What not to do at a client's house....

[Matt@]

there is no such thing as being too careful in a customers house! I had to stain some skiirting recently and the floor was brand new stone tiles with white grouting. It took as long to mask the perimeter of the room 2 foot deep as it did to stain the skirting. Guess what, I knocked over a small pot of stain and it went everywhere (everywhere over the plastic sheeting that is) if that had got into the grout eeek!!

light coloured carpets - the worst!

 

[Steve Maskery]

Hey Marcus! Delighted to hear the outcome. But you are a lucky so-and-so...!

 

[adidat]

this happened to someone i know, a plasterer working in a Chelsea flat got a subbie painter in, and he dropped a tin of paint on the fireplace, i seem to remember it costing 7k to fix!

adidat

 

[promhandicam]

My worst accident was slipping getting off a ladder and knocking about 2l of white gloss onto the tarmac drive. I had a dust sheet down which took the bulk of the paint with the rest on me! Although I got the dust sheet up quickly the paint had still seeped throug. Cleaned off with white spirit and about a whole roll of paper towel and I thought I'd got away with it until I realised the tarmac was suddenly rather soft. Fortunately the gas board were working next door and had a wacker plate so managed a fairly good repair which the customer was happy with . They were more concerned that I hadn't injured myself falling off the ladder -not surprisingly the thing that hurt most was my pride.

Moral of the story - tarpaulin under the dust sheet is best bet and white spirit and tarmac don't mix.

 

[davin]

Working with my friend Aldo over christmas fitting a kitchen.
I said "be careful hanging those wall unit brackets won'you, its a very thin wall and the tiliing has just been done in the bathroom next door!
Yeah yeah yeah. he returned looking a bit sheepish, ten holes through the wall,just happened to hit two tiles at once.
Oh how we laughed as he drove around looking for tiles on New years Day!
Anyway managed to find some and make it look fairly resepectable. But we still owned up to the customer when they got back from holiday.
Oh don't worry, there is a full box in the shed!!!

 

[Dan.patten]

A few years ago I was wiring in a kitchen extractor (im 17th edition) last job after complete kitchen refurb, i dropped my side cutters from height onto brand new white worktop.

Had to replace a complete 3 metre length and as the kitchen was a U shape it had butt and scribes both ends, not so much costly as it was time consuming

We live and we learn

 

[Atkins joinery]

A sparky on a job i was on was core drilling a bathroom fan. He slipped of his ladder and broke toilet, sink, bath, bath panel and ran across laminate floor! To top it on he had started drilling on the wrong wall! God knows what he was thinking but if he had carried on he would of ended up in the bedroom.

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[ColeyS1]

A sparky on a job i was on was core drilling a bathroom fan. He slipped of his ladder and broke toilet, sink, bath, bath panel and ran across laminate floor! To top it on he had started drilling on the wrong wall! God knows what he was thinking but if he had carried on he would of ended up in the bedroom.

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:shock:

:lol: thats a quality story !!!!

 

[adidat]

That's quite an impressive b@lls up!!

 

[Atkins joinery]

Yes ill bet. Glad it wasnt me. Easy done though. I once hit a porshe with a scaffold pole! Put a descent dint in it but i dint have to pay as i was employed at the time. Phew!

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[marcus]

Worst thing I did was at the end of a three day job which hadn't gone that well. The client and I were both thoroughly hacked off with each other. I got into my van at the end full of relief that it was over. And reversed straight into his garden wall and knocked it over..... Remembering that puts the Osmo incident into perspective!

 

[caroleb]

Stripping wallpaper at a clients house years ago. Electric steamer wired up to extension lead, and we are cracking on. You know what its like; it smells a bit; all the hot steam and wallpaper paste, and then it starts to smell a bit more, then more, then I look round and the clients extension lead has melted (where it was all coiled up on the cassette) and has sunk itself into their nice new deep pile carpet. Amazing, you wouldn't think an extension lead could look like a puddle of red and black poop.
You know that feeling you get when you know its bad. Like really bad. And your stomach kinda tightens up and you wonder if you can just leave......... :shock:
Where do you start? Eerrmm, Mrs Smith we need to talk.........

 

[nanscombe]

... Amazing, you wouldn't think an extension lead could look like a puddle of red and black poop. ...

Ah. So that's probably why they say unroll all the cable on the extension reel, so it doesn't overheat..

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Many of the small extension reels are only 5amp, so they'll melt at at the drop of a hat with any sort of load on them. Yes, that's why you are told to unroll them.

 

[tomatwark]

The other way round.

While helping a friend who is joiner with a roof once, the customers came out of their house, the wife telling the husband off because they were running late.

Husband puts his car into reverse and reverses straight into the side of my van.

He paid for the repairs but I can still here the wife telling him off for not paying attention.

Tom

 

[andersonec]

Some good news. The client said she was very pleased with her worktops and would get the carpet sorted out herself! And the invoice has been paid! Very surprised and very relieved. Hooray for nice people

Result!!!!

I used to work as an electrician back in the eighties and first fixed a n attic conversion in a large old house, at the same time there was some plumbers doing work on the pipes, for some reason they were doing some welding, finished work, went home and returned the next day only to find, yes you guessed it, no roof...... set alight from the smoldering sparks and burned it all.

Andy

 

[caroleb]

Ah. So that's probably why they say unroll all the cable on the extension reel, so it doesn't overheat..

Indeed. In my defence it was rated quite high wound, although obviously not 2000w which is the power output of the element on most strippers. And fwiw if you look at my comments you will see I have said 'where it was all coiled up on the cassette' so I knew why it happened. Perhaps you missed that. I just thought it was funny.

Sorry, I thought this thread was a fairly lighthearted sharing of nightmares, not an opportunity to prove how sanctimonious we can be. =D> Probably.....

No wonder so many folk have deserted this site. It took 3 posts for someone to see me off.....

Better correct myself before someone else takes opportunity..... 4 posts. There, done. (and you can keep the dummy!)

 

[dickm]

We have builders supposed to be coming in on Monday to work on our (timber) house. It was not a good idea reading all the "interesting" things that have happened to skilled folk . Not sure I will sleep for the next few weeks................

 

[nanscombe]

... Sorry, I thought this thread was a fairly lighthearted sharing of nightmares, not an opportunity to prove how sanctimonious we can be. =D> Probably.....

I wasn't attempting to be sanctimonious* as, although you might guess this could happen, this is the first time I've seen someone give an actual account of the consequences.

No wonder so many folk have deserted this site. It took 3 posts for someone to see me off.....

* Making a show of being morally better than others, especially hypocritically pious.

 

[Setch]

You can put my name on melted extension lead list, running a fan heater whilst working in an unheated house in the middle of winter. Fortunately I caught it before it damaged the carpet or caught fire! Like the others, I knew exactly what caused it, and I knew not to do it, but still got caught.

I'm also frankly amazed at people's desire to have floor coverings which are so staggeringly impractical, I hate working round cream carpets or expensive tile/wooden floors, you're on edge the whole time. Why pick something totally unsuitable for walking on..... to be walked on?