtime with the ‘second electrician’ to start laying floor tiles.
A week later we returned from holiday late in the evening of Sunday 7th August. – a day earlier than planned.
We immediately noticed that the patio bricks had been laid although kiln sand was missing from the joints. A rough coat of render had been applied to the outside walls. The Cowboy had lowered the same doors and replaced the gap above them between the lintel with pieces of timber. Inside The Cowboy had finished the kitchen floor which was covered with cement and adhesive. The tiles were very uneven and in some places raised half an inch above the adjoining tile. The place was a mess. The floor boards were still missing in the old dining room. My wife noticed that the sink was full of wire wool which we found out later they'd been using to remove the grout from the tiles and was badly damaged.
The next morning Monday 8th August The Cowboy arrived at around 10 o’clock with a gang of labourers who I hadn’t seen before. The Cowboy didn’t seem too pleased to see us and said ‘I thought you weren’t coming back until the evening’. The Cowboy explained that he’d got in some extra help to lay the patio and then made out it was such a difficult job getting the runoff correct. I asked The Cowboy about the kitchen floor and he said that he’d previously told me he wouldn’t be able get the floor even and I shouldn’t have bought those tiles. I asked him about the mess on the floor and he blamed one of his workers – Joe – who had been doing the grouting and didn’t realise it was grout adhesive combined until after he’d finished and realised the ‘grout‘ wouldn’t come off. The Cowboy seemed in such a bad mood that I didn’t dare say anything more about the doors.
This was the last week that The Cowboy was actually on site as he went off on holiday to Las Vegas the following week. He and two workers spent the rest of the Monday removing back to his house a pallet of patio bricks that he had over ordered. For the rest of the week we would occasionally see The Cowboy who was having trouble laying bricks for the steps. Joe spent two more days attempting to clean the floor with wire wool. A worker John carried on building a couple of courses of a retaining wall. Darren and Joe removed the old kitchen and ceiling and left many wires exposed. On one occasion while The Cowboy was not in attendance Joe received a very bad electric shock which burnt his hand.
On the Wednesday Joe’s brother arrived on site with Darren and the spent a day and a half putting up the fence. Darren told me that Joes brother had only ever put up one fence before.
Before The Cowboy left to go on holiday it rained and a large puddle formed on the patio around where The Cowboy had purportedly built a Soakaway. When I complained about it The Cowboy replied that it just needed thwacking down and he’d do it when he got back.
On the Friday before he left to go on holiday I asked The Cowboy if he could clear all the rubble, rubbish, tools and machinery off the garden as I had arranged to get some landscape gardeners in the following week to bring in some topsoil, rotovate the ground and lay turfs. I was concerned that if we didn’t get the garden straight there wouldn’t be enough growing season left for the grass to establish and we would be left with a mud garden for the winter.
He wasn’t too pleased and said ‘I thought I was doing that’. I explained my reasoning and he reluctantly agreed to have a skip delivered and arranged for Darren, Joe and John to turn up on the following Monday to clear up the mess.
On Monday 15th August Darren, John and Joe turned up. The removed a couple of fence panels and removed most of The Cowboy tools and equipment and left them on the land behind the property. They also cleared the best part of the rubble and rubbish into a skip which was also put on the adjacent land. While talking to them John and Joe told me they had got other jobs and wouldn’t be working for The Cowboy again. They told me they were fed up with only being paid £40 per day. I told them that The Cowboy had told me he paid them £100 per day minimum plus overtime. They were none too pleased.
With the exception of the first week, throughout the whole period when The Cowboy was employed his attendance on site was erratic.
The Cowboy would usually attend site early in the morning, assign jobs to whoever was there and then simply leave sometimes returning at lunchtime often repeating his disappearing trick for most of the afternoon. On some days I would meet him at the school gate at 3.15 and he’d say things such as I’ll be over yours in a while.
The Cowboy would rarely offer an explanation for why he could not be on site unless he intended removing all the workers from the job. On the odd occasions that he told us why he could not be on site he would say that there were emergencies.
The emergencies he mentioned varied from trouble with sub-contractors on another job, trouble with tenants and rent collection, that he had to mend his own fence, that he had problems with drainage at home, and that he had received a call from the Local Authority demanding he undertake immediate repairs to some properties he owned which were tenanted.
The Cowboy’s workers were equally erratic. On one occasion I said to one of The Cowboy's workers John ‘see you tomorrow’ to which he replied that he wouldn’t be in because he had to ‘go and sign on’.
Throughout the works everything seemed to be in a state of flux where The Cowboy would start one job but never finish it. If either I or my wife mentioned even politely any questions that we had with regards to the work he had undertaken, he was always very defensive and would say that the work was only temporary.
For the majority of the time that The Cowboy was employed at our property he showed little respect to it. Apart from the general damage he did to the garden area, The Cowboy or one of his workers ran over with a dumper truck and damaged irreparably some garden decking, a child’s trampoline and an inflatable swimming pool.
The Cowboy and his workers would constantly borrow tools from me. Some including a ladder were returned damaged and others such as drill bits and saws never returned. Internally The Cowboy or one of his workers ruined the new sink with steel wool and chipped the marble work surface. On one occasion The Cowboy threw one of our tea mugs at one of his workers in an outburst of temper. When I approached The Cowboy with complaints about damage he would sometimes apologise and say things like ‘we’ll sort something out’.
When The Cowboy returned from holiday he telephoned us and said that he couldn’t return to the site until Monday 5th September as he had things to sort out. The Cowboy later called around on the Saturday afternoon (3rd September – end of week 17) with his wife and said he wouldn’t be able to come that week as all his staff had deserted him for other jobs while he was on holiday. He said that his friend Darren wouldn’t be back from Wales for a week so there wasn’t a lot he could do on his own until he found more workers.
He also said that Darren hadn’t collected the rent from his properties as asked, so he’d have to spend the week doing that.
Next Post - Raindrops keep faling on my head - Breach of contract!
I informed The Cowboy that we’d submitted the building regulation forms.
The Cowboy said he’d call the building inspector to arrange a site visit for that week once the footings were dug, and then we could go ahead with the ready mix concrete foundations for which he needed some cash. I later paid him £5000 cash
During the first week The Cowboy replaced a damaged sewer pipe he had broken which led from the objectionable neighbours property underneath the old lean-to and connected with our sewers. I and my wife agreed to pay for this damage even though The Cowboy negligently broke it and The Cowboy quoted us £100.
On the day of the building inspectors first visit The Cowboy told me that it was probably better if we stayed out the way and he’d deal with him. After the building inspector had left The Cowboy told me that the building inspector from Rochford District Council was his ‘mate Len’ and he was more than happy with the excavations.
The Cowboy did say that the building inspector was not happy with the size of the proposed French doors at the rear of the old kitchen as he thought the wall /pillar in between the kitchen and old dining room which would have to support an RSJ was not big enough. The Cowboy said he’d suggested to the building inspector that he retains some of the old dining room wall as support for the RSJ and only puts a single door in the kitchen. This meant a change to the design of the new kitchen with brick pillars on either side of the room. I agreed to The Cowboy changes as they actually meant less work. I did not ask him for a refund for the replacing the proposed double doors with a single door. At no time did The Cowboy mention ‘soft spots’ or any other problems as The Cowboy later claims. The Senior Building Inspector Mr Len Martin later confirmed to me that he had not requested any special foundation requirements and was happy with the excavations. Mr Martin also later told me that although he had seen The Cowboy vans around the area, he had never before met The Cowboy or inspected any of his work.
On Friday The Cowboy arranged for the Ready mix concrete to be delivered which set over the weekend. At this time The Cowboy had four workers on site.
On the following Monday 16th May The Cowboy began laying bricks and had blocks and materials delivered. The Cowboy asked for a second payment of £5000 which we gave to him.
From this point onwards we started to have problems.
The Cowboy started to lay the first course of bricks himself without the aid of a plumb line. Around lunchtime The Cowboy unexpectedly left site and took two of his workers Joe and Danny with him. The Cowboy left on site John an inexperienced 17 year old labourer laying bricks, and Darren, The Cowboy's labourer foreman and school friend, who knocked up cement all day long.
On Monday evening The Cowboy returned late to pick them up and didn’t inspect their work.
On Tuesday The Cowboy dropped of his workers early in the morning and we didn’t see The Cowboy again until the evening.
On the Wednesday The Cowboy appeared during the day and had a fit of rage at the work that had been done, threw tools around, shouted and swore at Darren and John, knocked down some of the brickwork and started to redo it himself. The Cowboy stayed on site for the remainder of the week.
By the end of the second week the foundation brickwork had been completed and The Cowboy had partly laid one course of block work around the base. At the end of this week one of The Cowboy's workers Danny left the job.
The third week was much the same as the second regarding The Cowboy coming and going. The first two days he left John and Darren to carry on the block work up to the level of the window base. However when The Cowboy returned on the Tuesday evening and inspected their work it emerged that they had forgotten to put the damp proof course in on the far side and laid two courses of blocks too many. The Cowboy flew into a rage similar to the one on the previous week. On the Wednesday The Cowboy approached me and apologised for his behaviour the previous evening and asked as the roof was about to go on, could he have the third payment of £5000 in cash.
After I paid him I remember joking with my wife 'computer says no' when she asked me if I’d got a receipt, as I had been given the broken computer excuse again.
For the remainder of the third week The Cowboy employed John and Darren on ceiling and plaster removal in the dining room whilst he prepared the existing back wall to put the RSJ in place and continued with the block work.
Sometime during week three DG from DG Kitchen services visited with a copy of the kitchen layout plan for approval. He noted the progress of the works and said he’d call again next week.
During week four commencing 30th May, The Cowboy fitted the RSJ and completed the block work and put in a temporary sewage down pipe from our upstairs bathroom to the main sewers.
On the Thursday DG called over with the final kitchen units plan and met The Cowboy and they discussed the layout. Before he left, DG told me he thought it would be at least another month before they would be ready for kitchen fitting.
My wife and I expressed our concerns to The Cowboy that the work wasn’t going to be completed on time. The Cowboy admitted he was a ‘bit behind’ but assured us he’d complete on time. That weekend The Cowboy offered to work through and employed a Mr DA who he knows from the school gate to help him design the roof and cut the timbers. By the end of the weekend a basic timber structure was in place.
During week five commencing 6th June, The Cowboy called the building inspector to inspect the RSJ and I believe that the roof construction was also discussed. When on site, The Cowboy spent most of the week working on the roof timbers and installed some copper pipework.
At some time during the week I returned in the afternoon to find The Cowboy and two of his workers removing tiles from my garage conversion roof and inspecting a Velux window installation. I asked The Cowboy ‘What’s going on?’ to which he replied he was just checking to see how the Velux window fitting had been done to make sure he had enough timber support for the new kitchen Veluxes which were bigger. I told him to make sure he put the roof back securely. Later The Cowboy appeared to have trouble fitting three ‘Fakro’ windows into his roof construction and spent two days fitting and refitting these windows.
In Midweek around the 8th June, DG Services called with the final plan and pro forma invoice. DG walked around the block work with The Cowboy discussing possible installation times and marking the block work where electricity points and plumbing were required.
Before he left DG told me that he didn’t think the building would be ready on time and against his advice, The Cowboy had insisted that he fit the units over a long weekend on Friday 24th June, which was the weekend before our baby was due to be born.
Sometime later that day I again approached The Cowboy again and expressed my concerns that we wouldn’t have the new kitchen ready before the baby was born. He assured me that the works to the dining room and new kitchen would be complete and we’d have use of the new kitchen. The Cowboy stated that he could then work on the old kitchen / toilet and on the outside without having to disturb us in the main part of the house. I asked him how much longer that would take and he told me possibly two or three weeks.
Over the weekend The Cowboy employed an electrician who ran the wiring out to the new kitchen and dining room and fixed wall boxes. I asked The Cowboy if this electrician would be able to supply us with the electrical certification required by the building regulations.
The Cowboy told me that he had used the electrician before and he was fully qualified and had got out of college a year before. ( It turns out later in court that the 'electrician' wasn't qualified to do the work and the installation was illegal)
During week six commencing 13th June The Cowboy and two workers John and Joe, commenced the felt and battening of the roof and with the help of a ‘plasterer’ put a plasterboard ceiling in through the new kitchen dining area. The labourers and the plasterer then put a plaster undercoat throughout the whole dining area.
On the Saturday morning The Cowboy and Darren came in for a few hours and laid a concrete screed floor in the new kitchen area.
During week seven commencing 20th June the plasterer completed the plastering.
On Friday 24th DG Services arrived and fitted the unit bases over the weekend. There were no windows or doors fitted at this stage and The Cowboy kept blaming suppliers. The Cowboy put temporary plastic over the window and door holes to protect the kitchen and the appliances from the elements. DG services couldn’t fit any appliances as no electrical points had been installed. They arranged to return the following weekend however this was later deferred as The Cowboy was unable to get another electrician for a fortnight. It became obvious to me at this point that the kitchen would not be complete by the time the baby was born and I confronted The Cowboy who was apologetic.
Throughout the next week we hardly saw The Cowboy at all. It appeared to me that from this point onwards The Cowboy had given up completely caring about timescales to complete the job. On the Thursday one of his workers John told me he’d been fixing fences at The Cowboy's house and that The Cowboy was up at the school erecting a marquee for the school fete the following day. On the Friday afternoon of the fete my wife started to go into labour. I drove to the school to tell The Cowboy I had to go to the hospital. The fete was in full swing and I met the Mrs Cowboy Builder who offered to look after our son for the duration.
Our daughter was born on the second of July 2005 by which time the works should have been completed.
The Cowboy returned to our house on Monday 4th July. The Cowboy told me there wasn’t a lot more that he could do that week as he was waiting on windows and doors to be delivered and the electrician to come at the weekend, and that he had an emergency at one of his tenanted properties. The Cowboy left one worker Joe at the site all week, who he instructed to give the whole interior of the dining room / kitchen bare plaster one coat of trade white emulsion. I didn’t see The Cowboy again that week until the Thursday when he confirmed that an electrician would be coming at the weekend.
On Saturday 9th July The Cowboy arrived with a different electrician.
The Cowboy told me that the previous electrician had worked for this one but had been given the sack when he was caught having sex with this electricians daughter. This electrician whose name I cannot remember (and funnily enough wasn't in The Cowboy's court statement and like the rest of the Cowboy's workers didn't make statements to support him!) spent the weekend putting in wiring both inside and out and fitted an external floodlight. He also ran some wiring for the cooker and added an additional fuse box (which was later condemned and removed). The Cowboy fitted all the spotlights, light switches and the plug sockets in plain white plastic (which we later replaced at our own expense). Some of them were fitted upside down and many looked used with paint and dirt on them. When I complained to The Cowboy he said that they were just temporary.
During the week commencing the 11th of July The Cowboy arrived on Monday morning with tiles for the roof. The Cowboy laid the top few rows of tiles and then handed the job to John and Joe his workers. I assumed that they were nailing the tiles. They completed most of the job that week until they ran out of tiles leaving the edges and ridges and a large gap of about two feet next to where the extension should join the house. The Cowboy completed the edges himself with some different tiles he obtained that week. On the Wednesday he pulled one of his workers off site and was entirely pre-occupied with preparing his field for the children’s party he was hosting on Saturday 16th July, in particular a giant waterslide contraption, a scaffold zip wire construction and erecting marquees. Consequently very little was done to our property.
DG Services returned on the day of the party to connect the electrical appliances and complete the unit installation. They explained to me that they had had trouble fitting some of the units as the walls were not straight and the plaster uneven. Likewise they had to make many adjustments to the height of the units as the floor screed was very uneven and pitted. DG arranged for the worktop company Abbey Marble to come in later that week, who subsequently fitted the marble worktops to a good standard.
On the week commencing 18th July, The Cowboy was on site with two workers John and Joe, on the Monday and Tuesday sawing off roof timbers, refitting some fascia and one piece of soffit. On the Wednesday and Thursday Abbey Marble installed the worktops.
On or around the Tuesday morning I asked The Cowboy what he was going to do about the remaining existing patio (440 sq ft) which by this stage had been completely ruined.
The Cowboy suggested that I extend the patio over an additional area of approx 330 sq ft up to where the old tree stump was and that I have a small retaining wall and some steps up to the lawn. This area was completely trashed and The Cowboy said he’d have to build a Soakaway in this area anyway. I asked him how much extra this was going to cost and he told me he’d have to work it out.
Some time later that day The Cowboy suggested to me that the existing patio bricks, some of which his workers had stacked would look bad compared to more modern bricks and suggested that he drive me round to see a driveway in Little Wakering which he had done with more modern bricks. He drove me to this house and I agreed the bricks looked good. Whilst there he then suggested that we drive to Builderbase to look at bricks for the patio and the wall, which we did and I pointed out some bricks I liked.
Later that day The Cowboy who told me that he’d spoken to a block paver he knew who told him the going rate was around £17 per sq metre and that with digging out the area and building the wall would cost £6000 pounds.
I asked ‘what about the making good of the existing patio?’, to which he agreed after some discussion to reduce the quote by £1000 to £5000. I accepted his quote. I asked him about a price for putting fences around the new bit of land he was using for access. He went and counted the fence panels next door and told me he’d get back to me with a price which he did later that week, of £1600 which I accepted.
(Incidentally, when I later visited the owner of the house in Little Wakering, he told me that he’d never heard of The Cowboy and that a local paver from the same road had laid his drive)
Later that week the windows arrived and were fitted. During the week The Cowboy spent one morning removing clay from the patio area with a digger and dumped it on what was left of the garden. When I complained about this The Cowboy said it would save on skips and was the best way of getting the garden level and that he’d rotovate it. He also dug a small hole for a ‘Soakaway’ and laid some pipes which we later discovered were not connected to the ‘Soakaway’ but the main foul water drains.
Neither my wife nor I are ones to complain. Whenever we had spoken with The Cowboy we had been polite. Throughout July however we both were becoming increasingly concerned at not only the quality of work but also the time it was taking to complete. We raised the issue of completion on many occasions concerning the job as a whole and individual jobs. Each time we were given no assurances as to how long The Cowboy would take to finish and regarding the state of individual jobs we got the usual ‘ don’t worry, it’s only temporary’. My wife told me when she’d asked about the lack of flashing, tiles and ridge tiles, The Cowboy had told her that he was ‘testing the felt’. When I later asked him about the same thing he replied ‘what are you worried about – it’s not raining!’
At the start of the week commencing Monday 24th July (week 12) The Cowboy started fitting the doors. I can only describe these doors as ‘short’. On the inside the frame was installed six inches above the floor level and on the outside there was a fourteen inch drop. I approached The Cowboy and told him that I thought the doors were too short and presented a tripping hazard and that we wouldn’t be able to get a pushchair in and out. He told me that they had to be that high due to building regulations and that all we needed was a step. I spoke with my wife and we both decided this was not what we had expected or wanted. I went back to The Cowboy and asked him to look at the door installation in our garage conversion. He became very aggressive and started swearing and told me that the conversion didn’t meet building regulations.
I told The Cowboy that I either wanted the doors installed correctly with no step or I wanted new doors that fit properly. I also said that we would like doors which were not broken – as was the handle and lock on the French doors and a cat flap hole cut too large on the single door. At this The Cowboy flew into a fit of temper and said words to the effect of ‘that’s f**king it – c’mon lads were off!! And he marched off site taking his bemused workers with him . For the rest of the week we didn’t know if he was coming back or not.
On the Thursday night or Friday morning The Cowboy called and said ‘What’s going on then?’ I said to him ‘You tell me ’. He then said that it was becoming difficult to him to work with my family around and that as we were going on holiday that weekend he had arranged for the electrician to come and that he would come in and finish the inside floors while we were away and also get the patio laid. I asked him what he was going to do about the doors and he told me he’d lower the lintels after he’d seen how high the patio bricks were going to come up the wall outside.
On the Saturday he arrived with the electrician and they went through the boxes of slate floor tiles saying some were of a different thickness to others and they might have difficulty getting the floor even. I went off to the tile shop to change around six boxes of the tiles to ones of the same thickness as the others. I also purchased the bedding cement and adhesive.
On the Sunday we were late leaving and The Cowboy arrived at lunchtime with the ‘second electrician’ to start laying floor tiles.
A week later we returned from holiday late in the evening of Sunday 7th August. – a day earlier than planned.
We immediately noticed that the patio bricks had been laid although kiln sand was missing from the joints. A rough coat of render had been applied to the outside walls. The Cowboy had lowered the same doors and replaced the gap above them between the lintel with pieces of timber. Inside The Cowboy had finished the kitchen floor which was covered with cement and adhesive. The tiles were very uneven and in some places raised half an inch above the adjoining tile. The place was a mess. The floor boards were still missing in the old dining room. My wife noticed that the sink was full of wire wool which we found out later they'd been using to remove the grout from the tiles and was badly damaged.
The next morning Monday 8th August The Cowboy arrived at around 10 o’clock with a gang of labourers who I hadn’t seen before. The Cowboy didn’t seem too pleased to see us and said ‘I thought you weren’t coming back until the evening’. The Cowboy explained that he’d got in some extra help to lay the patio and then made out it was such a difficult job getting the runoff correct. I asked The Cowboy about the kitchen floor and he said that he’d previously told me he wouldn’t be able get the floor even and I shouldn’t have bought those tiles. I asked him about the mess on the floor and he blamed one of his workers – Joe – who had been doing the grouting and didn’t realise it was grout adhesive combined until after he’d finished and realised the ‘grout‘ wouldn’t come off. The Cowboy seemed in such a bad mood that I didn’t dare say anything more about the doors.
This was the last week that The Cowboy was actually on site as he went off on holiday to Las Vegas the following week. He and two workers spent the rest of the Monday removing back to his house a pallet of patio bricks that he had over ordered. For the rest of the week we would occasionally see The Cowboy who was having trouble laying bricks for the steps. Joe spent two more days attempting to clean the floor with wire wool. A worker John carried on building a couple of courses of a retaining wall. Darren and Joe removed the old kitchen and ceiling and left many wires exposed. On one occasion while The Cowboy was not in attendance Joe received a very bad electric shock which burnt his hand.
On the Wednesday Joe’s brother arrived on site with Darren and the spent a day and a half putting up the fence. Darren told me that Joes brother had only ever put up one fence before.
Before The Cowboy left to go on holiday it rained and a large puddle formed on the patio around where The Cowboy had purportedly built a Soakaway. When I complained about it The Cowboy replied that it just needed thwacking down and he’d do it when he got back.
On the Friday before he left to go on holiday I asked The Cowboy if he could clear all the rubble, rubbish, tools and machinery off the garden as I had arranged to get some landscape gardeners in the following week to bring in some topsoil, rotovate the ground and lay turfs. I was concerned that if we didn’t get the garden straight there wouldn’t be enough growing season left for the grass to establish and we would be left with a mud garden for the winter.
He wasn’t too pleased and said ‘I thought I was doing that’. I explained my reasoning and he reluctantly agreed to have a skip delivered and arranged for Darren, Joe and John to turn up on the following Monday to clear up the mess.
On Monday 15th August Darren, John and Joe turned up. The removed a couple of fence panels and removed most of The Cowboy tools and equipment and left them on the land behind the property. They also cleared the best part of the rubble and rubbish into a skip which was also put on the adjacent land. While talking to them John and Joe told me they had got other jobs and wouldn’t be working for The Cowboy again. They told me they were fed up with only being paid £40 per day. I told them that The Cowboy had told me he paid them £100 per day minimum plus overtime. They were none too pleased.
With the exception of the first week, throughout the whole period when The Cowboy was employed his attendance on site was erratic.
The Cowboy would usually attend site early in the morning, assign jobs to whoever was there and then simply leave sometimes returning at lunchtime often repeating his disappearing trick for most of the afternoon. On some days I would meet him at the school gate at 3.15 and he’d say things such as I’ll be over yours in a while.
The Cowboy would rarely offer an explanation for why he could not be on site unless he intended removing all the workers from the job. On the odd occasions that he told us why he could not be on site he would say that there were emergencies.
The emergencies he mentioned varied from trouble with sub-contractors on another job, trouble with tenants and rent collection, that he had to mend his own fence, that he had problems with drainage at home, and that he had received a call from the Local Authority demanding he undertake immediate repairs to some properties he owned which were tenanted.
The Cowboy’s workers were equally erratic. On one occasion I said to one of The Cowboy's workers John ‘see you tomorrow’ to which he replied that he wouldn’t be in because he had to ‘go and sign on’.
Throughout the works everything seemed to be in a state of flux where The Cowboy would start one job but never finish it. If either I or my wife mentioned even politely any questions that we had with regards to the work he had undertaken, he was always very defensive and would say that the work was only temporary.
For the majority of the time that The Cowboy was employed at our property he showed little respect to it. Apart from the general damage he did to the garden area, The Cowboy or one of his workers ran over with a dumper truck and damaged irreparably some garden decking, a child’s trampoline and an inflatable swimming pool.
The Cowboy and his workers would constantly borrow tools from me. Some including a ladder were returned damaged and others such as drill bits and saws never returned. Internally The Cowboy or one of his workers ruined the new sink with steel wool and chipped the marble work surface. On one occasion The Cowboy threw one of our tea mugs at one of his workers in an outburst of temper. When I approached The Cowboy with complaints about damage he would sometimes apologise and say things like ‘we’ll sort something out’.
When The Cowboy returned from holiday he telephoned us and said that he couldn’t return to the site until Monday 5th September as he had things to sort out. The Cowboy later called around on the Saturday afternoon (3rd September – end of week 17) with his wife and said he wouldn’t be able to come that week as all his staff had deserted him for other jobs while he was on holiday. He said that his friend Darren wouldn’t be back from Wales for a week so there wasn’t a lot he could do on his own until he found more workers.
He also said that Darren hadn’t collected the rent from his properties as asked, so he’d have to spend the week doing that.
Next Post - Raindrops keep faling on my head - Breach of contract!
The Contract - Get it in Writing or Else!
For a week I did not hear from The Cowboy. Thereafter I met The Cowboy on at least two occasions at the school gate. I asked him if he’d prepared the quote for me and he initially replied he was waiting on a mate who helped him with his costings and later, he’d got his costings back but hadn’t had a chance to write them up yet as his computer was still broken and not to worry as he’d sort something out soon.
On the 1st April 2005 I learned from one our near neighbours that he understood that our immediate neighbours had objected to our planning permission.
I immediately emailed Planman and consequently learnt that day in a return email from Planman that the planning application had been delayed until 25th April due to mislaid papers by the council and changes to the plan drawings requested as a result of an objection from our neighbours. Planman included these letters from the council as attachments to his email (I have all these emails which will eventually be published on http://www.cowboy-builders.com ). Planman sent me the final draft of the plan with the additional drawing the following day.
On Friday 8th April the last day of school term before the two week holiday I met The Cowboy at the school gates. The Cowboy told me he’d completed my quote and to pop round that evening after the kids were in bed around eight to discuss it with him.
I went round to The Cowboy's Ranch that evening.
Over a cup of coffee in his kitchen I asked The Cowboy ‘What’s it going to cost?’
The Cowboy leant over and said to me ‘Twenty three and a half grand’
I said it was a little steep and more than I anticipated.
He verbally went through the quote saying (to the best of my memory) that the clearance and foundations are going to take 1 week, the brick and block work 1 week, roof and tiling 2 weeks, fixings - door and window fitting, flooring, plastering electrical and plumbing 1 week, rendering painting and drainage and making good 1 week and he may have to move the drains which could take a few days. He added that he’d also have to allow four days for kitchen fitting which could happen the same time as they were finishing the outside.
Again The Cowboy justified himself saying he only used ‘proper tradesman’ who he paid £100 per day and high quality materials.
We discussed timescales as given his six week estimate and our baby being due to be born around the third week in June, meant the job had to start at the latest by the second week of May. I explained to The Cowboy that planning had been delayed and we were preferably looking at around May 3rd for him to start, assuming we received planning permission on the 25th as the letter from the council suggested.
The Cowboy said it suited his purposes as he still had a couple of jobs to finish, and he would definitely be available.
I asked The Cowboy again if this was a firm quote with no hidden extras. The Cowboy nodded and replied that if he came across anything that might be extra he’d discuss it with us first. I asked him what he requirements were for payment. The Cowboy replied that he needed £5000 up front to pay for materials and the next payment when the footings went down, a further payment when the roof went on and a final payment at completion. He also said if we could get it, he also preferred half the payment in cash as this saved him time having to go to the bank to get money out to pay his blokes who were all on the books and needed wages.
I accepted the £23500 quote and we shook hands.
At no time did The Cowboy indicate that his quote was not VAT inclusive, and given that the prices he charged me for the work in February were VAT inclusive, and his assurances that there were no hidden charges, I had no reason to assume otherwise.
I told The Cowboy I’d get my wife to arrange his £5000 deposit.
I asked The Cowboy if he could give me the quote in writing.
The Cowboy again replied ‘I’ll sort you something out soon as I get my computer fixed’.
Before I left The Cowboy handed me a Howden’s kitchen catalogue and said ‘You had better choose the kitchen you want quickly as I have to order it and it could take a month or more. I can get you anything in there for the price - I get them cost’
Over the following weekend I discussed with my wife the kitchens in the catalogue.
We decided that we didn’t like any of them.
I told my wife that I wasn’t very impressed by the kitchen I’d been in at The Cowboy's property and that I thought it looked cheap and poorly fitted.
We decided there and then to employ our own kitchen supplier and fitter.
We reasoned that this would allow The Cowboy more time to complete the building works.
I telephoned The Cowboy on the Sunday, but they’d gone away so I left a message on his answer phone to call us when he returned.
Sometime during that week we contacted DG Kitchen services of Southend who had been recommended by a friend. They arranged to call on the 25th April.
The Cowboy phoned me early on the Wednesday 20th April and left a message. I called The Cowboy back and told him that we didn’t like any of the kitchens in the catalogue and would supply and fit our own kitchen.
Aside from being ill with a chest infection, The Cowboy wasn’t very happy and started going on about kitchen units being all the same and that those in the book were ‘as good quality as your £10000 units.’
I told The Cowboy my wife had decided what she wanted and asked him how much he would reduce the quote by. He immediately answered abruptly £1500.
I remember being a little bit taken aback and thinking that kitchen fitters usually charge more than that just for fitting the kitchen (let alone that an element of this was supposed to be for VAT). I remember thinking I had little choice given the timescales and accepted the revised quote of £22,000.
I asked The Cowboy if he was available over the weekend to clear and level a small space on the new land for a greenhouse that was arriving on Tuesday 26th. He told me he’d be round on the Sunday.
On Sunday 24th April The Cowboy called in while passing and said he couldn’t make it but he’d fit us in on the Monday morning as he was currently working on a small job in Thorpe Bay in Southend.
We told The Cowboy that we’d been looking on the Internet and although the planning decision wasn’t due until Monday 25th, it appeared to have been made on the 21st and approved - so work could definitely start on the week starting 2nd May. I again asked him if he'd give us a quote in writing to which he said that his computer was still broken but he'd sort something out.
Whilst The Cowboy was at our house our neighbour who had objected to our planning, returned home and I took him round next door and introduced him as the builder who would be starting work on the extension in around a week’s time.
The Cowboy arrived at our house early on the Monday 25th April morning with his friend and employee Darren to put down the greenhouse base.
Whilst The Cowboy was at our house, as arranged, D&G services turned up to discuss with me and my wife the design of the kitchen units.
I introduced DG to The Cowboy and they discussed when the building would be ready for kitchen units to be installed. They discussed the plan are the likely locations of electrical and water supplies.
The Cowboy told DG and me that the building would be ready for kitchen fitting four to five weeks into the project.
Derek informed me that this was the order time for the units. DG told The Cowboy and ourselves that he would return three weeks into the project to mark the walls for electrical points and plumbing required, which he later did.
Before he left The Cowboy informed me that the job in Thorpe Bay wouldn’t be completed until after the bank holiday and he would start work on Wednesday 4th May.
Sometime over the long weekend of 1st - 3rd of May The Cowboy telephoned us to tell us that due to his illness and sub contractor problems he’d been delayed on the other job and wouldn’t be able to start work until Monday 9th May. We were rather concerned as the job was inching towards the baby's due date.
On Wednesday 4th May I telephoned The Cowboy at lunchtime because earlier that day a work colleague had told me we needed building approval before we could start work. Although I knew that a building inspector would have to ensure that the works were carried out to building regulations, I didn't realise that you needed building approval in addition to planning approval which I thought gave you building approval.
The cowboy sounded surprised and said ‘haven’t you got that yet? You only need to go down the council offices and pay your £350 or whatever for the building inspector visits’. I and my wife visited the Rochford District council building dept. later that day.
Sometime over the weekend of 7th-8th May The Cowboy visited us at our house and said that he’d just visited the ‘old couple next door’ ( our objectionable neighbours) and that they were fine about it.
The Cowboy explained he’d told them the works would take about 6 weeks and that he’d keep the site clean and safe for their dogs and make good any damage that might occur. When I spoke with our neighbour later that day she described him as ‘charming’.
Next post - Hole in the wall gang - The Contract Works
On the 1st April 2005 I learned from one our near neighbours that he understood that our immediate neighbours had objected to our planning permission.
I immediately emailed Planman and consequently learnt that day in a return email from Planman that the planning application had been delayed until 25th April due to mislaid papers by the council and changes to the plan drawings requested as a result of an objection from our neighbours. Planman included these letters from the council as attachments to his email (I have all these emails which will eventually be published on http://www.cowboy-builders.com ). Planman sent me the final draft of the plan with the additional drawing the following day.
On Friday 8th April the last day of school term before the two week holiday I met The Cowboy at the school gates. The Cowboy told me he’d completed my quote and to pop round that evening after the kids were in bed around eight to discuss it with him.
I went round to The Cowboy's Ranch that evening.
Over a cup of coffee in his kitchen I asked The Cowboy ‘What’s it going to cost?’
The Cowboy leant over and said to me ‘Twenty three and a half grand’
I said it was a little steep and more than I anticipated.
He verbally went through the quote saying (to the best of my memory) that the clearance and foundations are going to take 1 week, the brick and block work 1 week, roof and tiling 2 weeks, fixings - door and window fitting, flooring, plastering electrical and plumbing 1 week, rendering painting and drainage and making good 1 week and he may have to move the drains which could take a few days. He added that he’d also have to allow four days for kitchen fitting which could happen the same time as they were finishing the outside.
Again The Cowboy justified himself saying he only used ‘proper tradesman’ who he paid £100 per day and high quality materials.
We discussed timescales as given his six week estimate and our baby being due to be born around the third week in June, meant the job had to start at the latest by the second week of May. I explained to The Cowboy that planning had been delayed and we were preferably looking at around May 3rd for him to start, assuming we received planning permission on the 25th as the letter from the council suggested.
The Cowboy said it suited his purposes as he still had a couple of jobs to finish, and he would definitely be available.
I asked The Cowboy again if this was a firm quote with no hidden extras. The Cowboy nodded and replied that if he came across anything that might be extra he’d discuss it with us first. I asked him what he requirements were for payment. The Cowboy replied that he needed £5000 up front to pay for materials and the next payment when the footings went down, a further payment when the roof went on and a final payment at completion. He also said if we could get it, he also preferred half the payment in cash as this saved him time having to go to the bank to get money out to pay his blokes who were all on the books and needed wages.
I accepted the £23500 quote and we shook hands.
At no time did The Cowboy indicate that his quote was not VAT inclusive, and given that the prices he charged me for the work in February were VAT inclusive, and his assurances that there were no hidden charges, I had no reason to assume otherwise.
I told The Cowboy I’d get my wife to arrange his £5000 deposit.
I asked The Cowboy if he could give me the quote in writing.
The Cowboy again replied ‘I’ll sort you something out soon as I get my computer fixed’.
Before I left The Cowboy handed me a Howden’s kitchen catalogue and said ‘You had better choose the kitchen you want quickly as I have to order it and it could take a month or more. I can get you anything in there for the price - I get them cost’
Over the following weekend I discussed with my wife the kitchens in the catalogue.
We decided that we didn’t like any of them.
I told my wife that I wasn’t very impressed by the kitchen I’d been in at The Cowboy's property and that I thought it looked cheap and poorly fitted.
We decided there and then to employ our own kitchen supplier and fitter.
We reasoned that this would allow The Cowboy more time to complete the building works.
I telephoned The Cowboy on the Sunday, but they’d gone away so I left a message on his answer phone to call us when he returned.
Sometime during that week we contacted DG Kitchen services of Southend who had been recommended by a friend. They arranged to call on the 25th April.
The Cowboy phoned me early on the Wednesday 20th April and left a message. I called The Cowboy back and told him that we didn’t like any of the kitchens in the catalogue and would supply and fit our own kitchen.
Aside from being ill with a chest infection, The Cowboy wasn’t very happy and started going on about kitchen units being all the same and that those in the book were ‘as good quality as your £10000 units.’
I told The Cowboy my wife had decided what she wanted and asked him how much he would reduce the quote by. He immediately answered abruptly £1500.
I remember being a little bit taken aback and thinking that kitchen fitters usually charge more than that just for fitting the kitchen (let alone that an element of this was supposed to be for VAT). I remember thinking I had little choice given the timescales and accepted the revised quote of £22,000.
I asked The Cowboy if he was available over the weekend to clear and level a small space on the new land for a greenhouse that was arriving on Tuesday 26th. He told me he’d be round on the Sunday.
On Sunday 24th April The Cowboy called in while passing and said he couldn’t make it but he’d fit us in on the Monday morning as he was currently working on a small job in Thorpe Bay in Southend.
We told The Cowboy that we’d been looking on the Internet and although the planning decision wasn’t due until Monday 25th, it appeared to have been made on the 21st and approved - so work could definitely start on the week starting 2nd May. I again asked him if he'd give us a quote in writing to which he said that his computer was still broken but he'd sort something out.
Whilst The Cowboy was at our house our neighbour who had objected to our planning, returned home and I took him round next door and introduced him as the builder who would be starting work on the extension in around a week’s time.
The Cowboy arrived at our house early on the Monday 25th April morning with his friend and employee Darren to put down the greenhouse base.
Whilst The Cowboy was at our house, as arranged, D&G services turned up to discuss with me and my wife the design of the kitchen units.
I introduced DG to The Cowboy and they discussed when the building would be ready for kitchen units to be installed. They discussed the plan are the likely locations of electrical and water supplies.
The Cowboy told DG and me that the building would be ready for kitchen fitting four to five weeks into the project.
Derek informed me that this was the order time for the units. DG told The Cowboy and ourselves that he would return three weeks into the project to mark the walls for electrical points and plumbing required, which he later did.
Before he left The Cowboy informed me that the job in Thorpe Bay wouldn’t be completed until after the bank holiday and he would start work on Wednesday 4th May.
Sometime over the long weekend of 1st - 3rd of May The Cowboy telephoned us to tell us that due to his illness and sub contractor problems he’d been delayed on the other job and wouldn’t be able to start work until Monday 9th May. We were rather concerned as the job was inching towards the baby's due date.
On Wednesday 4th May I telephoned The Cowboy at lunchtime because earlier that day a work colleague had told me we needed building approval before we could start work. Although I knew that a building inspector would have to ensure that the works were carried out to building regulations, I didn't realise that you needed building approval in addition to planning approval which I thought gave you building approval.
The cowboy sounded surprised and said ‘haven’t you got that yet? You only need to go down the council offices and pay your £350 or whatever for the building inspector visits’. I and my wife visited the Rochford District council building dept. later that day.
Sometime over the weekend of 7th-8th May The Cowboy visited us at our house and said that he’d just visited the ‘old couple next door’ ( our objectionable neighbours) and that they were fine about it.
The Cowboy explained he’d told them the works would take about 6 weeks and that he’d keep the site clean and safe for their dogs and make good any damage that might occur. When I spoke with our neighbour later that day she described him as ‘charming’.
Next post - Hole in the wall gang - The Contract Works
Get on your Horse
In Decemeber of 2004 we choose an independent planning advisor http://www.planman.co.uk to draw up the plans and submit the necessary documentation to the local planning authority http://www.rochford.gov.uk . Planman visited the property in December and we discussed all our ideas for the extension with him. He took photographs and measurements and told us that because of Christmas there would be a delay and that the drawings would be ready for submission to the planning authority sometime in mid January and that he'd arrange it all for us. We duly paid him about £350 for his services.
After we returned from holiday in early January 2005 we were unfortunate to suffer a shed fire which destroyed some fence panels and our greenhouse as well.
One day I was clearing the mess into a skip in our driveway when the cowboy builder was passing and stopped to ask what was going on. I told him what had happened and he offered to help put down a new concrete base for the replacement shed and replace the close board fence panels. I asked him what it would cost and he told me about £1000 to £1500. I told him he'd got the job as it was covered by insurance and replacement had already been approved by the claims loss assessor.
The cowboy and a team of workers duly arrived over two weekends in mid January and did a satisfactory job. Whilst the cowboy was there I told him I'd believed our planning application for the extension should be in and when I got the plans I'd get him round to quote. We discussed in finer detail our extension requirements and he again told me it would take around six weeks to complete a job of that nature. I asked him what the fire damage work was going to cost and could he give me an invoice. He said not to worry as we could 'square up later'.
Around the end of the second week of February I got a call from Planman saying that the plan drawings were on their way to us and the necessary paperwork had been submitted to the council. He apologised for the delay as he'd been ill for a month with pneumonia. The drawings duly arrived. There were some mistakes on the drawings with windows omitted so we sent them back for correction. A couple of days later the corrected drawings were returned.
Around the beginning of March I tried to contact the cowboy by phone on at least four occasions as I was being pressed by the claims company for the final receipts and I wanted to settle up with him. When I finally spoke with him he told me that his computer was broken. I offered him the use one of mine and he came over later that day left me two sheets of headed paper and told me to type myself two invoices for him for £692 including VAT for the fences and £850 including VAT for the concrete base. He told me to number them 01641 and 01642 and I duly paid him.
I typed the invoice on one sheet of paper and sent it to the claims company, and kept the remaining one in my office. (I later handed this bit of headed paper over to my solicitor as proof of my honesty - after all I could have written out a quote for the extension myself on it!! - the solicitor failed to produce this in court for some reason that he has yet to explain to me.)
Getting a quote.
On the second Saturday in March I met the brother of the builder who had died in our road, and he informed me they were busy until August at the earliest. While I was there he phoned another building firm in Great Wakering, who unfortunately were also busy throughout the summer.
On the following Monday I met the cowboy's wife at the school gate and told her I’d like the cowboy to come over as soon as possible and give us a quote. She excitedly told me he was working away on a job in Malden but she’d let him know and it would best to call him that night to discuss it.
On the evening of 14th March 2005 I telephoned the cowboy and invited him to come over and give us a quote. (I know this from our telephone records which our solicitor also failed to produce in court for some reason even though they'd asked us to produce them!).
I phoned the cowboy and we spoke for half an hour and discussed timescales and the full extent of the work, and I expressed that we would definitely like work to start sometime in April to allow time for completion before our baby was born.
The Cowboy arranged to call over the next day 15th March.
He duly arrived late the following afternoon with a clipboard, tape measure and some photos and aerial photos of the property he said he was currently working on in Maldon.
I gave the Cowboy our only copy of the plan and we walked around the house discussing our requirements. Throughout the conversation I referred to my list of tasks I'd compiled which I’d previously used with the dead builder and Planman when discussing the requirements. I offered the Cowboy a copy but he told me he preferred to make his own notes. The cowboy made some notes on both his clipboard and the plan drawing as we walked around and took measurements of his own.
We also discussed in detail Planmans notes on the plan regarding building constraints and requirements.
As we walked around the property we spoke in detail about the layout of the kitchen, number and position of electrical sockets, appliances, plumbing, spot lighting, Velux roof windows and ceiling recesses. I took the Cowboy into my office (garage conversion) and showed him the Velux windows, ceiling recesses and spotlights and told him I wanted the same in the kitchen. To which he replied ‘no problem’. The cowboy pointed out that the drawing referred to a new rsj over the old external wall connecting to the new extension . He suggested that we conceal it in the wall so as to give the appearance of a continuous ceiling from the old dining room to the new kitchen extension. He said we'd have to replace the ceiling in the old dining room to allow for the spotlights and the walls would need replastering as the consisted of the old 1930's plaster which was rotten.
Whilst outside the Cowboy suggested that the main sewers might have to be moved to the side of the house to allow the doorway to fit and he’d include it in his pricing.
My wife was in the old kitchen when the majority of these requirements were discussed with the Cowboy. When we entered the old kitchen we discussed plumbing, as this is where the water mains is located and new pipes to the new kitchen would have to run from. The cowboy suggested that we might as well replaster and board to hide the pipework. Whilst in the old kitchen, my wife expressly asked the Cowboy for a washing machine to be temporarily connected to the mains supply in the old dining room. He replied ‘no problem, seeing as we’ve got to replaster we’ll just bash a hole through the wall and run a pipe off the mains supply’. During this time we also discussed raising the floor, bringing the outside toilet inside and blocking up the back door and replacing with a window as per the plan.
The Cowboy left the property with what I believe was a complete picture of all the works required. Before he left I asked him when I could expect a quote from him. To which he replied ‘Leave it with me, I’ve got to do me costings’ I thanked him for his time and asked him to provide a firm quote with no hidden costs or extras as we had a limited budget to work with. The Cowboy left the property with our only copy of the plan on which he had made notes and said he needed it for his costings.
Next - "The Quote"
After we returned from holiday in early January 2005 we were unfortunate to suffer a shed fire which destroyed some fence panels and our greenhouse as well.
One day I was clearing the mess into a skip in our driveway when the cowboy builder was passing and stopped to ask what was going on. I told him what had happened and he offered to help put down a new concrete base for the replacement shed and replace the close board fence panels. I asked him what it would cost and he told me about £1000 to £1500. I told him he'd got the job as it was covered by insurance and replacement had already been approved by the claims loss assessor.
The cowboy and a team of workers duly arrived over two weekends in mid January and did a satisfactory job. Whilst the cowboy was there I told him I'd believed our planning application for the extension should be in and when I got the plans I'd get him round to quote. We discussed in finer detail our extension requirements and he again told me it would take around six weeks to complete a job of that nature. I asked him what the fire damage work was going to cost and could he give me an invoice. He said not to worry as we could 'square up later'.
Around the end of the second week of February I got a call from Planman saying that the plan drawings were on their way to us and the necessary paperwork had been submitted to the council. He apologised for the delay as he'd been ill for a month with pneumonia. The drawings duly arrived. There were some mistakes on the drawings with windows omitted so we sent them back for correction. A couple of days later the corrected drawings were returned.
Around the beginning of March I tried to contact the cowboy by phone on at least four occasions as I was being pressed by the claims company for the final receipts and I wanted to settle up with him. When I finally spoke with him he told me that his computer was broken. I offered him the use one of mine and he came over later that day left me two sheets of headed paper and told me to type myself two invoices for him for £692 including VAT for the fences and £850 including VAT for the concrete base. He told me to number them 01641 and 01642 and I duly paid him.
I typed the invoice on one sheet of paper and sent it to the claims company, and kept the remaining one in my office. (I later handed this bit of headed paper over to my solicitor as proof of my honesty - after all I could have written out a quote for the extension myself on it!! - the solicitor failed to produce this in court for some reason that he has yet to explain to me.)
Getting a quote.
On the second Saturday in March I met the brother of the builder who had died in our road, and he informed me they were busy until August at the earliest. While I was there he phoned another building firm in Great Wakering, who unfortunately were also busy throughout the summer.
On the following Monday I met the cowboy's wife at the school gate and told her I’d like the cowboy to come over as soon as possible and give us a quote. She excitedly told me he was working away on a job in Malden but she’d let him know and it would best to call him that night to discuss it.
On the evening of 14th March 2005 I telephoned the cowboy and invited him to come over and give us a quote. (I know this from our telephone records which our solicitor also failed to produce in court for some reason even though they'd asked us to produce them!).
I phoned the cowboy and we spoke for half an hour and discussed timescales and the full extent of the work, and I expressed that we would definitely like work to start sometime in April to allow time for completion before our baby was born.
The Cowboy arranged to call over the next day 15th March.
He duly arrived late the following afternoon with a clipboard, tape measure and some photos and aerial photos of the property he said he was currently working on in Maldon.
I gave the Cowboy our only copy of the plan and we walked around the house discussing our requirements. Throughout the conversation I referred to my list of tasks I'd compiled which I’d previously used with the dead builder and Planman when discussing the requirements. I offered the Cowboy a copy but he told me he preferred to make his own notes. The cowboy made some notes on both his clipboard and the plan drawing as we walked around and took measurements of his own.
We also discussed in detail Planmans notes on the plan regarding building constraints and requirements.
As we walked around the property we spoke in detail about the layout of the kitchen, number and position of electrical sockets, appliances, plumbing, spot lighting, Velux roof windows and ceiling recesses. I took the Cowboy into my office (garage conversion) and showed him the Velux windows, ceiling recesses and spotlights and told him I wanted the same in the kitchen. To which he replied ‘no problem’. The cowboy pointed out that the drawing referred to a new rsj over the old external wall connecting to the new extension . He suggested that we conceal it in the wall so as to give the appearance of a continuous ceiling from the old dining room to the new kitchen extension. He said we'd have to replace the ceiling in the old dining room to allow for the spotlights and the walls would need replastering as the consisted of the old 1930's plaster which was rotten.
Whilst outside the Cowboy suggested that the main sewers might have to be moved to the side of the house to allow the doorway to fit and he’d include it in his pricing.
My wife was in the old kitchen when the majority of these requirements were discussed with the Cowboy. When we entered the old kitchen we discussed plumbing, as this is where the water mains is located and new pipes to the new kitchen would have to run from. The cowboy suggested that we might as well replaster and board to hide the pipework. Whilst in the old kitchen, my wife expressly asked the Cowboy for a washing machine to be temporarily connected to the mains supply in the old dining room. He replied ‘no problem, seeing as we’ve got to replaster we’ll just bash a hole through the wall and run a pipe off the mains supply’. During this time we also discussed raising the floor, bringing the outside toilet inside and blocking up the back door and replacing with a window as per the plan.
The Cowboy left the property with what I believe was a complete picture of all the works required. Before he left I asked him when I could expect a quote from him. To which he replied ‘Leave it with me, I’ve got to do me costings’ I thanked him for his time and asked him to provide a firm quote with no hidden costs or extras as we had a limited budget to work with. The Cowboy left the property with our only copy of the plan on which he had made notes and said he needed it for his costings.
Next - "The Quote"
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