Homeowner charging me what to do

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I have a 2000sq foot house that I wired I installed all the plugs switches and
covers he installed all the lights to save money.
He is calling me back to finish the circuit breaker box and meter.

I have not gone back yet to finish
because he still has to put up the vent hoods for me to wire plus all the cabinets
are not in and the electric hot water tank has not been installed yet either.

I want to wait untill its all there so I
can do it all in one trip. Here is the problem I told him to call me when its
ready which he just did so I went over there to finish up and it was not
ready he still did not have the above mentioned things installed.

But I did notice he had someone else install a dissconnect for the ac and he wants to
charge me for it. I dont think I should have to pay. Any thoughts or opinions.
 
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The contract reads

The contract reads

In my contract it reads when the drywall and all appliances are up I will come back and finish. He has been calling me to come back when these things still need to be installed. So anyways he went ahead and had somebody install a discconect for the AC condenser so the ac man could hook up his whip. One more note the power was shutoff by the power company and will not be turned back on untill the final inspection which cannot happen untill the aplliances and garbage disposals are in.
 

Buck Parrish

Senior Member
Location
NC & IN
Keep your emotions out of it.
Do the work you are required to do.
Some of these home owner / want to be contractors , can be a real pain to work for.
Kill him with kindness.
Don't argue about who's paying for the disconnect until you are about to get paid. May be you can find some hidden charge to compensate.
Or perhaps agree to pay half of it.

Your not alone been their done that.
 
risking my license

risking my license

The homeowner wanted to save money on the electrical so he asked me if he installed the lights if I would charge him less I said yes because I am slow right now.
 

Dennis Alwon

Moderator
Staff member
Location
Chapel Hill, NC
Occupation
Retired Electrical Contractor
Ryan it sounds like you got yourself into a situation. I believe the problem is that other trades are trying to get done and because you don't make the trip back the HO hired the heating contractor or someone else to install the disco.

Ideally it would be nice to do a rough in and come back once when everything is done. In reality that doesn't always happen and you need to put enough money in the contract to cover those extra trips. Do what you have to to save face and get done. Think of it as a lesson learned.
 

ultramegabob

Senior Member
Location
Indiana
the minute someone else started doing electrical work on my job, I would pull up stakes, and want to settle the bill for what work has been done up til that point, and let them know that all warrenty has been voided....
 

tmbrk

Senior Member
Location
Illinois
ryandumas28 said:
I installed all the plugs switches and
covers he installed all the lights to save money.

By "install all the lights" do you mean the wiring and boxes or just the fixtures themselves?

Where are you located?
 

Minuteman

Senior Member
Wired a new house in a rural town for a HO who is a friend of a friend. The HO's dad was a retired engineer fro the auto plant. The dad wanted to install all the light fixtures to save money and had heard that the AHJ in the small town allowed it under the "qualified person" definition. Okay, I excluded it from the contract.

We failed the final. Three fixtures had bad connections to the fixture wire. Nine fixtures had no lamps. HO would not pay until we passed the final. I told him that I would fix the failure at T&M. Sent him a bill for 4 hours (including drive time) plus the lamps. He refused 3 hours, as he said that dad said that it should not have taken that long. My reply was something about how come dad didn't do it right in the first place - and the horse he road in on. I managed to hold up the re-inspection long enough that HO's wife sent a check for the balance.

buckofdurham said:
Keep your emotions out of it. Do the work you are required to do. Some of these home owner / want to be contractors , can be a real pain to work for. Kill him with kindness. Don't argue about who's paying for the disconnect until you are about to get paid. May be you can find some hidden charge to compensate. Or perhaps agree to pay half of it.


As far as the a/c disco. I agree with Buck.
 

Buck Parrish

Senior Member
Location
NC & IN
You guys don't miss nothing.:D
I'm new here.
If I'm called a senior member after a 100 post. You other guys with 5000 post or more. You should be our elders or captians, something ...
 
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