Ooh, I forgot to say...

We had been talking with M. Philippe who bought the menuiserie next door, and we mentioned that we were going to finish doing Phase 1 this spring [hah!], and that we were using T+B as the project managers.

He said he has heard of them from various people and knows several firms that will refuse to even quote for a job if they are project managing. Apparently, they have either worked for them before or are good friends with someone who has and they don't want the hassle.

I'm glad I remembered that, as I was starting to wonder whether we are unreasonable clients.

I don't think so, but when you are on your third builder, second plasterer and can't wait for the next few weeks to end so you can say goodbye to your project manager, it does make you wonder...

In mitigation: the first builder vanished on us, the second builder went into planned receivership [which T+B would have known about if they'd done those checks they charged us for], and the first plasterer would have done Phase 1b for us, but by the time T+B had finished their faffing he had booked another job.

And the joiner is happy to work for us, again, but not deal with T+B!

It will be interesting to see how the village gets on with them doing the salle des fêtes...