The Brew Cabin

Knowing how many cowboys there are in the building trade has always put us off using them so when we decided to re-lay and extend our patios, we were resigned to do it ourselves. After having read your excellent web site, we felt confident to get some quotes.
We have been quoted, so far, for a labour only charge, of between £2900 and £6000 to lay 84sq m of Indian Sandstone flags and to build a natural stone mortared wall ¾ meter high by 12 meters long. 90% of the preparation work has already been done by us (excavation, clearance, laying of the base and design of the random pattern down to the last flag), as per your instructions. They have quoted for compacting the base, laying the flags on a full mortar bed, for full mortar joints and for building the wall. We are supplying all materials. All the contractors have said it’s a straightforward job, and will lay the flags straight onto the base that we have prepared.
We want a first class job, so don’t want to take the cheapest quote and get a shoddy job, however, we don’t want to be ripped off either, so if you can give us any guidance on what would be a fair price for such a job we will be extremely grateful.

As I've not seen the job, I can't really say what would be a fair price. Things such as access, location, local trading conditions etc all play a part in settting the price of a job such as this.

The paving is straightforward enough, and, from speaking with contractors throughout Britain and Ireland, the 'going-rate' for laying Indian sandstone is around 15 quid per square metre. So, your 84m² patio should cost something around 1250 quid to lay.

The walling is another matter, as the amount of labour involved depends on the type of stone being used - particularly whather its coursed or random, and how much dressing will be required. The price diff between an average 'builder' having a stab at building in stone, and the cost of a genuine stone mason is around 200%, but a stone mason will do a better job in a shorter period of time.

You have to go with your own intuition. Have you checked out previous work by these companies? Have you spoken to previous clients? Is there one that makes you feel more comfortable than the others, or is there one that gives you the jitters?

The proportion of cowboys in the construction industry is actually quirte small - it's just unfortunate that one story about a cowboy is more interesting to the general public than 1,000 stories of honest-to-goodness builders who bend over backwards to fulfil the client's wishes. I would suggest that the best way to sort the wheat from the chaff in your case is to ask for a written method statement, in which each of the contractors tendering for the woirk sets out exactly how the paving will be laid and the wall built. This will give you abetter insight into their working methods and, hopefully, will help narrow down the field.

Dear Tony

Many thanks for this helpful advice. You’ve confirmed what we suspected that, although we think that the contractors we’ve seen so far will do a good job, (they all said the right things about laying, pointing and drainage, as per your web site) they’ve got a bit carried away with their profit margins!

Location and access to our property is good so there should be any premium being charged there. Generally speaking, in our experience, wages and charges for work tend to be on the lower side in Devon than in the South East say, so that shouldn’t affect the quotes. As we were going to lay the patios ourselves originally, we did have a quote from a stonemason for the walling (building stone walls is a bit out of our league) for £500 approx to supply and build, which we thought was very reasonable. In view of your advice, we’ll probably use him and then we can be in no doubt about what were being charged for laying the flags.

We can now sort out the silly quotes from the serious ones and we will definitely ask for a written method statement. We’ve seen pictures of each of the contractors past work but perhaps we should push to see the real thing!

Once again thanks.