Friday/Saturday
Two weekends back, I had a door-to-door person give me a quote for upgrading my ceiling insulation, taking advantage of a $1600 govt. grant. Sounded good, so I told them to go ahead, and they came and went over a couple of days (last Fri/Sat). They removed old insulation and put new stuff in.
I had a look at the work they'd done, and got annoyed because of the poor job, not doing what they'd quoted for: they'd only removed and replaced about two thirds of the insulation in my roofspace, and in some areas put new stuff on top of old. They had also managed to knock out the wiring for the lights in three rooms of my house (including bathroom, which made things interesting in the evenings).
...Sunday/Monday
On Sat/Sun/Mon I'd been trying to get hold of the installer to fix up the slack work they'd done, and arrange for an electrician to fix my lights. He went from giving strange exuses, to ignoring my calls and messages completely.
On Sunday night, my lights (those that still worked since Friday) all went out. I saw that the fuse in my fuseboard had tripped, but didn't re-set it, since I figured there might be something bigger wrong due to whatever they'd stomped on to take out those three rooms on Friday.
Tuesday
I called the insulation company directly on Tuesday (giving up on the guy who did the installation), ready to complain and demand things be sorted out ASAP, and found out that they guy who had done my insulation removal/installation most definitely wasn't from their company.
Uh-oh.
The dodgy guy was using a stolen/acquired quote book (later discovered to be one of six, each with fifty pages). The real insulation company went to the police, who are now pursuing fraud charges. At this point, we've only got a couple of first names, and mobile phone numbers (one of which soon became disconnected). The govt. department that does the $1600 ceiling insulation cashback thing has also been notified, and they are actively pursuing this as well.
So, up until now things are interesting enough with police and fraud charges. But wait, there's more....
Wednesday
I finally got an electrician around on Wednesday (organised it myself, since the real company isn't at fault, and I'd written off any hope of hearing from the dodgy guy). I told him what I knew at that point, and he went exploring in my roof to trace the crazy wiring I have and fix it all.
His comments went from "It smells like a campfire up here" to "Come up here with a camera and have a look at this" to "You're lucky to still have a house".
Follow the links for pictures in my roof-space, above my lounge. The yellow stuff is the new glass wool batts, the brown/grey stuff is the old insulation, and have a guess at what the black is...
http://stuff2web.com/d/mrm
http://stuff2web.com/d/ygz
The dodgy installers didn't fully remove the old insulation, somehow packed it around a halogen downlight, and put new insulation on top of all that (this is on Friday/Saturday). My fuse popping on Sunday would have been due to this fire.
It had smouldered it's way 4 to 5 meters along, going along my roof between my rafters. Amazingly, it didn't ignite the wooden rafters themselves, and petered out when it got to the end. I was completely unaware at the time that that was happening.
There was also another (independent) fire around another halogen, which the sparky had already cleared away before seeing the big one:
http://stuff2web.com/d/ssp
At this point, I got to call 000 for a fire engine, even though there wasn't any urgency, and a fire engine came to visit. The firies confirmed it was out, and not making any sort of toxic fumes. Another phone call later, and my insurance company told me to let the electrician get back to work and replace the burnt out wiring, and that I was covered (less excess) for getting it fixed up. There were also another couple of halogen lights, more or less similarly dangerously enclosed by insulation.
The insurance company is sending an inspector at the end of next week to check out the damage, and see if any other insurance-covered repairs are required. It looks me like all the wooden roof-bits are practically unaffected, though there is a crack on my lounge room ceiling.
So, the dodgy installation guy, already being chased by the police and environment.gov.au since Monday will soon have my insurance company after him for this. I may also be able to go to the dept. of fair trading, and the courts.
On Wednesday night I went into the police station, along with the real insulation company guy, and told them what I could remember. The police's only interest is for the fraud side of things, but there is also a lot of interest from environment.gov.au (who do the $1600 thing), and I'm sure my insurance company will want to get after him for the fire-related part. The Department of Fair Trading, and courts may get involved too. I'll know more about this side of things after a week or two.
Thursday
Found out today that last night, after we left the police station, the constable called the girl who had door-to-door'd me (the only working phone number we had left), and quite quickly got her to give up the guy who was running the show. He had received the quote books from a family member who had been to a training course or something at the real insulation company.
I went and visited a few of my neighbours (at the request of the police and real insulation company) to see if many of them had been visited, and also to warn of potentially dangerous insulation installation. Only one of them had been visited by the people who door-to-door'd me in the first place, but she had asked them for ID which scared them away.
The real insulation company was more than willing to re-do the insulation job properly, but was advised by their lawyers not to - in case it looks like an admission of liability. Its more than likely I can get the dodgy job redone properly, for my entire roofspace, at no charge - since I'm still eligible for the $1600 thing. I'm also not without insulation, since there is a several hundred dollars worth of new stuff put in by the dodgy guy.
That's it for now
Probably not much will happen for the next week or so, until the police constable running this is back from holiday, and my insurance company has been by with their inspector.
So, so far: I'm OK. My house is pretty much OK. The police have ID'd the guy, and I'm covered by my insurance. I've now met 7 of my neighbours (up from the previous 1). I'm out a few dollars at this point, but may be able to sue (or whatever one does in Australia) the guy to get it back. I'm not really annoyed now, but just interested to see how it all plays out.
Lessons so far
Learning from your mistakes is a good idea, and learning from others' is even better! 20/20 hindsight suggests, for any unsolicited door-to-door calls:
(1) Ask for ID
(2) Look up the company they're representing in a phonebook (don't trust anything they give you), and confirm that the person really does represent the company.
(3) Ask the workers for evidence of relevant qualifications/certificati
(4) If you have halogen downlights, after any work (probably should do this semi-regularly anyway) check that they are clear of insulation/leaves.
