Pottering Along

So a lot of promises have been made on our builders part and the last two weeks haven't really lived up to them. You might remember they now have to provide us with a fortnightly schedule of what will be happening on site- which they are yet to fill in correctly. Two weeks ago they did not get all items completed and this last week they had completed what they said they were going to. So its not terrible but if I was the builder and had given such bad services I would be saying I would get the bare minimum done each week and then  'surprising' the owner with extras. But then again, if I was the builder the house would be finished by now!
We have back roof frame and all the scaffolding is now down. The other progress items are not very interesting (laundry chute cut out, minor electric and plumbing works etc)

Things are Looking Up!

Last week we received an email from the builders stating our house would be finished mid June. So we are back on schedule! YAH!
So much for the general manager stating there was no way we would be finished on time....Jake thinks he meant that the build was meant to take 9 months, whereas the contract states 12 months (buffer of 3 months?) and that's what we always go off.
They sent us a schedule for the next three months, not much happens in March but then a lot happens in April and May.
Ceilings were done this week to the top floor. Its looking good. We noticed another error but hopefully it is easily fixed. As for this week...haven't been out yet but we did get an email saying that due to unforeseen circumstances they were not able to get us our fortnightly update on time but it should be to us on Monday.

Where to start.....

So much has happened over the last few weeks... not much of which was progress on our build!
Basically we complained to the managers at our building company about poor communication, lack of progress, amount of errors, how they have been handled, no accountability and the fact we looked like we were going to run over schedule.
To cut a long story short, we dropped the b word in our email, Building Commission, who you go to if you have a complaint against a builder. The builder took it very seriously and we met with the manager of the South West division on site on Saturday. He gave us a $250 gift voucher for our time and could only apologise for all the problems we have had. Apparently they are changing up their procedures and we should see an improvement.
He said he did not expect us to finish on time (June) and dropped October into the conversation a couple of times. EEK!!!!
So lets hope things go better from here.
We are still dealing with some problems. One of which is I have to choose a new bath spout. I had picked a laundry spout knowing it may not work. The builders assured me it was fine several times and then the other day told me there was no way they could do it. Stupid builder. I wanted a mixer on a gooseneck swivel spout from the hob- basically doesn't exist for a bath. I had to settle for a wall mounted gooseneck swivel spout with separate mixer. You have to understand my bath is my favourite place in the whole house so it was quite a big compromise for me to make.
Windows have been installed, aircon tubes are in and top storey render and eaves have been painted.

Last weekend our visit to the block only showed slight progress to the electrical works and the upstairs wall corners had metal cornering placed on them. This weekend's visit had the entire top floor plastering done! Very happy to see.

As we were leaving we noticed the top of the columns at the front of the house has been rendered. We feel like a lot of time could have been saved with better scheduling..... but at least there's progress.

Building makes time go slower....

On Monday 13 we had a meeting on site with the site manager to talk about our most recent issues. A few of them we were dead right about. However, rather then apologise the guy would just say " that's an easy fix'. What if we weren't so observant? Would we just  have had to put up with the mistake forever?

One of the things that couldn't be fixed was the annoying plumbing in two of the wardrobes. He will encase them in mdf so they are less noticeable. We reiterated several times our annoyance at this never being on the plan, if it had we could have planned around it, put it in a better location. 

We thought they had put provisions in for gas (we aren't having any gas connections) but the manager said it was actually just where the main water supply was going to run into the house. Which makes sense....except the hose they had there split in to two (our water goes to the solar upstairs or booster out the back to warm up) and then a few days later the hose completely disappeared. Fancy that!

The only progress that week was the lowering of the scaffolding to allow the painters to paint the eaves. The following week the only progress was that the electrical work was started. I don't know much about electrical work but it seemed like good progress for a week. For two weeks though and with them trying to catch up on all the lost time due to errors, it doesn't seem good enough.

The site manager did say he was hopeful he would be finished BY June....We shall see!

Our Builders are Incompetent

In this whole building process the thing I have come to regret most is our choice in builders. I understand that no build is ever smooth sailing- especially when building custom- but I didn't expect these kinds of continual stupid mistakes that we never receive an apology for and usually takes weeks to get the builder to admit an error has been made and then to begin to fix it.

My husband and I had been finding it strange that we had not had to pay a progress payment since July '13 and yet both ground floor and top floor bricks had been completed which are meant to be two separate payments. After reaping the benefits of not having to pay extra interest we thought it was about time to enquire about it. Sure enough we got an email replying that the ground floor had just been processed that day and that top floor would be next week. HOW COINCIDENTAL! No thank you for being honest and good customers and pointing it out.

Then we went out today to look at recent plumbing work and found several items wrong that reflected things in earlier plans that we had changed. For example they automatically included gas hood and regulator on original plans which we had removed as we decided to be independent of gas but now there looks to be provisions for it on site. There are also two exposed pipes running from floor to ceiling in my walk in robe and one of the kids built in robes.....I have never in my life seen exposed piping in a house and what a nuisance to have in your wardrobes (or anywhere for that matter.) You may remember on the other side of the wardrobe we had to grin and bear the last minute inclusion of two aircon ducts that take up almost a third of the space we had planned on having.

We have asked that they inform us of the plans to correct all the mistakes by the end of tomorrow as my husband and I have the day off for our ultrasound. This better not wreck what should otherwise be a fantastic day!

After already having it in the plans that my bath spout would be in the middle of the bath the builders suddenly moved it to the side for an easy fix. I complained and they fixed it but here the plumbing is showing it back on the side.

The random pipe in my walk in robe :-(

We also realised we never checked the height of the vanities and discovered they are actually quite low. Nothing we can do about it now though.

Solar Heating

We stopped by the house the other day when we were going passed. As it was the Christmas holidays and the builders office is currently shut it was just to gaze and not hoping to see something new. Just as we got back in the car to leave I noticed something on the roof that hadn't been there the last time. Over Christmas the Solar panel for the hot water system was installed. I love surprise progress.