C
Colour Republic
You're missing the point. Cutting down a door or plinth doesn't make you a chippy, re-seating a toilet doesn't make you a plumber, in the same way that being able to stick some tiles behind a basin as a splash back or grout a few square meters of tiles doesn't make you a tiler.
As for losing jobs, I can hand on heart tell you that if I was subbing out part of a job to a tiler that flat out refused to trim a door after he finished, I wouldn't give him the job. Why would I when I would have to send someone else in and incur extra costs to do such a tiny simple job? Now if I already had a chippy on site to trim that door or a plumber to remove that toilet then of course it would fall to them but if they have already finished up, then yes I would expect you to do it. The only time I would still give you the job over another tiler that would do it, is if you're hot, and I mean really hot at your job. I'd want to walk in to that room and cry with how beautiful its been done. Then I would bow down to you and say don't worry I’ll sort that door/plinth/toilet out because you're worth the hassle.
I'm almost sick of defending multi-trades on here but still I’ll go on. I've said many times I started off as a decorator, but the fact is that over the 17 years since I started on the tools maybe only 20% of that has been spent on decorating. I can no longer call myself a decorator, in fact most of my time on the tools is carpentry related but again I wouldn't call myself a carpenter as I'm very proud to call myself a multi-trader. As the fact is I turn out better work in many disciplines than those who profess to have a single trade and call themselves professionals at it. The general acceptance level of most trades in this country is pretty damn poor. Don't try and convince me otherwise as I’ve trailed and employed them. For every 1 or 2 great trademen there are 8 crap ones.
Again as I’ve said on here many times, the only reason I became multi-trades is because of this very thread. The tiler who wouldn’t trim some plinths, the electrician that wouldn't in-fill his chases, the plumber who didn't refix the floor boards he took up (and also skipped half of them because he couldn't remember where he took them up from), the carpet fitter who wouldn't trim doors and left them stacked against the wall... No it's all left to the decorator who as the last one on site takes pity on the homeowner and doesn't ask them to get every single trade back in to finish the last trades job but just gets on with it.
It has been said in this thread a few times that if you get one trade to undertake another’s trade then the customer loses out and ends up with a poor job. That is total bull, the other is true where if you get single trade in to do their little piece, then 90% of the time they will leave something for the next trade to pick up and finish off, only it doesn't get finished off because 'it doesn't come under the next trades remit' and so it gets left again. I see it every day when I walk in to a new customer’s house and see all those odd jobs which were never finished off over the years and just left. They have been short changed every time.
I've no problem in the slightest with somebody sticking to one trade but you better excel at it and become a master at your craft and after 5 years of being on this forum, with all its thousands of members, I can still only count on 2 hands those that are worthy of calling themselves master tilers. There're also many good tilers, great tilers in fact but the overriding majority are jobbing tilers that are 'just' good enough, nothing special but just pull it off to an 'acceptable' enough standard. Isn't that a sad state of affairs? Surely if all you do day in day out is tile, then you should wipe the floor with a multi-trader like me? Shouldn't you make me look like a total novice just playing at the game? But most of you can't. Don't hate me for saying it; hate your fellow tilers that forced people like me to say 'you know what? I can do it better than them' and learnt the trade.
You all must think people like me are a curse to the trade. I'm not. I don't go out actively tagreting tiling jobs, in fact I can count on one hand the 'purely tiling' jobs i've taken on in the last 5 years. No it's always as part of a lager job where tiling, or plastering, or electrical.... makes up a percentage of that job. Most of you cry foul when a HO employs a builder to install their new bathroom, "how can this be??" you scream "Do they not understand??". No in fact they don't, all they want is one point of contact that they can blame if things go wrong or aren't finished off. They don't want to be told "Sorry madam, I don't do that, didn't you know?"... No quite frankly they didn't:mad2:
Tell me Brian that these people got conned...
these people who I decorated their new extension
these people who I designed and fitted a kitchen for
Or this house I completely designed and refurbished inside and out including building the decking and installing a garden lighting system for...
or maybe a bathroom?
All of that said, I'm glad some of you refuse to undetake the simplest of 'non-trade' related jobs. As if you didn't, I wouldn't get any work
I don't mean to offend anyone and the above is not aimed at anyone in particular, not even you Brian for your comments but just a general rant at the sorry state of affairs.
errrrrrr rant over for now:sofahide:
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