Observation

I was working with another contractor last week at one of my clients homes and the talk turned to new building regulations that are coming into effect, memberships, licensing and finally black market builders. He had not seen my website and as the talked turned to cowboy builders I felt a lot of tension from him. He asked if he’d end up with a Cowboy Of The Week Award if there was a problem with the work he was doing? My answer to that was simple. continue

In part one I discussed the fact that when a job opens up EVERYBODY applies for it. Unfortunately for the few that are just the type of candidate we want to see there are sometimes hundreds of people we don’t want to see. The reality of it is they are wasting every body’s time. What do you care right? Wrong! continue

DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD

Bad DIY

I offer this piece of advice for all those who have a friend, work collegue, mate, uncle or cousin who loves to dish out DIY advice with no actual training in the field. DO NOT blindly take that advice without using a bit of common sense. Case in point!

We found this serious fault a few weeks ago when asked to repair an apparent burnt out bulb in a bathroom we had fit about a year earlier. When we entered the loft space to change the transformer we found the burnt piece of plastic pipe waste pipe as shown in the photo. The plastic pipe was resting DIRECTLY ON TOP of the halogen light! continue

I tell my contractor mates on a regular basis that they should follow up on everything they do. Not just quotes or estimates. If you undertake a Gas Safety Check for a client place their document in file dated eleven months from now and call them or send them a reminder. Once you find a client and they are happy with your work keep them close. Stay in contact.

Another good article here.

Well it looks like we’re going from the frying pan to the fire with the announcement that CORGI has lost in it’s bid to run the gas registration scheme from 2009 to 2014. The HSE has stated that the preferred bidder for the scheme will be CAPITA.

For those of you who don’t know CAPITA please allow me to introduce you. Here are a few links providing some interesting articles: CAPITA and Blackburn Council, CAPITA and the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB), CAPITA and Housing Benifits Please feel free to GOOGLE the NET yourself for more articles that are sure to impress.

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We see more and more of these types of jobs as more and more people are convinced by more and more advertisers that they can create a kitchen the size of Taj Mahal out of a 2 x 2 metre room. Unfortunately for the homeowner we are always the one who has to tell them that… continue

We had to scale down a bit for the holidays this year as most of our suppliers are closed for two weeks making it almost impossible to get parts for boilers and gas fires. We’re finally back to a full time schedule now that Christmas and New Years is over. So today started with the repair of a gas fire we ordered parts for before Christmas and a new call we received on Saturday regarding yet another dead fire. continue