customer canceled after 7 day cool off

[Eco Deal]

We had a guy sign up arranged scaffold and sent lads on job.

we hit a problem - roof tiles where very thin so we could not angle grinded alot out of back to fit tiles back down flush.

so rather than just go ahead we stopped job told customer that his tiles would be poping up if we continue , ..
blah blah.

SO i found a thinner roof bracket which will solve the problem now ....

anyway he does not want to go ahead

so I am 400 quid down on scaffold and 400 on labour cost ???

what would you guys do ?

the customer does use forums as well

 

[infinity]

was it past 7 day cancellation?

 

[whinmoor]

Did you take a deposit? How much?

 

[SolarCity]

For what reason does he not want to continue?

 

[Gavin A]

We had a guy sign up arranged scaffold and sent lads on job.

we hit a problem - roof tiles where very thin so we could not angle grinded alot out of back to fit tiles back down flush.

so rather than just go ahead we stopped job told customer that his tiles would be poping up if we continue , ..
blah blah.

SO i found a thinner roof bracket which will solve the problem now ....

anyway he does not want to go ahead

so I am 400 quid down on scaffold and 400 on labour cost ???

what would you guys do ?

the customer does use forums as well

Problems is, they could argue this should have been picked up at survey stage... obviously that'd take an expert at tiles with a mighty keen eye to have spotted, but they could argue it.

We had one like this a while back for a 4kWp sanyo system, 2 year old house, guy had rung us originally saying he was a building surveyor himself, and had already had 3 companies round to survey saying the roof was fine etc so didn't need a site survey, but we did one anyway. survey showed it as being a warm roof construction, but as we couldn't tell exactly what the construction was, because it was fully insulated and boarded etc we said we needed to see the original plans to be sure... anyway, I wasn't too concerned because he ought to know these things if he's a trained building surveyor etc and it looked like it'd be 6" x 2" rafters minimum with insulation between and below, just like another we'd just done.... so eventually he sends us the plans the night of the actual job, which I don't get to look at until the morning when the team's already on site... phone call from site saying the roofs really odd, so I check the plans and it turns out it's a sodding SIPS roof construction, and after a day trying to come up with a mounting method that'd work we eventually manage to speak with the buildings engineer, who says no chance.

We returned the guy's entire deposit straight away, but he was still kicking off and wanting us to cover half the interest payments on the loan he'd apparently taken out. At that point I told him that I thought we'd acted entirely reasonably, and he'd have to take that one on the chin for not sending us the plans when asked.

moral of the story, never trust a building surveyor, if they don't even know their roof is a SIPS roof (or that the gable wall had structural vertical beams, not blockwork)... and always say no to SIPs unless it's at the design and build stage.

 

[dansk]

MEP, same as Gavin TBH, live and learn and take it on the chin, at the end of the day its 800 of your tax, out of all your installs how many times does this happen? first time ever? if so its bound to happen one day. unless your a stubburn one then get the real code out, it fully protects you also once works have started. if it was me i would explain the costs so far to customer, ask nicley if he would make a contribution becuase you have a solution but he dont want it, and if not smile and say thank you very much and pull out. then post his name address in here so no one else gets caught ;-)

 

[SRE]

I'd take the labour on the chin and the scaffold out of the deposit. Our roofer is one of the best in the area and even he comes across problems sometimes when he's on the roof that couldn't be identified before the job started.

Customers often don't understand the structure of their house and the implications of the work you're doing that's why we include the structural assessment in their pack and only use roofers that are member of the Federation of Master Builders. The customer generally panics when something unexpected happens and the answer is often no as a result.

On your prices MEP I can't see how you can afford not to charge for the scaffolding. I might be able to take it on the chin because I've built in some slack but if I were in your shoes I'd be charging for it - very nicely with a sympathetic smile on my face of course.

 

[Eco Deal]

We have had this four-five times now

Three during the Nov 11 - Dec 11 rush , Supply sortages so customers cancel even tho we offered a suitable replcement Ie Power one 3600TL instead of SMA 4000TL.

So we took all them on the chin.

one guy we signed up had an abestos roof and a tiled roof on the house , so we told him we can not touch abestos roof so he signed up to have his panels on his tiled house roof ... two weeks later he calls "I found an installer who will fit on abestos roof can I have my money back'' ????

took this on chin ......

Getting fed up with being messed around now I know other installer would cover thier cost

 

[Eco Deal]

he does use forums this is where he found us ..

 

[Gavin A]

tbh, I wish I'd kept the deposit money now, as we've still not managed to use the additional sanyo panels from that job and they ain't cheap, aside from the scaffolding costs etc.

I just didn't want to risk the potential for having someone bad mouthing us.

 

[Eco Deal]

The way I see things , Is if somebody bad mouth you on a forum .. you would be able to state your case , which is fully understandable.

now every company get bad press a some point although I have not had any yet I can see it happening if I hold some of this guys money.
but where do you draw the line , what is the point in siging an agreement ! what is the point in the 7 day cool off period if we allow customers to cancel after .... imagine if we canceled install before a deadline what would happen then ?

"sorry I found another customer more local to install for find some one else to install the system for you''

that would go down well

''sorry your roofs slate i just signed a customer up with marley tiles bye''

 

[Eco Deal]

I nearly got lumbered with 32 sanyo se10's after spendin over 20k on them coz a customer had cheap chinese slates and they where breaking left right and centre , if i see those again I will tell customers these are going to be a nightmare.

 

[Marvo]

I think if you hit a snag and promptly found a workaround to the problem this wouldn't give the customer the right to cancel. What reason did the customer give for wanting to back out of the installation?

 

[Eco Deal]

The reason for the problem in the first place was as follows

Problem: The tiles on roof are very thin so the standard bracket we use was too thick.

Solution: Found slim line brackets same brand thinner but wider (next day)

reason for canceling: not comforable with using thinner brackets as its near coast.

Tried to talk him round etc etc .

- - - Updated - - -

windy ----

 

[Marvo]

Surely this could be sorted out if you your new spec signed off by an engineer?