Help! Grout and silicone problem - bathroom just retiled

[jambourie]

Hello,

I had my bathroom retiled a couple of weeks ago. Floors were tiled with large square grey tiles with white grout and walls with white brick tiles with grey grout. There are a couple of problems with the work the tiler did:
- The grout on the floor tiles has already cracked (hairline cracks) and is crumbling away. He has tried to cover this up in some places with silicone which does not look good.
- In the internal tile corners on the walls he has used white silicone over grey grout, which has sort of smudged together and ended up looking dirty.
- Generally the silicone looks messy and dirty.

I will attach some pictures to show you examples of this. Is this normal? Surely the job should be neater than this? What has gone wrong?

Is it normal that they grey grout looks darker when wet? Should he have sealed this?

Any help or advice would be really appreciated!

Thank you.

 

[White Room]

Hi and welcome....you are correct to have reservations about the quality of work......

 

[Bubblecraft]

Hi & welcome to TF. I'm sorry to say this but not only is the silicone work awful but grouting is shocking. This is unacceptable. Hairline cracks could be caused by a number of reasons. Incorrect adhesive, substrate not prepared correctly.

 

[peteablard]

Have you spoken to your tiler about this?. Sorry but that is a very poor job. Dark grout with white tiles will show up any imperfections and as we'll as the grouting being very poor in general it also shows up that the tiles are spaced poorly. It looks like the silicone was applied before the grout had dried and has smeared the grout into the silicone

 

[Alex E]

That workman ship is atrocious! Please tell me you haven't paid them yet? The grout lines are dreadful!

 

[dobragol]

This must be one of the worst tiling/grouting/siliconing I've seen in ages . Really poor quality job.Talk to your tiler as this is unacceptable but get someone else in to rectify it.I don't think the guy who done this job is able to tile better than this .

 

[jambourie]

Thank you all, I thought this wasn't right. I did speak to him about the wobbly grout and he said it was hard to get it straight with the small tiles and spaces and grey grout. But then he finished the job while I was away, and the worst bit by far is the edging with grout and silicone, and the cracked grout on the floor. What has gone wrong with the grey grout? Why does it look so clumpy and messy? I'm wondering if even I could have done this better myself

 

[jambourie]

I will get him back and see what he says. What should I say is specifically wrong with the job?

 

[Bubblecraft]

You should say that overall, you are not happy with the finish. That is absolute rubbish about the grout on the walls. It's just not been done properly. It has been rushed. As I have said in my previous post, your hairline cracks on the floor have been caused by failing to prepare the substrate correctly or incorrect adhesive used. This could be a number of things but unfortunately, if this is how it is now soon after grouting, it can only get worse! There is no excuse for the state of the silicone. It has been applied while grout is still wet which has caused it to mix & discolour. He's also trying to either cover up large gaps with the silicone or the nozzle has been cut too large.

 

[carlito]

Rushed at the end springs to mind!

 

[jambourie]

I think he did actually rush it at the end and that's part of the problem. Bubblecraft, where he made the cuts up against the wall, the gaps between some of the tiles and the wall was almost an inch, so he used really thick grout and then tried to cover it with silicone. I'm guessing now this isn't the right thing to do..

 

[peteablard]

Rushed all the way through IMO. Look at the cut in the floor tile round the architrave, it's way too big and you can see where the blade has overrun in each direction. No care taken at all.....
if I were you jambourie I'd make a list of everything you're not happy with and give it to the tiler hen he comes to look t it.

 

[Rookery]

Agreed its a sub-standard job. I'm sorry but the only real solution is to have it re-done. Poor workmanship, poor practices and probably poor selection of tools and materials have all contributed to this.

 

[diamondtiling]

In a nutshell...........The guy is not a tiler.

 

[prceramics]

makes me really sad to see this i am sitting at home with no work and guys out there doing this kind of work !, not acceptable

 

[stusgsx]

That is a very poor job to say the least.
How someone could actually have the front to charge for it?!
Does the guy actually advertise as a tiler?

 

[Two-Trowels]

makes me really sad to see this i am sitting at home with no work and guys out there doing this kind of work !, not acceptable

And herein lies part of the problem. Home owners get a price from a pro tiler (insert bricklayer, chippy etc as appropriate) and the price is too high so they shop around and end up with something like the above job - I've seen it loads of times with most trades. The poor pro tiler like yourself is out of work and the chancers are busy, there's no justice.

I'm not suggesting for a moment that the OP opted for a cut price cheap job (although thats what they ended up with) but I sincerely hope it didn't cost much.

 

[jwatson]

what a chancer!!!!!
if i was to list what was wrong with the job, i would be here for a long, long time.

this is totally unacceptable, IMO needs all doing again. i would try and persue any monies paid to this cowboy and tell as many people as you know stay clear. hope you get this sorted

 

[kilty55]

unfortunately this job is a rip out imo

 

[jambourie]

Actually I got a few quotes for the job and he wasn't the cheapest. He seemed to know what he was doing and he had glowing reviews on ratedpeople.com. The problem is finding a tradesman when you don't know anyone else who's had similar work done. He is coming back next week so I will list the problems and hope that he can sort it, otherwise I will have to find someone to fix it.

Thanks everyone for your help. At least now I have the confidence to confront him about it!

 

[glasgow_tiler]

it would take a lot to get that to look nice, realy bad job unfortunately

 

[John Benton]

I bet he didn't turn up in a van, more like on a horse and left it tied up outside.

As previously said, make a list of all the problems that have been spoken about and present it to him. Ask him what he is going to do about it and let him answer. I'm guessing that it will be a load of waffle and excuses.

This guy has never fitted a tile properly in his life if that standard is anything to go by.

 

[macten]

Awful setting out
Bad levels and and uneven joints
Sloppy and inaccurate cuts
Terrible grouting
Terrible siliconing on top of wet grout which gives the dirty look and also makes the silicone useless
Incorrect prep of floor or wrong adhesive used

So on balance - everything has been done wrong/badly.
Only way forward is to rip out and start again.

 

[d noulton]

that is shocking worst tiling ive seen in a long time sorry not very constructive all said in previous posts

 

[EverDon Tiling]

wow thats really bad i feel for you. And its not hard to open fake accounts on sites like ratedpeople.com and leave your own feedback did he point out to you he was on there.

 

[AliGage]

Did you see any of his work or getting any references?

Ratings on sites like RP carry about as much weight as feedback on ebay. A++++++

 

[charlie1]

Hi Jambouree, It could have been worse....mmm... nah just looked again, It couldnt!!!

 

[judge]

in a nutshell "AWFUL !!!!!"