A cautionary tale picking a handyman from the forum

[Fuschia]

Avoiding those adverts where the only recommendations come from brand new posters have exactly the same grammatical style and spelling foibles as the handyman's ads, we were really surprised a few months ago when we arranged a few days work by a guy who took our money but left everything half finished.

When we posted accurate feedback on the edf, we were subject to vitriolic messages. Other forum members contacted us to say they had had similar experiences. It looks like fake recommendations on a thread caused it to be taken down. I can only presume that in his mind, we were to blame. That night our car was severely vandalised - tyres slashed, several windows smashed. The admin of edf didn't respond to my messages asking for help with information for the police.

Shortly after that an edf member contacted me because they had been totally ripped off by this guy who took the money but walked off the job.

We have moved out of London now, so he can't attack us any further.

Based on this experience, I wouldn't advise anyone to use any individual that only exists as an edf nickname and a mobile phone no.

How do you even know who they are? Where they live? Is their business registered? Are they insured? What qualifications do they have?

Where they have recommendations on the edf, are they by real people that you know personally?

There are plenty of conmerchants about. Don't fall prey.

[Pugwash]

If it is a minor job I will take recommendations from the forum but I do a search against the contractors name to see what others have said.

My policy is always when hiring a contractor to only take people who will give a full address and company name plus a landline and web site. (If they are local business - I have even gone to the address given to check them out (I do not go inside)

[Jeremy]

Sounds awful - especially the aftermath. Is this unpleasant individual still advertising (or being recommended) on the forum?

[Fuschia]

Jeremy Wrote:

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> Sounds awful - especially the aftermath. Is this

> unpleasant individual still advertising (or being

> recommended) on the forum?

He is. At first when our experience was very different and the work was shoddy I just posted a mildly negative report, but what I have heard since via pms includes behaviour that really should be reported to the police or trading standards. I wonder how often forumites are intimidated out of posting honest but negative feedback. And quite how prevalent fake recommendations are.

Caveat emptor, for sure. Pugwash's approach is very sensible.

Bear in mind that these handymen often are left unattended in the house.

[canela]

you poor thing! Thank you for sharing your experience. I'm just about to start looking for a local tradesman, so will bear your advice in mind.

[Sue]

Having had my fingers burned several times (will I never learn, it seems not) by tradespeople from the forum, I have belatedly realised:

1. Ask for references and check them out. If people don't get back to you after you've left a voicemail or whatever, assume there is a negative reason for that.

2. Don't employ somebody who approaches you directly via the forum without doing the above.

3. Where it is a big job or there is more than a small sum of money involved, go to see similar work done elsewhere by the person in question.

4. If you have misgivings/doubts about somebody after a short time, they are probably well founded. Don't ignore them thinking you are being silly.

5. The more somebody tells you how good they are, the less good they probably are.

6. If somebody says "I can do that" though it is totally unrelated to the job you originally employed them to do, they probably can't.

7. People who on the face of it appear to be nice people may still do rubbish work.

Now - my biggest nightmare and biggest expense. Can anybody recommend a really competent kitchen fitter?? :))

ETA: Fuchsia, how come this person is still being allowed by admin to advertise on here?

I'm becoming more and more disillusioned. I've also recently come across a tradesperson who is proactively asking people to recommend him on here. Well, maybe he is excellent, but it put me off using him again.

And I agree that people are loath to post on here if they have had a poor job done by somebody who has been recommended by others.

However I remember the "old days" when you had to ask around to try to find somebody, and in many ways that was even worse.

[hendricks]

I concur with Sue's advice. I have used several excellent tradesmen that I found on the forum this year whilst refurbishing my house. I was fortunate that the majority were excellent, however, one was not. I did not post a negative review for fear of an unpleasant backlash (either online or in person). Having read about Fuschia's experience, it is understandable why people don't want to post bad feedback.

I checked all the recommendations for all the tradesmen I used and looked through members' prior postings to see if they seemed trustworthy and genuine. I pm'd some for further feedback. Ironically, I didn't do as a thorough a check on the one who was rude, unreliable and dishonest. I later discovered he had some dubious recommendations from first time posters.

If you are engaging a tradesman, do your homework and as Sue says, if it involves a lot of money, ask to see their work. I have had members contact me and visit to see my builder's work which i was happy to oblige.

[Fuschia]

ElmGrove Wrote:

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> How can someone who took your money and left

> everything half finished, and who did something

> similar to other people still be advertising on

> here? Perhaps you could post this information in

> the About This Forum section, ask admin.

I don't know, ask admin. It was pretty awful that on the day the police were round looking at the mess of our car, my pms to admin asking for them to confirm they could provide ip addresses to the police, were not even acknowledged.

They don't seem to care.

[StraferJack]

Could it be that admin is a busy man, away from this forum and often doesn't have capacity to read, much less respond to all his emails?

Of course if he is that busy and people aren't happy, he could just shut the forum down

[unlurked]

I thought that admin would provide relevant info to the police etc. Am sure it says that in admin rules or somewhere. Have PM'd you Fuschia.

[Administrator]

The last PM I received from fuschia was in April.

If I'm ever asked to provide info to the police by the police then I do.

To say that I have not acknowledged your PMs when you have not sent them is a lie. If you want to go to court about that slur that says I did not answer your cries for help then I'm happy to do so. I find that quite offensive.

[Fuschia]

Admin, the family room moderator actually got back to me and confirmed the message had been received and someone would get bsck to me, but they never did. Perhaps you can look into that, before accusing me of slurs?

Thanks

[Fuschia]

This is the message I received on aug 12th from the family room moderator in response to my message:

Hi Fuschia,

I'm not able to help with this I'm afraid, hopefully Mark has been in touch? He is really the only person who is able to help with this sort of thing.

So sorry to hear about your car.

Fuschia Wrote:

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> A forum user is main suspect for smashing up my

> car last night - need someone to phone me from the

> admin team so I can pass on details to police to

> try to trace him from his IP address

>

> Thank you

[Administrator]

You said "my pms to admin asking for them to confirm they could provide ip addresses to the police, were not even acknowledged."

You have not sent me one PM about this. This is the first I have heard about this.

If you ask the police to contact me for the users details I will provide them. I will not give them to you, that's the same rule for everyone.

[Family Room Moderator]

I've just checked, and your original message was sent to me as a PM, but didn't include Admin. I assumed you had sent a message to Admin separately before approaching me for help. If I had realised at the time, I would have flagged it up for you, apologies that this didn't happen.

I assume that if the police were involved at the time they would still look into it?

[Alan Medic]

http://www.eastdulwichforum.co.uk/forum/read.php?30,1176661

This is the sort of post that would make me suspicious. Not in itself but looking at previous posts he had a similar job done less than 12 months previously.

[shambles]

My partner does handyman work for forum users and is always grateful if someone takes the time to post a recommendation on here. I agree that you need to be extremely careful when employing someone but if they have done a good job for you then it's nice to say so and to let other forum users know. I don't understand your point Sue - that a tradesman recently asked you to post a recommendation and because of that you have been put off using them again? Seems a bit mean especially if they did some good work for you.

[Alan Medic]

Dear shambles, might I suggest that your user name does your partner no favours?

[Fuschia]

Family Room Moderator Wrote:

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> I've just checked, and your original message was

> sent to me as a PM, but didn't include Admin. I

> assumed you had sent a message to Admin separately

> before approaching me for help. If I had realised

> at the time, I would have flagged it up for you,

> apologies that this didn't happen.

>

> I assume that if the police were involved at the

I did pm admin as well as you

Re the police, there was insufficien evidence. I do feel very strongly that forum members should be protected from this sort of behaviour. I know that at least one person has been seriously

ripped off just recently

It would help if the mods acknowledged complaints?

[monica]

Hi, I have had both positive and negative situations as far as using the forum for tradesmen are concerned. I am fortunate that a majority of the tradesmen I have used have been great, and I have gone on to recommend them on here. I do get pms regarding my recommendations, and I always accommodate, with feedback and invitations to view works undertaken.

However I have had a couple of negative situations with a highly recommended tradesman on here, however I chose not to advertise it on here, I put it down to poor communication. Then out of the blue someone I knew, but never hired asked me to recommend them and asked for a testimonial????

I do feel for the moderators, they have their work cut out, trying to keep control on the recommendations.

Normally I would contact the OP of the recommendations, I am interested in, and take it from there.

Good luck Fuschia with your new home.

[shambles]

I agree Alan Medic - luckily I don't advertise for him!

[StraferJack]

You know how it's bad form to have a pop at the person, not the argument?

Sometimes that's harder than others.

[Sue]

shambles Wrote:

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I don't understand your point Sue -

> that a tradesman recently asked you to post a

> recommendation and because of that you have been

> put off using them again? Seems a bit mean

> especially if they did some good work for you.

xxxxx

They did a very minor job that took them about thirty seconds, and charged me thirty pounds :(

It was something I could have done myself if I'd realised what needed to be done, but unfortunately googling had not brought up the information I needed.

It was somebody who I used because he had a large number of recent recommendations on here.

I am not suggesting that the recommendations were false, but clearly there were so many because he has asked people to recommend him, and my objection is that he actually asked me to recommend him on here, after this thirty seconds of work.

I am very happy to recommend tradespeople who have done good work for me, but I don't like feeling under pressure to do so (and in fact in this case I didn't). As I say, it has put me off using him again.

[SybianTester]

pay when the works done simple

[Administrator]

Fuschia Wrote:

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>

> I did pm admin as well as you

No you did not.