Subcontractor lays tiles very poorly

Hello,

due to the many construction projects, the tile setter commissioned by the developer employed a subcontractor from Italy. The work is poor, i.e. corners and edges were broken off, silicone smears everywhere, etc. The icing on the cake was also the consistently (in some houses) incorrect calculation of the tiles, i.e. after deducting 10 - 15 % waste, 20 - 35 % too many tiles were charged. A nice extra income - I don’t want to suggest a system here, but with about 200 - 300 houses per year, a nice sum. We were credited for the difference of the excess tiles laid - now we have another problem child. An ordered border looks awful. non-removable silicone, broken corners (looks great on a black border).

The construction manager does not respond, emails to the management yield no consensus. Even employees of the parent company were shocked at the poor work quality.

Such a border costs 700 - 800 €, maybe a small sum on site, but not acceptable to us as at least some parts are extremely unsightly.

How would you proceed in such a case? Customer-oriented work is by the way very, very minimal at this company, so an appeal to reason is hardly possible.

Hello,

I am not allowed to provide legal advice, as this is exclusively reserved for consulting professions in Germany. However, I can tell you from my daily practice how I would handle it.

How would you proceed in such a case? By the way, customer-oriented work is given very little importance in this company, so an appeal to reason is hardly possible.

Under no circumstances pay the tile work; you can withhold up to three times the value (defects) – at least with a construction contract according to the German Civil Code.

Complaint of defects with a deadline of 2 weeks (there is no imminent danger). If there is no response, send another complaint of defects with a deadline of 1 week. If this deadline also passes without result, hire an external tile company to fix the defects and invoice your general contractor for the costs.

That will surely get him moving :-)

Rhenish greetings

This model would also have worked wonderfully for all trades. However, after the bathrooms etc. were planned, everything was done so far, and the first tiles were laid in the house, the invoice came by advance payment (as has been usual with this company for 2 years). True to the motto "take it or leave it," and since the builders were satisfied in the first construction phase (about 1.5 months lead time), we foolishly paid. Only no one mentioned at that time that a subcontractor was responsible for our houses. Yes, we were naive and basically got "screwed." That is the crux of the whole story. If we had known. We did not make advance payments for any other trade; here at that time, we had no other choice because replanning with a company not rooted with the developer was no longer possible.

Could you please also correct the typo in the name of the thread if possible? I only noticed it today.