Is this wall and floor tiling acceptable?

[Tess]

Invested in expensive tiles (£1,200 for this lot) and the tiler initially charged over £1000 to fit these 9sqm as part of his refurb of my whole bathroom (plastering prep was extra). I have argued him down to match another quote because of the state of the corners - slivers etc, but does the rest of the job look acceptable and long lasting to you? There is a wedge shaped gap at the door that I wonder how he will fill. The tiles have a gap to the wall I can slide card between them up to 2.5 cm deep (shown). Please advise.
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few more pics.. the rainshower pipe wobbles in its hole, is that acceptable?
Has there been adequate waterproofing used? (glazed and sealed ceramic green tile)
Many Thanks for your help.

 

[Lou]

Has anyone got any comments on how this tiling is?

Thanks

 

[al strachan]

tiling looks fine to me, just badly planned and setout.

 

[Tess]

I agree, I've been quite upset about that lack of care and disappointed in the finish for these beautiful tiles. This is my family bathroom for the next ten years and the first time I've invested anything like that much in my home. Hopefully the guy can make some sense of the door gap before he goes, to me it looks like a gap too big for just a brass plate, perhaps it needs to have some tile slivers -Idk. Thanks for your answer Lou.
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tiling looks fine to me, just badly planned and setout.

Thanks Al

 

[acaciaguy]

The setting out and overall care in finish isn’t great. How much did you pay for just the tiling?

 

[Tess]

The setting out and overall care in finish isn’t great. How much did you pay for just the tiling?

The original quote was £1060 for 9sqm with me paying for trims, sealants, grout but I have argued this should be decreased due to the unsightly finish, to be in line with the other quote I had which was £485 including VAT. The project manager of the bathroom who was also the tiler has since agreed to this reduction but says he is not happy about it.

 

[Boggs]

£1060 for 9sqm!!!!

Can I do all your tiling please.

 

[Tess]

£1060 for 9sqm!!!!

Can I do all your tiling please.

Pre-tax, yeah - I've been had.
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I expected a high quality finish correlating to the high quote for tiling, and bought expensive tiles with that expectation.

 

[JMC tiling]

Hi Tess,

Unfortunately there are a few setting out issues here and clearly the cost IMO is a little over the top for that amount of tiling with the tile you have chosen. However, it is retrievable to a point as the actual tiling looks ok as i'm assuming of course that the tiles are meant to be a little un-even with a rustic style edge hence the slight uneven grout joints? he needs to cut a sliver of tile to go under the door and shave the door down to size. thankfully with this style of floor tile, a small cut isn't the end of the world and would look much better then a threshold filling that gap. The cuts into the corner are not ideal but at least he has wrapped them around the corner to make then look like 1 whole tile so I would probably be putting a nice neat small silicone colour match bead in each corner to tidy it up. The cut around pipe you have shown will look fine with a chrome cover plate and maybe thats what he planned to do anyway? I'd say if he gives you the discount and sorts them issues out you might still be ok, not perfect but still a decent look. Hope this helps.

 

[Bill]

I could have tiled & grouted (expertly) that in less than a day and would have gone on holiday for the rest of the week........... How much?

Although I feel your pain at the job - think that the expensive quote was correct?

 

[Tess]

Hi Tess,

Unfortunately there are a few setting out issues here and clearly the cost IMO is a little over the top for that amount of tiling with the tile you have chosen. However, it is retrievable to a point as the actual tiling looks ok as i'm assuming of course that the tiles are meant to be a little un-even with a rustic style edge hence the slight uneven grout joints? he needs to cut a sliver of tile to go under the door and shave the door down to size. thankfully with this style of floor tile, a small cut isn't the end of the world and would look much better then a threshold filling that gap. The cuts into the corner are not ideal but at least he has wrapped them around the corner to make then look like 1 whole tile so I would probably be putting a nice neat small silicone colour match bead in each corner to tidy it up. The cut around pipe you have shown will look fine with a chrome cover plate and maybe thats what he planned to do anyway? I'd say if he gives you the discount and sorts them issues out you might still be ok, not perfect but still a decent look. Hope this helps.

Thanks for your detailed response JMC. Super Appreciated. I've also just paid a tiler to give his opinion in person and he also said the threshold needs to have that extra bit of tile before the threshold bar (but thought one of those too). Last time we spoke tiler guy said threshold wasn't in the quote but he would do it - the bathroom floor was definately in the quote lmao!

For the silicone bead would you say colourmatch to the green tiles would be best aesthetically? And that goes all the way up each corner?
The tiler who visited also pointed out the trims around the window are on in two different ways/ different thickness showing to the room, but perhaps there was a reason for that.

It was an expensive job - 6.5 k for the bathroom and I bought nearly everything and prep was standard, old suite and floor were already out and new basic floor laid. Hopefully I've learnt some lessons going forward with new contractors. When I asked for receipts due to high materials costs (1.8k) guy admitted he worked profit into his materials costs - reckon at least 50% and hasn't shown any receipts. Argued that I wanted him to take off that for two waste pipes I had bought. Will have to bring that up again. Just to give you a fuller picture of the story!
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I could have tiled & grouted (expertly) that in less than a day and would have gone on holiday for the rest of the week........... How much?

Although I feel your pain at the job - think that the expensive quote was correct?

I don't know if I understand your question- the expensive quote was definitely intended by the tiler guy, it was even higher than that originally and I told him it was expensive, he took £120 off before it got to £1070 when I crazily accepted the quote! (I know I said 1060 earlier but checked now.)

 

[JMC tiling]

Not nice Tess, looks like they are probably a bit chancy and unfortunately they have had you a bit here but its difficult for a customer to choose the right tradesman sometimes.

With regards, the silicone, use a colour match as close to the tile as you can to hide the joint, will look miles better. Without seeing the setup of window properly in pictures, its hard to comment on the trim situation but sounds strange to have them 2 different ways.

Goodluck with the rest of it, hope it works out ok for you.

 

[Tess]

Thanks again JMC

 

[Tess]

Okay so I have another example of how this guy has been chancy :- I'm pretty sure it's a made up task I've just noticed - bearing in mind the bath moved forward like 20cm, toilet and sink stayed in their same places "Water and waste provisions for new sanitary ware: £180 materials, £380 labour (£560)"
T
his can't amount to hardly any new pipe or work as far as I can see?

I'm already paying £420 just for fitting the bath (including bath cost £120, I provided waste-pipe, not including the panel sides), £230 for fitting the sink (I provided the sink, taps and waste pipe) and £770 for fitting an electric bidet toilet, not including the cabinet surround.

I'm feeling I have fairly strong grounds on the basis I'm paying the fittings already to strike out this "Water and waste provisions" line item at £560. Anyone want to weigh in on this? Thanks

 

[Dumbo]

Have you had an estimate / quote for the works , if so did you accept it
Are these figures varying from the estimate / quote if you had one .

 

[Tess]

Have you had an estimate / quote for the works , if so did you accept it
Are these figures varying from the estimate / quote if you had one .

There were some changes to the toilet price mainly but this "Water and Waste Provisions for New Sanitary Ware : £560" has been there all along. Does it matter if I agreed to it in the quote if I can see now that it's not a real job, even if there were "materials costs" included?

 

[J Sid]

When u say a real job, do u mean that they haven't do it?

 

[Tess]

Yeah, I'm seriously doubting that was even a thing they had to do

 

[Dumbo]

If i want to charge a customer a £1000 pound for a bag of adhesive and its written in a quote and they have accepted it i cant think there is a thing they can do about it . I really think you need to speak to a solicitor as this seems really messy but i suggest when you first talk to them you keep on point with your main issues and then after you have done that move on to the more ambiguous issues , after all we are not lawyers

 

[widler]

I thi k what you should do is use one of these adveets which the forum is throwing about, looks like dan is promoting cowboys bow, under 2 grand for a new bathroom one add says , bit of a pee take on a pro tilers forum imo

 

[Smiler5714]

I hope I'm not out of turn here but I agree that the setting out could have been worked out far better, especially on the floor. Normally you set out to extreme furthest points so in your case one edge would have been under the door so there shouldn't be a need for 'slithers'. Now that you have what you have, slithers are the only option but shouldn't look too bad.

As for the corner of the shower, it drives me nuts seeing tiles running out with deminishing cuts, thats usually because the walls aren't plum but can easily be sorted in the prep stages or by bedding up adhesive sometimes. Okay this takes longer to do but the finish is far better for you the customer. Did this guy board out the shower area first because if so he needs a new 6' level!!
Regarding the silicone beads within the internal corners, this has to be done to comply with building regs anyway but yes, go with the best tile colour match however, whatever you do, please make sure your man can silicone up neatly otherwise it will just destroy it all even more. The last thing you need is to have green silicone smeared all over the place!!

Finally, pricing...... Did you only get the 2 quotes? We're these people recommended?
In future get references, talk to people and even be cheeky and ask if you can see people's previous work. If you get to see their work then you can make judgement yourself.
I've seen pictures of people's work that they themselves use to advertise their services but it's absolutely shocking. Unless you're in the trade then you probably wouldn't see or notice some of the rubbish that's produced and so even some customers themselves just see shiny new tiles on a wall and think it's the business when in fact, it's shocking!!

I hope you end up with the finish you want and everything goes well.

Stu
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Oh, one other thing......that bath fitting price, I have just quoted to refit a bath for someone, albeit back in its original place.....£90 including silicone and tap connections and I will even fit the wall mounted tri-fold shower screen too.
No more than 3 hours work Saturday morning. So, £300 for this guy to move and fit a new one 200mm away OMG!! Even if it takes half a day, that's one nice income!

 

[Andy Allen]

I thi k what you should do is use one of these adveets which the forum is throwing about, looks like dan is promoting cowboys bow, under 2 grand for a new bathroom one add says , bit of a pee take on a pro tilers forum imo

were you drunk when you posted this ??

 

[Boggs]

£90 including silicone and tap connections and I will even fit the wall mounted tri-fold shower screen too.

You can come and do some for me then.

£90 won’t leave you much after vehicle running costs, tax, ni and materials.

 

[widler]

A bit of a statement Craig 😁
Did you mean British Standard rather than industry standard?
I think we need to know what sort of porcelain tiles are going down

were you drunk when you posted this ??

No, my fat fingers and I didn’t have my glasses on, when i read it back i realised only the thickest and stupidest of people wouldn’t be able to understand it and try and be clever , so I couldn’t be arsed changing it.
Point proven
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Ive no idea why julians post has been qouted ?

 

[Andy Allen]

No, my fat fingers and I didn’t have my glasses on, when i read it back i realised only the thickest and stupidest of people wouldn’t be able to understand it and try and be clever , so I couldn’t be arsed changing it.
Point proven
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Ive no idea why julians post has been qouted ?

thanks for clearing that up mate...
as I thought it was just some thick as sh$t plasterer writing it....

 

[J Sid]

No, my fat fingers and I didn’t have my glasses on, when i read it back i realised only the thickest and stupidest of people wouldn’t be able to understand it and try and be clever , so I couldn’t be arsed changing it.
Point proven
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Ive no idea why julians post has been qouted ?

I see your still ignoring court order to stop stalking me Craig

 

[Tess]

I hope I'm not out of turn here but I agree that the setting out could have been worked out far better, especially on the floor. Normally you set out to extreme furthest points so in your case one edge would have been under the door so there shouldn't be a need for 'slithers'. Now that you have what you have, slithers are the only option but shouldn't look too bad.

As for the corner of the shower, it drives me nuts seeing tiles running out with deminishing cuts, thats usually because the walls aren't plum but can easily be sorted in the prep stages or by bedding up adhesive sometimes. Okay this takes longer to do but the finish is far better for you the customer. Did this guy board out the shower area first because if so he needs a new 6' level!!
Regarding the silicone beads within the internal corners, this has to be done to comply with building regs anyway but yes, go with the best tile colour match however, whatever you do, please make sure your man can silicone up neatly otherwise it will just destroy it all even more. The last thing you need is to have green silicone smeared all over the place!!

Finally, pricing...... Did you only get the 2 quotes? We're these people recommended?
In future get references, talk to people and even be cheeky and ask if you can see people's previous work. If you get to see their work then you can make judgement yourself.
I've seen pictures of people's work that they themselves use to advertise their services but it's absolutely shocking. Unless you're in the trade then you probably wouldn't see or notice some of the rubbish that's produced and so even some customers themselves just see shiny new tiles on a wall and think it's the business when in fact, it's shocking!!

I hope you end up with the finish you want and everything goes well.

Stu
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Oh, one other thing......that bath fitting price, I have just quoted to refit a bath for someone, albeit back in its original place.....£90 including silicone and tap connections and I will even fit the wall mounted tri-fold shower screen too.
No more than 3 hours work Saturday morning. So, £300 for this guy to move and fit a new one 200mm away OMG!! Even if it takes half a day, that's one nice income!

Thanks.

He was reccommended by a friend but think this is because he was a carpenter on another company's project at that time and he is a good carpenter.

He came yesterday and fitted extra slivers to the door with an oak threshold under the door- he wanted to do all in wood but I told him the floor needs to fill the room! Looks alright now, slivers and slightly uneven grout lines but sigh.

I'm a bit worried about his silicone skills but its the last job to do before he gets paid.

£6,570 is what he's expecting total - and the only materials he bought were: white plastic extractor fan, basic switch cords, geberit cistern with no frame, mdf for toilet cabinet, pine for bath sides, tile adhesive, 2m underfloor heating with control panel, ditra mat, steel bath (£120) plus wear and tear on his tools and a few nails and screws maybe.

I'm going to write to him to say I think his £1800+VAT for materials is too much of a mark-up, since he's admitted when I asked for receipts that he added mark-up and refused receipts.

(Included in the £6570: materials as above, vat and labour, which didn't include taking out the old suite or rubbish disposal or decorating).

"Provisions for Sanitary Ware" line item - £600 and this above the £1500 for fitting bath, sink and loo despite no changes of position (bath panel/ toilet cabinet/ shower-screen/box for shower NOT INCLUDED! ). I was in a haze when I agreed, having just lost my father and being a novice to this - but I did write to him to clarify before accepting quote re: materials that if he didn't buy things he wouldn't charge me for them. What's my standing re not paying the materials costs or asking for receipts.

He's also blanket charged 20% VAT on all materials and labour, which I think is wrong?

Thanks for any further feedback.

Further moan - electrics not signed off after I bought exactly the agreed IP rated products, due to his miscommunication and underfloor heating warantee invalidated by his delay.

I honestly like the guy I just hate being peed on and told it's raining.

 

[acaciaguy]

Did he fit any electrical parts in the bathroom?

 

[Tess]

Did he fit any electrical parts in the bathroom?

He had an electrician to fit the electrics which were: 4 lights, extractor fan and electrics for the bidet toilet and underfloor heating.

 

[acaciaguy]

Brill. He’s done correct thing there. Get a cert from them for that

has he given / will he give you his vat number. It will be on the invoice.