very poor job by tiler from this forum

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snadge

about 9 weeks ago I came on here to get advice about what was a good price for having our kitchen tiled so we would know if we were getting ripped off or not... the outcome of that was a tiler from this forum came and priced it (telling us we were being ripped off by the other company for £200 to tile all around kitchen splashback) he offered to do it for £130 - we gave him the job.. all we wanted was a fair price and a professional job done...

top and bottom of it is he done a really poor Job... tiles not straight...the run isnt straight either, lippage, adhesive coming through gaps, VERY BADLY grouted, silicone like a blind man had done - seriously..I have the photos.. a Tile was kicking out on the corner so much that it cast a shadow all the way across the rest of the run when lights were on.. he also scratched al our stainless steel sockets with his supposed "non-abrasive" pads... I offered to remove all these sockets and turn off the electric supply but he refused saying "i didnt have too" and that he would use "tape and paper" to cover them and to stop water getting in?? - he didnt even bother to cover our oak worktop surfaces which were £600 and brand new as was the kitchen, he wanted to leave them wet with grout all over them but I told him no and cleaned, dried and covered them...when he left it dried out and needed to be re-oiled, there was even some green pen ink from one of his felt tip pens on the worktop I had to sand down to remove it..

here we are 9 weeks down the road and we still have the poor tiling, he offered a refund and we obviously havent received that either... I requested weeks ago that he send a cheque via rec delivery and he now replies with he sent "cash last week" hmmm , I bet it was non-recorded aswell... edit: yep i was right...not recorded delivery...now nobody would be so stupid to send £100 cash in the post not recorded...it only costs 70p

we are absolutley devastated...the last 9 weeks of my life have been misery, everytime I go in that kitchen im reminded of the predicament im in, I already suffer with really bad mental health problems and I suffer panic attacks and this is actually making me ill - even worse is I recommended him to my girlfriend as she had a reputable tiling company already lined up to do it but I was trying to do her favour and save her money by getting him to do it for a 'real' price and look whats happened, so you can imagine how I feel... Iam busy trying to help a friend out by helping him build a website so I can get some cash to give back to her towards the replacement tiling which is £450 weve been qouted to have it removed, new tiles and re-tiled.

absolutley devastated... :(

"if its not good enough for my house, its not good enough for my customers..." ...sick joke that isnt it?

heres whats wrong:

1. the tiling is not straight, it runs off up from the corner and is raised in the middle and anyone can see that, then runs back down towards other side.
2. he should have started in the center of the wall so center grout line is in middle of the hob/hood running down and worked your way out too the sides from there...but he started in the corner and center line is a good 2 inches off...not a major issue but shouldnt have been done like that.
3. he has chipped and gouged (scratched) some of the tiles. most of this was done when he's gouged out some of the grout to regrout it.
4. some tiles are not sitting straight, particularly in the middle above hob two tiles are sitting at angles opposite to each other and right in the corner there are two really bad ones
5. the grouting is abysmal... to say the least, its light in places and dark in others (dirty mix?) and uneven, thick in places, not enough in others and has scratches and lines,gouges in it (peaks and troughs too) - everyone ive showed the tiling too cant believe the state of the grouting, ive been told that there is also lippage and adhesive on show coming through where grout is supposed to be.
6. some tiles appear to sitting slightly proud too (is this lippage?), when we turn on lights you can see it even more.
7. under the hood where he has left the rough edges in view ive been told he could/should have run a chrome (or other) lip all the way along underneath butt-up-to the hood, my GF said just fill the gaps at the sides but she doesnt know, she not a tiler, niether am I.. i did say the best thing to do would be to run a lip all way along and he agreed but just said we didnt have enough, ive been told that a professional tiler would have suggested that in first place, gave us several choices of lip and would have driven to get the stuff to do it which was 1 mile away at B&Q. instead we have rough edges with adhesive all over it, not a problem in itself but just worth mentioning.


PHOTOS - these do them no justice as they dont look half as bad on photo, in person its a real eye sore.

pics of the silicone thats now been removed:

tiling1.jpg

tiling2.jpg

tiling3.jpg


there was lots of that silicone just like that, longer runs of it too...


check out the silicon here AND the tile with corner sticking out.
tiling4.jpg




pics of the tiling not level: you can see it more when you see it start from the corner

tiling7.jpg



as you can see in pic below the two tiles that are at opposite angles to each other - the gap from the worktop to the tiles is at its peak there..
LOOK at the grouting aswell

tiling8.jpg



here below you can see what the grouting is like, its like at all over and worse in some places

p1010705x.jpg



more grouting, lots of itlike this, I had to take close up photos for obvious reasons but in person when you see it as a whole its worse..!!

CHECK OUT THE SCRATCH AT BOTTOM ASWELL AS GROUTING most of this was done when he's gouged out some of the grout to regrout it.

p1010707.jpg



this corner sums up the rest of the job as a whole

25664766.jpg



ive adjusted the contrast on this so you can see it better

p1010718a.jpg



more

p1010719.jpg

p1010712a.jpg



I can go on and on with pictures.... what these pictures havent shown is scratches to the double sockets and all chipped and scratched tiles but if you so wish I put up pictures of those then I will... although one picture does show a gouge/scratch one the tile
 
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It's sad to hear when a tradesman turns out to be a cowboy, 2 things though, 1 name and shame him :mad: , and 2 you get what you pay for, i know thats not helpful but it's a lesson in life, just cause the're on here it don't make them a trustworthy traadesman, again sad to here your story.[/list]
 
Hi snadge; I know the history of this one & I thought it was going to be resolved! obviously not. There is no excuse for shoddy work but before we start naming/shaming/branding on here, any chance of a little more background & maybe some pics of the work, even if only in your profile?

I know who is involved & although I don’t know him personally, I’m a little surprised it’s turned bad for you! :cry:
 
Hi Richard and Plumbgas, I have adjusted the original post and added just a few of the photos I have, I want to say that they do look much worse in person, as you can see it all as a whole and in better detail, but take a look at those, ive added a list of things that are wrong with with it.. I forgot to mention he also chipped, scratched, gouged a few tiles too..

Ive had a reply from him saying that he did indeed send £100 cash un-recorded in the post... nobody who has any sense would do that (only someone who wants to say they sent it but really hasnt).. I even asked him to send a cheque but he refused and says he sent cash - as we had not received anything for weeks when I asked him what was happening I advised him to send it by Recorded Delivery as I had a feeling what was coming next..low and behold I was correct. he goes on to mention that I only asked him to send it rec. delivery the other day as if to imply its MY fault for not asking him to do so originally.. I did say cheque "originally" so that if it were lost or stolen it would be useless and nobody would be out of pocket and another cheque could be sent
- we wont ever see that money from him, now we have to fork out £450 to get it sorted...

it has me absolutely stressed out and my anxiety is through the roof...
 
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job does look awful, and i am in no way defending the tiler but the scratches on the tiles that you've shown look like they would have been in the tiles in the first place. it would be very hard for a tiler to mark the tiles like that. the chips too - he would have had to work hard to chip a lot of them whilst tiling. what he shouldnt have done is used the marked\chipped tiles.

Just pointing this out in case you end up moving it forward. best if you sound credible.

sounds like richard C knows a bit about the job\tiler itself so i wont comment in any detail on that.

You sound pretty stressed in your posts, try to remember that whilst it is annoying and a shame, no-one died and it can be put right. theres no sense in working yourself up as much as you sound like you are.
 
job does look awful, and i am in no way defending the tiler but the scratches on the tiles that you've shown look like they would have been in the tiles in the first place. it would be very hard for a tiler to mark the tiles like that. the chips too - he would have had to work hard to chip a lot of them whilst tiling. what he shouldnt have done is used the marked\chipped tiles.

Just pointing this out in case you end up moving it forward. best if you sound credible.

sounds like richard C knows a bit about the job\tiler itself so i wont comment in any detail on that.

You sound pretty stressed in your posts, try to remember that whilst it is annoying and a shame, no-one died and it can be put right. theres no sense in working yourself up as much as you sound like you are.

actually - those were caused from him gouging out the grout to regrout it - which was a fail aswell... there are a few more lighter ones.. they certainly werent in the tiles and if they were he shouldnt have installed them... so thats no defence for him on that respect - there are also two hairline scratches , the scratches/gouges werent there until he gouged it out and regrouted (just a small section) , he went too fix a job and made WORSE!
 
i wasnt trying to defend him - i did say he shouldnt have used them.

the pic looked like a glazing fault, but if hes been at them with a grout remover ...
 
you get what you pay for, i know thats not helpful but it's a lesson in life, just cause the're on here it don't make them a trustworthy traadesman, again sad to here your story.[/list]

I wasnt trying to cut corners and get it done on the cheap though? - I wanted to know if WHAT a fair price was for the job so we dont get ripped off - we were told by him that a proper price would be £130... and the other company was charging £200 and he said that was way over...

so its not like i tried to cut corners and get it done cheaply... I thought £130 was a 'proper' price for a professional job - had I known it wasnt I would have certainly paid the £200

...so in that respect I dont think that is a fair comment in this case but i do agree with it
 
Who was it?
Who it is, is not important at the moment; you will find out when snadge chooses to tell all; I’m not interested in turning this into a "General Forum" circus slanging session but I’m not defending anybody; one way of finding out is to do some “intelligent” post searches. I won’t stand shoddy work but am trying to keep this on an, unbiased even keel at the moment for obvious reasons. We are talking about a regular contributor here & I am trying to understand what went wrong but it is not in anyone’s interest to jump the gun.
 
The only reason I'm not gonna post his name, is because the post will prob get deleted and that won't help the poster get he's problem sorted...

The cloak and dagger thing ****s's me off tho.
 
FFS, defend a friend, hide a bodger.
Don’t start making false accusations & slagging me off *********** I've already said he's not my friend & I will not defend bad workmanship, I just don’t want a General Forum style witch hunt.

If you knew my style at all you would be very aware that I will be the first to condemn bad workmanship. If your only aim is to Troll, ******* & troll somewhere else. :evil:
 
FFS, defend a friend, hide a bodger.
Don’t start making false accusations & slagging me off........ I've already said he's not my friend & I will not defend bad workmanship, I just don’t want a General Forum style witch hunt.

If you knew my style at all you would be very aware that I will be the first to condemn bad workmanship. If your only aim is to Troll, ........ troll somewhere else. :evil:

Sorry, it's your forum is it?

No, didn't think so.

I think you should re read my posts and then re read your reply and you will see how sillly and uncalled for your reply was...Especially tomorrow.

No trolling here, not my style, just hate bullshite and like to say it as I feel.

Over and out.
 
i will be totally honest: I did not name him (yet) because I was scared that other users on the forum would come down on me like a ton of bricks because he is a regular member in the tiler forum, and also too give him a little more time to see if he actually is going to refund us so at least we have 'some' money towards a re-fit - but I dont think he is at all...

- I want my post to stand as a warning to others that come here looking for help and advice, that may get lulled into a false sense of security and end up having someone who's not what they think they are completely messing up their home or project and because they are self employed "single person" tradesmen and not a 'company' with shop(s) it is easier for them to "bodge it & leg it"

people like that are a bad mark on tradesman that are good at their jobs, as now I wont ever trust another self employed tradesman, it will be full on companys who have shops (address where you can find them) and reputations to keep from now on out.
 

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