Sub Contractor advice required.

[Jon Peachment]

Hi Guys.

I'm a sub contracting electrician that has worked for a certain company for over 2 years on their contracts. The latest job was a restaurant refurbishment that I was on for around 10 weeks.

My query is this.... While on the job one of the directors started to become verbally aggressive towards me. This happened on a number of occasions and I asked each time for him to stop getting aggressive and to calm down. The builders on site noticed this going on and thought it was extremely unprofessional. On the last occasion it was exceptionally bad and I told him that I was not going to finish the job for him as I would find work elsewhere. I am weekly paid so I put my invoice in for the work I had completed. The company has decided that they do not wish to pay me as I "left them in a bad situation" they and to get other electricians in to complete the job. Since then I have asked for payment in the correct manor and have kept all communications between us. They called me over a week ago saying they were deciding on how much they were going to pay me and would pay me tomorrow. I have just received an email asking for a further 7 days saying this.
Hi Jon


I note that I have given you 7 days from Friday 19/10/18 for payment. However, we are not in a position to finalise any fair and reasonable proposal until next Friday 2/11/18 at the latest. Therefore, please allow us until next Friday in which to submit our proposal and reasons.


We are not being unreasonable in asking for a further 7 days and we will be entirely reasonable in looking at an amicable settlement. If you choose to ignore my request and issue proceedings, we will have no option but to defend and counterclaim.


I trust that both parties will be sensible in coming to an amicable settlement.

What rights as a sub contractor do I have in this situation? Do they have a right to counterclaim?

Previously when they ran out of work for me they only informed me on the Friday that they had no work on the Monday.. is this not the same situation?

 

[pentel]

Hopefully over the last 2 years you have also been working on contracts for others?

Did you bill an hourly rate or were you on a price?

If hourly then they should probably pay you, if you were on a price then they can deduct whatever it cost to get the job completed from your price provided that they gave you an opertunity to finish the job.

 

[Jon Peachment]

Hi.
Yes I was working for other contractors as well. On the restaurant refurbishment I was hourly paid.

 

[BEB_Kerry]

Is there any agreement between you and the company refusing to pay?

 

[Jon Peachment]

Is there any agreement between you and the company refusing to pay?

There was never an agreement between us. We all know it's a hourly bases weekly paid situation.

 

[obscure]

There was never an agreement between us. We all know it's a hourly bases weekly paid situation.

Actually there was an agreement (a contract). It just wasn't in writing. You agreed to do work for them, they agreed to pay you, you did the work and they paid you - any court would take that as proof of a contract.

 

[Chris Ashdown]

Im would write to the company (not email or Phone) and explain the verbal abuse you received from the other person, and as a professional you felt you had no choice but to walk away rather than become further involved as you had no wish to be further abused in this manner

Further note you have been quite happy to work fir the company over the last few years and feel sorry it had to come to walking out due to this directors abusive nature

 

[MBE2017]

Further to the above advice, I would include your final invoice, with the hourly breakdown, and state that unless full payment is received as per your original agreement within 7 days, you will commence proceedings.

If you accept their last email you are in effect giving them the green light to make deductions.

 

[Gecko001]

Actually I do not think the OP is in a strong position at all legally.

The OP has walked off the site and that is a breach of contract. He is not an employee and cannot go to an employment tribunal for any redress. If the OP's breach of contract has resulted in additional costs for the electrical contractor over and above that which the OP would have charged for completion of the work, the electrical contractor could have a strong case for claiming damages for breach of contract from the OP. The verbal abuse the OP suffered is unlikely to be given much weight in any court proceedings the OP might bring as it will be the OP's word against that of the director's.

 

[Jon Peachment]

Actually I do not think the OP is in a strong position at all legally.

The OP has walked off the site and that is a breach of contract. He is not an employee and cannot go to an employment tribunal for any redress. If the OP's breach of contract has resulted in additional costs for the electrical contractor over and above that which the OP would have charged for completion of the work, the electrical contractor could have a strong case for claiming damages for breach of contract from the OP. The verbal abuse the OP suffered is unlikely to be given much weight in any court proceedings the OP might bring as it will be the OP's word against that of the director's.

Thank you.

So even though I never told them verbally I would finish the contract, never signed a contract, and they could have taken me off there and did take other electricians off the site at less than a days notice you are saying they have all the power in this situation? Why is that? Surely if they can get rid of me in a days notice I can leave in a days notice?

 

[Newchodge]

Thank you.

So even though I never told them verbally I would finish the contract, never signed a contract, and they could have taken me off there and did take other electricians off the site at less than a days notice you are saying they have all the power in this situation? Why is that? Surely if they can get rid of me in a days notice I can leave in a days notice?

You are moving the goalposts. That's not fair.

 

[Jon Peachment]

You are moving the goalposts. That's not fair.

Please explain how it's not fair? I'm after advice.

 

[Newchodge]

Please explain how it's not fair? I'm after advice.

Giving half a story then getting advice you don't like then giving additional information that changes the potential advice is annoying for those trying to help.

 

[Jon Peachment]

Giving half a story then getting advice you don't like then giving additional information that changes the potential advice is annoying for those trying to help.

I've come to the forum because I'm an electrician. I'm not a business law expert. I didn't know the information that you would require, hence why I'm here. I've given the information as it's been requested. At no point have I moved the goalposts. I've just added more specific information as people have asked. Is it possible to keep this to the original point of the thread and not go off on a tangent.

 

[Gecko001]

The contract you had with this electrical contractor seems to have been a verbal one, but nonetheless you had a contract. They offered to pay you a certain amount and you accepted that offer. That is a legally binding contract.

If you left a job without finishing it, the main contractor would difficulties getting another sub-contractor to finish off your work. If they could find another sub-contractor to take it on, the new sub-contractor would do it at a premium as they would have to check all your work and test it before they could certify it. That leaves you in a difficult situation legally as your actions will all most certainly have cost the contractor you were working for some extra costs.

If they fired you at a day's notice, you might have a claim for damages against them for breach of contract, but it would be very hard to quantify those damages.

It is nothing to do with fairness. These situations rarely are. You leave a job without finishing it and the main contractor suffers certain costs that can be easily quantified. The main contractor tells you he does not want you any more before the job is finished and you suffer what exactly? You suffer something but putting a figure on it is where you might have difficulties. Who is more likely to get a good result if they decided to sue?

 

[Jon Peachment]

The contract you had with this electrical contractor seems to have been a verbal one, but nonetheless you had a contract. They offered to pay you a certain amount and you accepted that offer. That is a legally binding contract.

If you left a job without finishing it, the main contractor would difficulties getting another sub-contractor to finish off your work. If they could find another sub-contractor to take it on, the new sub-contractor would do it at a premium as they would have to check all your work and test it before they could certify it. That leaves you in a difficult situation legally as your actions will all most certainly have cost the contractor you were working for some extra costs.

If they fired you at a day's notice, you might have a claim for damages against them for breach of contract, but it would be very hard to quantify those damages.

It is nothing to do with fairness. These situations rarely are. You leave a job without finishing it and the main contractor suffers certain costs that can be easily quantified. The main contractor tells you he does not want you any more before the job is finished and you suffer what exactly? You suffer something but putting a figure on it is where you might have difficulties. Who is more likely to get a good result if they decided to sue?

Thank you.

The main contractor is an electrical company who just got their own guys to finish the job. It would not have cost them extra. This was not a job I had won on a contract to complete. I was just one of the electrician's on site. A sub contracting electrician.
The amount of work that was left to complete didn't change because I had left, and we are all hourly paid so it still would have taken the same length of time.

 

[estwig]

**** me doesn't everyone get excited!

Keep your powder dry and wait the seven days to see what happens, nothing to do until then except get all excited about it.

 

[Gecko001]

It is interesting to see how some electrical contractors work. They hire self-employed people to work on an hourly basis. Several self-employed sub-contractors can work on the same job and start or finish half way through a job. Probably very little supervision over the duration of the job to ensure continuity of quality of work. Possibly no inspection of wires and connections etc. etc. A quick test at the fuse box at the end of the job which will not catch faulty workmanship that, although will not be enough to cause a test failure, could quickly lead to problems in the future.

 

[Chris Ashdown]

He is not a employee and presumably not contracted to do the job until com[pletion but just supply himself for work for which he is paid a hourly rate
If they had control of how and when he worked, would he not be clasified as a employee
He does naturally have the option of reporting the abuse to the police if he wished, probably little action if any taken

 

[Gecko001]

I think you have to have a thick skin when you work as self-employed. Clients will often behave to sub-contractors and self-employed people in a way that they would not behave to an employee. There are no employment tribunals or unions for the self-employed and clients know this.

I often hear of incidents of clients shouting and banging fists on the table at self-employed professionals and contractors and sub-contractors in the building industry. There is, of course, the choice of not working for the client again after the particular project has finished, but because of contractual reasons or fear of damage to their reputations within the sector, the self-employed will continue to take this type of behaviour.