Non Payment from Contractor

[Paul Finn]

Cardon Construction Ltd / Cardon Property & Construction based in Albert Street, Manchester M30 OBG is a sister company of Excell construction that has now gone into voulentary Liquidation owing subcontractors and hmrc approx £1.2 million.
They personally owe us £40k. Made us work through xmas to get a new Lidl up and running. Kept making excuses that Lidl had not paid them so we rang Lidl direct. They had infact been paid.
Once we confronted them with this and sent baliffs to the same offices that they are trading from now they liquidated and ran with peoples money who had worked hard for them for over 6 weeks.
To any new or existing subcontractors or clients wishing to do business with this firm I advise you to avoid at all cost.

 

[Paul Finn]

CARDON CONSTRUCTION LTD

CARDON PROPERTY & CONSTRUCTION LIMITED
1 City Approach
Albert Street
Manchester
M30 0BG

0161 660 6605

 

[Ian J]

They personally owe us £40k. .

Presumably as a prudent businessman you had that debt credit insured

 

[Paul Finn]

Lets just say we learnt the hard way .

 

[The Byre]

It is for those kinds of silly games that competitor Aldi get much of the work done by their own building crews, some of which are sent over from Germany.

Are all construction companies run by people like that or only most of them? It certainly seems that way!

 

[Mr D]

Ok so a company has gone into liquidation. This happens a lot, will happen a lot more next couple of years too.

The company owes you. The directors being thieves is irrelevant unless investigation done.

Maybe you will get some payment eventually in a year or two, do not bet on it and may well be tiny payment compared to what is owed.

 

[MBE2017]

It is for those kinds of silly games that competitor Aldi get much of the work done by their own building crews, some of which are sent over from Germany.

Are all construction companies run by people like that or only most of them? It certainly seems that way!

Been happening for years, I was owed £60k by an electrician 20 years ago for materials, chatting to him it turned out it was for a retail centre in Manchester, German company, he was subbed by his best friend the architect. His friend had explained he was waiting on payment after 12 months, knew his electrician best mate was on the verge of losing his house.

My company had instructed myself to close him down, bankrupt him if necessary. Instead I got him to sign over his house and promised I would be unable to find him for three months, to give him some time. I then explained most German companies pay in advance, rarely late. I got him to ring the company in Germany who were furious their name had been dragged into late payment, turns out his architect friend had been paid a year before bang on time. The MD in Germany told the electrician to be by his phone in five minutes, when the architect rang offering full payment on the spot.

You can never tell in business who to trust, or even who your real friends are. The electrician and I became great friends, all down to myself knowing a little bit of how the Germans operated, from working in Munich for several months.

Luckily we saved his house, I got paid, as he did. He knows he could have lost everything in other circumstances.

I have said it many times on the forum, give credit if you reallywant to, but always remember to keep a check on it, it is a debt owed. At the present time, I would be reducing all credit and getting payments up to date ASAP, if I was owed any money.

 

[The Byre]

Not all Germans are angels and not every German company is wonderfully honest. Dieselgate and the Wirecard fiasco are witness to that!

But Germans and German companies do expect things to be done EXACTLY as stipulated. For example, if the contract states "in accordance with the guidelines of the VDE for the laying of cable in households" and it is not laid between 10-20cm from the ceiling and running vertically down to fixtures and fixed with a clip every 20cm, don't be surprised if all the plasterboard has to be removed and the wiring relaid.

They read the contracts and make sure that every inch of a product or service adheres to that contract. Contacting a lawyer because someone has not complied with a contract to the letter is almost a national sport!

That works both ways - commissioning a product and then making what you may think are reasonable changes halfway through works will have lawyers scouring contracts to see if such a thing is accommodated and if so, what the contractual extra charges are going to be.

Wobetide the householder who decides to commission their own foundations and then discovers that the concrete has not cured sufficiently for building work to begin at precisely 7am on the stipulated date. Boy, is that going to be expensive!

 

[UK Contractor Accountant]

Wobetide the householder who decides to commission their own foundations and then discovers that the concrete has not cured sufficiently for building work to begin at precisely 7am on the stipulated date. Boy, is that going to be expensive!

reminds me of the German Huff haus build on Grand designs where the German Team were held up by the English Crane driver getting lost putting the schedule back.

 

[JeremySilva]

It's not great is it? According to the Administrators' proposals:

• Last accounts showed the business was solvent and had £1.7M of assets.
• Latest management accounts showed £1.4M of debtors and £385k of cash. Actual recoveries so far are zero. (Though there should be £30k coming from the bank.)
• Assets have been sold back to the directors for £18k. Payment deferred.
• Administrators are chasing one book debt worth £60k. 'The directors have been retained to assist with the collection of the book debts.'

 

[Darren_Ssc]

reminds me of the German Huff haus build on Grand designs where the German Team were held up by the English Crane driver getting lost putting the schedule back.

No coincidence it's a C4 show then?

 

[Darren_Ssc]

It is for those kinds of silly games that competitor Aldi get much of the work done by their own building crews, some of which are sent over from Germany.

Are all construction companies run by people like that or only most of them? It certainly seems that way!

I heard an interesting story once about such a supermarket that ran into problems with a building project when the local gangsters wanted to arrange a bit of protection. Since I wasn't there to witness what actually happened I'll leave it to your imagination...

 

[Mark T Jones]

This will be happening A LOT over the next 18 months.

Anyone who hasn’t put in place a good, strong credit control process (which starts before you provide credit and ends when you have collected), and seriously considered credit insurance is seriously at risk.

Offering credit ‘because everyone else does’ is basically paying ‘who blinks first’ - except that they probably already have credit insurance.

 

[Darren_Ssc]

Offering credit ‘because everyone else does’ is basically paying ‘who blinks first’ - except that they probably already have credit insurance.

In some industries you provide credit or you don't get the business. In many cases you also accept poor terms. Yes, that's not great, especially if you don't enjoy being unemployed. This ideal world of choosing who, what and when is something of a luxury few are able to avoid.

 

[Mark T Jones]

In some industries you provide credit or you don't get the business. In many cases you also accept poor terms. Yes, that's not great, especially if you don't enjoy being unemployed. This ideal world of choosing who, what and when is something of a luxury few are able to avoid.

Anyone adopting that philosophy at this moment will need to familiarise themselves with the Spongebob plan

I don’t know the OP’s business, but it’s reasonable to assume that doing what everyone else does has just wiped out a years profit.

 

[MBE2017]

In some industries you provide credit or you don't get the business. In many cases you also accept poor terms. Yes, that's not great, especially if you don't enjoy being unemployed. This ideal world of choosing who, what and when is something of a luxury few are able to avoid.

When I had my courier company a director of GEC was upset I refused him automatic credit, his attitude was they were the great huge GEC, and I should ignore my no credit until a new company traded and paid on time for six months.

I still got the account, but it is down to owners who to give credit too. After six months I gave them a credit account, and stuck rigidly to 30 days max. I only ever gave approx ten accounts on credit in as many years.

 

[Mr D]

Anyone adopting that philosophy at this moment will need to familiarise themselves with the Spongebob plan

I don’t know the OP’s business, but it’s reasonable to assume that doing what everyone else does has just wiped out a years profit.

Not as if no one has been burned before.
Pretty much every year I read multiple times that someone has lost a lot of money owed by a company going under.

 

[Darren_Ssc]

Anyone adopting that philosophy at this moment will need to familiarise themselves with the Spongebob plan

I don’t know the OP’s business, but it’s reasonable to assume that doing what everyone else does has just wiped out a years profit.

OK, I'll go and sign on tomorrow then. Should I apply for my bounce back loan now, I wonder?

 

[JamesL]

Cardon Construction Ltd / Cardon Property & Construction based in Albert Street, Manchester M30 OBG is a sister company of Excell construction that has now gone into voulentary Liquidation owing subcontractors and hmrc approx £1.2 million.
They personally owe us £40k. Made us work through xmas to get a new Lidl up and running. Kept making excuses that Lidl had not paid them so we rang Lidl direct. They had infact been paid.
Once we confronted them with this and sent baliffs to the same offices that they are trading from now they liquidated and ran with peoples money who had worked hard for them for over 6 weeks.
To any new or existing subcontractors or clients wishing to do business with this firm I advise you to avoid at all cost.

I know it's a long time ago but did you ever get anywhere with Cardon because we're just in the same position with one of the directors at the moment

 

[JEREMY HAWKE]

Proof that you should search a director and their previous firms

There is a lot of advice on this forum along with experienced and knowledgeable experts

The trick is to use the tools available to discover the risk before offering credit

 

[Mark T Jones]

I know it's a long time ago but did you ever get anywhere with Cardon because we're just in the same position with one of the directors at the moment

What research did you do before deciding to work for nothing?

 

[MikeJ]

I know it's a long time ago but did you ever get anywhere with Cardon because we're just in the same position with one of the directors at the moment

OP hasn't been on for five years. There's a possibility he's subscribed to this thread, and will get a prompt that there's been a new reply, but don't hold your breath.