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ChuffingHell | 16:38 Sat 06th Jan 2007 | Law
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I'm not sure if this is the right place to put this question (rather than home and garden) but hopefully someone will be able to help me!

we had an extension built on our house earlier this year. the building work started in the last week in may. we were told it would take five weeks but it's still not actually finished.

in august, the roof went on, doors etc and the walls were painted in september but after we paid our final payment (thinking it was finished), the roof started leaking. throughout october, november and december we have been asking our builder to come out and sort this out. he's been a few times but it still hasn't fixed the problem.

he sent someone out who is apparently a roofer by trade (this is the first time this person has been to our property) last week who apparently said he immediately identified what the problem was and has now fixed the problem but i'm pretty hacked off that a) it's taken over 7 months to do and b) it appears no skilled roofers have previously been working on the extension.

do we have any grounds to complain for compensation?
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Unless you put a clause in the contract agreeing a timescale and made time 'of the essence', I don't think you can complain about the time it took. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but not paying until the work is done is a great motivator of absent builders (but then pay promptly).
Regarding the second part of your question, I'm not sure where (court) you think you might be able to get compensation from - especially if you say the roof is now fixed.
why do you want compensation, are you american?

as buildersmate said, you should never pay anybody untill a job is 100% finished. but now the roof is fixed i think the biggest loss the builder will have is that you, as a customer would never reccomend them to anybody if asked.............. and that in any trade is worst thing that could happen!!
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No I'm not american.

We paid for the building in installments and literally two weeks or so after paying the last the last installment, the first signs of water damage came through. Because it was the summer at the time of 'completion' there wasn't much rain and thus the problem didn't come to light until the rains came!!

The main problem is the roof is STILL not fixed. Every time they come out to "fix the problem" they never fix it, hence my question. Is there anything I can do because taking 7 months is just not acceptable - or at least I don't think so.
could you not get a quotation off a separate roofing company and send the quote to the the building company as a "get here now or........" kind of warning??

also i would speak to citizans advice and trading standards?

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