12014 Middle-class hell

[quote=Charles Phillips;114693]Huh: I'm in the middle of a dispute with middle class Brits (who have an Italian project that's gone over budget - not a lot) and an honest Italian builder (who they haven't paid). They are pleading poverty - which does not wash very well with the contractor. It doesn't wash well with him, because they imported from the UK things like a €3000 bath, fancy wash-handbasins, taps - delaying the contract (which they are now sayng is the builder's fault)[/quote]

Charles, interesting to hear this from a fellow Brit (assume you are) for I hear it with growing frequency from Italians who deal with the British expat community. I'm ashamed to say we are acquiring bit of a reputation for non-payment, I've heard it not only from two very reputable builders I know (both of whom were initially reluctant to talk about it) but also a lawyer friend. He said he was approached by a couple late last year wanting to sue their builder for non-performance or something but he had to tell them frankly, "you haven't got a case". I wonder if some people arrive here perhaps having heard horror stories about expats being ripped off and in their determination not be ripped off themselves become totally unreasonable in the process?

Charles, I've moved this to another thread to allow everyone to explore/share experience of non-payment, flouncy Expats & "them wot thing the sun shines out of..."

Its always disappointing, to say the least, to see well-off people withhold money from cleaners and tradesmen for months-at-a-time (and then frequently dispute it) whilst 'ordinary' people give us floats to pay them from.

I guess that many people who have achieved success in life have done so by developing good negotiating skills, but the time for negotiating is before you seal a deal, not afterwards. Have they no shame?!

There does seem an assumption held by some ex pats that all Italians are thieves and liars, and they are therefore fair game for their own dishonest practices, An Italian friend tells me that trying to get his clients to pay up monies due is like getting blood from a stone. Lets hope we are not all tarred with the same brush, or else it is going to prove difficult to get anyone to work for us.
A

I worked 18 years as a contractor in Scandinavia not once did I come away unpaid. I worked 12 years in London and my company is still owed alot of money from 3 clients. So it seems the law covers debtors in the UK.

It hasn't happened to any of my colleagues here in Italy over the last 4 years yet; but it's bound to happen eventually. And the solicitors what do they say "not a chance" and all you get are bills.

My condolences to you and your colleagues; personally I would spread the word around the village about them not being reputable people.:smile:

[quote=Charles Phillips;114693] they imported from the UK things like a €3000 bath, fancy wash-handbasins, taps[/quote]

They won’t look right! :no: You wait and see!!

Aesthetically Italian 'things' just look/fit better, I am, for example, growing to love huge dark furniture, I have become very fond of chandeliers in the kitchen and I about to ditch my IKEA linen and get a ridiculously fancy (Italian) bedspread.:yes:

Don!t ditch the linnen we will have it TO REPLACE THE LINNEN THAT SOMEHOW HAS GONE MISSING FROM THE CLEANERS IN MONTI!!
ALL THREE BAGS OF IT

When can we pick it up!!

Oh dear - I was in serious grumpy old man mode last night (and I quite understand why tusc made it a new thread) - but I'm amazed that 'us Brits' (+ lotan, who I suspect isn't a Brit) are jointly encountering evidence of this rather nasty aspect of the Brit attitude to money owed to foreigners. For sure, part of it is that the budget was spreadshot at €1.36 to the £, and maybe some holders of Sterling genuinely cannot raise the money. Now, if they were honest with the Italian contractors, and offered to settle on a slightly lengthened time scale, this would be acceptable: but that is not their approach. It seems impossible for a Brit to cede 'la bella figura'....now that sounds strange, because it is recognised as an Italian trait...but for an Italian to frankly admit to feeling the pinch is not a brutta figura, but Brits - instead of being honest - try to find justification that their overspend "isn't their fault", and it isn't that they "can't afford it", it is Someone Else's Fault.
Dai - or alternatively DIE - sounds the same to me.

I don't think it's just the Italian contractors who are being shafted. We have an aquaintance who is an English mason in the southern Marche who also has complained to us that he has had difficulties being paid by some English as well.

Once again, I do not think that you can blame people because of their nationalities. The current economic crisis has created difficulties for many people in many countries to repay their debts. They simply did not budget for a situation like this one to happen. Nothing to do with the passport they carry.
I heard that debt collectors are extremely busy this year.

Our experience in Italy is actually finding out how much we owe - we always get a preventivo (eventually) - but getting the Fattura has been painful.
Especially as I missed out on changing the required sterling at 1.28 in October (aaargh) - but that's the gamble you take in buying property in another currency - I didn't complain at 1.46....
In my former life working for a large european distribution company the Italians had the worst debtor days in the whole of Europe (average of 145 days compared with 30 in Germany and 45 in the UK)
We now run our own business and and very aware of the consequences of slow or non payers. The worst payers are usually the ones who try to negotiate a discount. And believe me those who are "good" payers receive an enhanced after sales service compared to the slow payers!!
Gala you're right our biggest client at the moment is an official receiver................

[quote=Gala Placidia;114771] .... I do not think that you can blame people because of their nationalities. The current economic crisis has created difficulties for many people in many countries to repay their debts....

Gala - I'm afraid I can't agree with you .. non payment to my company was 4 years ago when the UK was living on a high. I agree things have gotten worse though....:smile:

Jinty - We paid all our suppliers in advance to get the best discounts.. but did we get better service (?) Yes - from Germany, Austria, Scandinavia... No - from Italy, GB, France and don't talk to us about Bosnia!!!

So paying up front is not always the best way forward although I would say it helps - the cliché "put up or shut up" comes to mind.:smile:

Would I jeopardise the relationships with my Geometra, Builder, Kitchen Supplier, Handyman and cleaner by being slow to pay ? – not a chance.

In fact as Marc pointed out I have left a “petty cash” fund with my friend to cover any unforeseen events. This hasn’t been touched – even though my geometra paid my ENEL bill for me and Roberto my neighbour (handyman and all round good egg) fixed a frozen pipe over the winter which I only found out about two weeks ago!

How much would a burst pipe have cost me if it had been left for 4 months?

If it had been the other way round and I had a burst pipe in Glasgow while I was in Italy for 4 months would my neighbours have fixed it ? I don’t think so….

The exchange rate is not an excuse for not paying people who have undertaken work for you.

BTW anyone else doing their sums with Euro parity???

[quote=Gala Placidia;114771]Once again, I do not think that you can blame people because of their nationalities. The current economic crisis has created difficulties for many people in many countries to repay their debts. They simply did not budget for a situation like this one to happen. Nothing to do with the passport they carry.
I heard that debt collectors are extremely busy this year.[/quote]

The information passed on to me from the English mason was what has happened to him over the past 5 years, so I don't think that the current bad economy is to blame! My point, however, was simply to say that it isn't only the Italian builders/masons who are sometimes not paid but English builders as well. The thread had referred to the fact that English often have complaints about Italian builders and try not to pay them, but contractors of other nationalities suffer the same fate.

hmm ...I run my own jewellery business (UK based ) and part of what I do is restringing and reparing all kinds of jewellery. I used to wait until I'd been paid in full before returning the jewellery but now I've started sending the jewellery back before payment and I've NEVER had a problem with not being paid.

I also have let customers take away an item of jewellery from my stand at Craft Fairs then send me a cheque .Once again I've always had payment in full within days.This doesnt sound like Brits cant be trusted!

Once I applied the same principle in Italy and trusted a builder who was a friend of our carpenter.I gave him 500 euros in cash before he had done a small job finishing off some window sills.We came back 2 months later to find the work hadnt been done, phoned him and he assured us he was going to do it.

I've never seen him or the money again.

Does that mean I will never trust another Italian workman? No of course not it was one isolated incident .

I'm sure there are some Brits who are in dispute with their builders or architects but should we really generalise?

Our carpenter always used to say how he liked doing business with the Brits as they were such prompt payers! However, I guess it all boils down to comparissons - he is still owed money ( a fairly substantial sum) by an Italian 'friend' of his whose original bill was in the good old days of lira!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! He reckons it would cost him more than the actual bill to chase it up legally so it continues on the never never and is put down to experience!

I have never had any objection to paying for good work. However, the so called finishing builder assigned to the house made such a terrible job that we refused to pay the last E10,000. This was the first time that the Geometre had used this guy ..... previously only a painter, as we found out afterwards.
You can see the excellent finish pictures on my profile page.
He has taken us to court for non payment, and the geometre just says it is normale. Welcome to the world of some new Italian standards.

Has anyone seen my electrician?
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In common with the mason, I also had problems before this crisis getting what is due from a couple of UK based holiday home owners. After obtaining my cash, I've dropped the offending clients. Who needs it? :no:

We have delayed paying our final bills for our house BUT had our geometra told us there was another €100k to pay we could have bought it at a better rate - as it was we thought there was about €20k to pay. As it is we can raise the money but a. it is costing us a hell of a lot more than we were expecting and b. we have been hit by the weakness in the £ and c. it takes longer to raise money in the Uk now. Had the work been completed to the timescales we were promised (finished in July) then they would have been paid in full by now.

Also it is usual in the UK to withold payment until all the snagging has been dealt with - as we had no windows or electricity in August (despite being promised them for early July and having no where to stay when we came out with my parents and our children for a month) and still have doors that do not fit, windows that don't open as designed, had no heating for much of the time we were there at Christmas (when there was snow), I don't feel guilty about not paying yet. When everything is finished then we will make the final payments - hard lesson maybe but we had our summer ruined, have lost rental income this year because the house is still not finished.

[quote=Jinty;114778]Would I jeopardise the relationships with my Geometra, Builder, Kitchen Supplier, Handyman and cleaner by being slow to pay ? – not a chance.

In fact as Marc pointed out I have left a “petty cash” fund with my friend to cover any unforeseen events. This hasn’t been touched – even though my geometra paid my ENEL bill for me and Roberto my neighbour (handyman and all round good egg) fixed a frozen pipe over the winter which I only found out about two weeks ago!

How much would a burst pipe have cost me if it had been left for 4 months?

If it had been the other way round and I had a burst pipe in Glasgow while I was in Italy for 4 months would my neighbours have fixed it ? I don’t think so….

The exchange rate is not an excuse for not paying people who have undertaken work for you.

BTW anyone else doing their sums with Euro parity???[/quote]

Oh absolutely, screwing around with payment in a small community where everyone knows each other - and all the people involved in house restoration, etc will certainly know each other very well and swap stories - is a real own goal.
Like you, when we weren't here permanently we used to leave a small cash reserve with a trusted friend to cover emergencies and more than once I remember our geometra fixed things up in our absence without dipping in to the petty cash or asking for reimbursement until we met up with him later. Perhaps we've just been lucky but in all the years we've been here, we've never been harrassed for payment. In fact, it's invariably been the reverse and getting final bills out of workmen has sometimes been a real challenge.

We too had heard all the horror stories before we engaged our geometra and then selected his preferred builders from those who estimated for the work. We didn't seek to negotiate our builders to the lowest price, nor to get them to fit in lots of extras without charge, trusted them to get on with the with job in hand and make their own decisions as appropriate. Nor did we seek to negotiate our local builders merchants to the floor - the prices quoted were fair and we paid them, and used to cringe overhearing other Brits seeking to screw the prices to the floor. The end result our builders turned to be a gift from the Madonna, did a truly wonderful job for us, our geometra did his job superbly, the project was completed under budget and they told us. We had positive feedback about the way we had been with them. End result we were all very happy - well I hope we were.

I do understand people seeking good prices, but there is a level at which the supplier and the customer need to feel happy. A good job for a fair price is what I like.

So a general question comes to mind ...................would you take your car to the garage , get a written quote, go to collect the car and get told that the bill is double the cost. then happily pay the bill without question.......I don't think "we" would.
But it happens a lot here, and then your geometra, "advises" you to pay up, so as to not upset the builder. (oh dear we cant have that now can we) ...........its a double standard being used here.........pay up , your a good fellow ( but a chump), don't pay up and even ask as to the reason for the extras your the bad guy .......its BS in its worst form................

Had to laugh at the term foreigner applied to Italians in their own country.

Our experience has been like Violetta's for small jobs. We've had to beg to pay as soon as a job was finished as we weren't sure when we'd be back in Italy. Likewise when an expected bill hasn't arrived before we've finished our holiday and our neighbour has offered to pay it, I've had to insist she takes the money in advance as she's always said we could pay her on our next visit. I immediately start to imagine some great tragedy preventing me from seeing her again so always make her take the money.

Arty has hit the nail on the head!
Many years ago I heard a travelling man, who tarmacced drives for a living, on radio 4 being interviewed about his work. He was a man who took pride in doing a good job. He was asked whether people beat him down on price to which he replied - if I quote £500 for a job they get £500 worth of work. If they push the price down to £400 then they get a £400 job done.
In my business I have only rarely dropped my price because I always quote a fair price for the job. I have noticed, and others have told me the same, that people who push on price are always slow to pay and also they find something to complain about to delay payment longer!! I now stick to my guns and let them go elsewhere. :laughs: