Advise regarding dispute with plumber

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Uraeus

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Hey folks,

Wouldn't mind some feedback from you on the following matter.

Wall of text beware..

I few weeks ago after the mad rains in Durban, I wanted to add some extra drainage around our house, since I noticed pooling of water when it rains.

So the weekend comes and I start by locating the nearest drain to where I can have the excess water go. So I start by digging, and digging some more.

Eventually notice I got a pretty bad plumbing problem where my storm water pipes and sewerage pipes have broken and have cracked in them due to old age. Also my paving had sunk over the months, which I only noticed afterwards.

So I get the handy garden boy to start digging some more to find the problem, where I thought I should get a plumber to come an Quote to fix the problem.

So the plumber says he cant quote until he has seen the extent of the problem. So after 3 days of getting his laborer to dig, they exposed around 5m of piping, which was old. Although the rest of the house has the same problem with old piping.

The next day I come home and now the hole has been covered up and I've been handed an invoice, not a quote, for what I believe to be excessive, of R5000.

After doing some bouncing of emails for the parts listed on the invoice, they come to R600 (courtesy of builders express).

Is it really reasonable to charge me R5000 for changing a pipe? :wtf:
 
Labour for plumbers.... it's like R350 to R500 an hour, isn't it?
That's where they make their money.
 
The labourer worked for three days not the plumber. Labourers are about R150 a day. Price seems excessive and why didn't he quote or give an indication of price per day?
 
Surely its not R350-R500 for the laborer digging the hole? 6 hours a day, for 3 days, 18 hours * R350 = R6300.
Im not complaining cos I got a discount. Yes the actual plumber did assist, but wasnt there 80% of the time
 
That is why I'm a tad picked off. Didn't do what I asked. A quote. Yes, go and dig a hole so you can quote on the job, don't do the work until you verify with the client surely?
 
Uraeus said:
That is why I'm a tad picked off. Didn't do what I asked. A quote. Yes, go and dig a hole so you can quote on the job, don't do the work until you verify with the client surely?
Click to expand...

But coming back to it, yes, it is super crap that they charged you 90% labour and 10% parts.
My suggestion would be that you can say you never accepted any quotation (important!!) to have them fix the fault. I do however not know how to go about them spending hours and hours digging.
 
It was a single unsupervised laborer working 6 hours a day, Albeit really slowly. The plumber visited possibly twice a day to check the laborer was on track.

A laborer is like R120/day Tops. Assuming the plumber is taking fat profit, that is R250/day + a few R350/hour hours.

Now i'm beginning to see how they charge..darn it. Any plumbers on this forum ? ;)
 
Tell him you reject his quote and will be getting other quotes!

Admittedly, the problem was that it was his labourer that was digging. You couldnt have expected no charge.

However, neither could you have expected such a large charge. He wasnt upfront with you, and you didnt ask.

I know a plumber. Not that all plumbers are the same, but from what I can gather, prices are largely made up on the spot and can depend on whether they like you and if you called them out on a Saturday in the middle of a rugby game.
 
Be honest. Tell him you were expecting him to quote as originally discussed an that you did not give the go ahead for the repair. suggest you perhaps get anothyer plumber to quote and be prepared to meet the original guy on the new quote.
 
I think you should try level with him. You never signed or agreed to paying anything in the first place, so he can't just invoice you. Try get a few quotes on the work and get him to come down to something a bit more reasonable.

Had you known that it would cost that much I'm sure you would have gotten your garden boy to do all of the digging and then get the plumber to fix the pipe at a cost of +-R1500.
 
Here is where anyone who says "reason" with him is wrong.

He was asked to quote, he didn't do that... you didn't give him the go ahead to do any repairs. Tell him you will not pay the invoice as you that is not what you wanted. Its his loss if he had a labourer dig for 3 days and all that...
 
Did you or did you not allow the plunber to repair the pipes.
If you only requested a quote then surely that's what you were supposed to be given.
You could have done it cheaper but R5K is nornal for such a job.
 
You can't work out the value of the job on parts and the cost of a laborer. Presumably the dudes entitled to make a living as a qualified expert.

Admittedly, his mistake was invoicing before quoting but he's entitled to charge you for a quote regardless.

R5k seems like the upper side of reasonable for the job done, but how many quotes would you have been willing to pay for?

Jobs done, pay the man.
 
He's only allowed to charge for a quote if he makes you aware of the cost beforehand...

I also disagree with the "jobs done pay the man" aspect.

the OP asked for a quote, anything above that is not part of the job spec and therefore is at the plumbers cost...
 
B.O.F.H. said:
He's only allowed to charge for a quote if he makes you aware of the cost beforehand...

I also disagree with the "jobs done pay the man" aspect.

the OP asked for a quote, anything above that is not part of the job spec and therefore is at the plumbers cost...
Click to expand...

Yes, legally speaking. But, the required job was done. Unless the price is unreasonably high the plumber deserves compensation. I'm guessing the price is reasonable if he took the liberty of doing the work when the OP could quite easily and legally refuse payment.

I'm talking about what's right and fair and not what's strictly legal.

If the guy did a good job at a reasonable price, pay him.
 
Unless of course the object is to get free stuff at the cost of a small businessman.
 
I completely disagree with that attitude.

A supplier was asked to do a job (supply a quote), what is right and fair is that the supplier do what was asked of them.

By doing the work (if he has done the work) he has removed the owners right to get multiple quotes and decide who he wants to have do the actual work.
 
B.O.F.H. said:
I completely disagree with that attitude.

A supplier was asked to do a job (supply a quote), what is right and fair is that the supplier do what was asked of them.

By doing the work (if he has done the work) he has removed the owners right to get multiple quotes and decide who he wants to have do the actual work.
Click to expand...

/shrugs

So, then he should have dug up the pipe in its entirety then got plumbers in to do the quote.

The real question here is if he got stiffed. If not, just pay and don't be anal about it.

The fact is that fault finding is a billable service. I seriously doubt the OP believed he would have a company on site fault finding for three days at no cost.
I'm guessing the difference between the cost to find the fault and the cost to repair is negligable. Without the fault finding work the best he could have hoped for is an estimate. Unless he was willing to pay for the fault finding and then get multiple quotes.

Paying the plumber who did the fault finding for the repair seems like the more convenient option.

Or he could screw him for the difference on a legality. You get *******s like that everywhere. They're usually the ones who end up bitching about ****ty workmanship.
 
Thank you everyone for the feedback.

I knew it would have been a costly ordeal replacing pipes, which is why I asked for a quote. People get quotes
all the time, doesn't mean they get the job done right then and there.

We have been living with the problem unknown for well over a year, and the previous owner would have not known about it either.

I have no trouble paying people to do work, that is quoted for beforehand. I had already been burnt by a builder doing work without quotes, then handing me a huge invoice.

I contacted the plumbers requested an additional invoice detailing costs of excavation, removal and installation of piping.

Basically say 3600 is for labor, including 600 for excavating the pipes. Yes I understand people need to make a living in the end of the day, no objections to that.

I guess I should just pay it and accept more school fees i've had to outlay.. or be willing to go to small claims over it.
 
Are you sure that the pipe was actually replaced ? Time to dig it up again imo.
 
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