Drainage in New Plymouth

15th March 2012
I had a very bad experience with this plumber this morning. When I had called earlier in the week to arrange a time I had explained that I start work at 9am, I have a lot going on at work and so I could meet either early in the morning or late in the afternoon. I was told that I would be the first job on Thursday morning and that they would be there just after 8am. At 8.30am I called to find out where they were and explained that I had to be at work at 9am. He said he would be there in ten minutes. At 8.45 I rang again to say that I had to leave for work, to cancel the job and I would arrange for somebody else to do the job another time. The guy was unbelievably rude. He had in fact just turned up outside my house so he wasn't far off the "ten minutes away" but he was 45 minutes later than originally arranged and seeing as I had emphasised from the start that I needed to start work at 9am I didn't find this acceptable. I explained to him that I had been told that someone would arrive just after 8am and that this hadn't happened and I had to leave for work. He said "If you don't want my work then fine, I don't care". I do understand that tradesmen get busy and things come up but, as I said to him, it would have only taken a phone call to arrange another time. Instead I got a lot of aggro, I was made to feel that I was in the wrong and in the end he hung up on me but not before calling me a female dog. Not once did he apologise for running late or offer to make it another time. As I said, I was made to feel that I was in the wrong and that is far from the case. I wouldn't even consider using this plumber again. While understanding that unforeseen circumstances do arise I feel that more understanding on his part about his customers own time and responsibilities would have gone a long way to retaining my business.