Error in house construction - How did you deal with it?

How many times I've heard the saying in various variations:

- that's fine
- we've always done it that way, nothing has ever been missing
- that's normal

I really can't hear it anymore. No one says when you go to them with a complaint: alright, you're right, we'll look into it...

Heater beeps: hm, well, that's hard to say now
Toilet makes strange noises: normal for rimless
Plaster crooked and bumpy (and what the DIN allows is really very tolerant): that's normal, you should have ordered Q4

What I've heard... sometimes unbelievable...

In any case, always send a brief written confirmation to the person afterwards. After a longer time or several conversations, you eventually don't know anymore what you discussed with whom...

Also very important with follow-ups... get it countersigned immediately, send an email or something

With many things, we have reworked ourselves or had other companies rework, and with some things you have to somehow try to live with...

But how do you decide whether to live with it now or whether it is simply unreasonable...

Boom phenomenon. Huge amount of work, time pressure, scarce staff.... My friend K. has an electrical business. They now work until 9 PM and sometimes on Sundays. Everyone, boss and journeymen, is exhausted, money no longer comforts, could mistakes happen? This is not an excuse but an explanation.

Man, am I glad that (so far) this hasn’t happened to us. We are on the construction site about three times a week. Foremen, journeymen, and apprentices are in a good mood, work well together across trades, and don’t stay until the wee hours. The schedule works out, and neither the architect nor we have been able to detect any defects so far. We pay a rather high price for the work performance and settle the invoices on time.

It occurs to me that a phrase often heard from the general contractor (GU) is, building is a matter of trust. Then I say to the dear GUs, you first have to earn trust.

I've never heard that from our GU - it's more of a marketing slogan for all service providers.

I believe that you shouldn't sign anything without trust in the first place. I'm also the one here who advises choosing your GU partly based on gut feeling, and that already includes some trust. Coming afterwards during the house construction process with "you first have to earn it..." strikes me as wrong and condescending.
For the technical aspects, however, the expert can gladly mediate.
In our case, it was more the craftsmen from the GU's subcontractors, so there are quite a few intermediaries you have to trust.
We had a completely different relationship with the craftsmen we met in the afternoons than with the boss (never seen?!), the site manager, or the GU themselves.
Obvious defects were pointed out by us ourselves with a finger.

Man, am I glad this (so far) hasn't happened to us. We are definitely on the construction site three times a week. Foremen, journeymen, and apprentices are in a good mood, work well together across trades, and don't stay out until the wee hours. The schedule works out and neither the architect nor we have been able to find any defects so far. We pay a rather high price for the work and settle the invoices on time.

That's the joke: we never went for the cheapest and therefore paid a lot for the botch job, which makes it all the harder to overlook.

Otherwise, I could say: my God, at least it was cheap.

We have only one major defect and we will not have it fixed. The craft company believes they have made no mistake and should do rework? These "craftsmen" no longer enter the house. The pulse stays low when a beep beep car crashes on the floor. Repair ourselves so that it can be walked on barefoot and in a few years it will be sanded down or a new one will be installed.