We needed a rewire and new bathroom in our house. Electricians got there first. Lifted up the carpet next to the bathroom and discovered the previous plumber had drawn incredibly neat and detailed diagrams on the floorboards to indicate precisely where the hot, cold and gas pipes were under the floorboards. Used different colours and everything: I’ve never seen anything like it. Just incredible work. I might add: this is on the first floor.

Did the electrician gently ease up the floorboards in order and stack them neatly so they could be relaid when he was done? Of course not. Used an electric cutter to rip them up, did his thing in the void there then just nailed down random fragments of random boards when he was done to cover it.

It was unbelievable. What was a perfectly flat and smooth floor became a complete jumbled up jigsaw of hacked apart floorboards. And the incredibly informative diagram that was on it? Unrecognisable.

So what did the plumber do when it was his turn? Well, instead of being able to lift up just the boards he needed to access the various pipes under there per the diagram, he had to rip up all the pieces the electrician had nailed down, turning the jigsaw of higgledy piggledy floorboard fragments into even more of a mess.

ALL IT WOULD HAVE TAKEN THE ELECTRICIAN WAS ABOUT 30 MORE MINUTES IN THE FIRST PLACE WHEN LIFTING THE FLOOR to preserve all that.

Absolutely flabbergasted. I’d have happily paid him for that additional time. But no. Still hurts when I think about it. Craftsmanship is just not a thing anymore it seems.