Using Spanish or Polish builders in France

[Angie]

I appreciate the rules and regulations that go with having building work done on our house in France and the importance of making sure that the builder is registered etc. which we have done religiously up til now.  But what are the actual implications of using "foreign" builders who are unlikely to be registered in France?  Some friends of our in Northern Spain have had some fantastic renovations done to their old farmhouse - it is simply stunning and took the spanish builders 5 months to complete which was on time and budget (a fraction of what we have spent on our house). 

We have been trying to get a small extension built for the past six months but even trying to get a quote is so time consuming and the 2 French builders we have in mind have quoted a ridiculous amount of time to build it and the price is even more ridiculous.  They initially promised to start (if we employed them) in March 2009; but this has already been put back to June!  Our friend's builders are currently without work due to the downturn in Spain and can complete the job in half the time quoted by the French guys at almost half the price.  Alternatively some other friends in Spain have recently employed some Polish builders who are equally enthusiastic and reasonably priced.  Do we really have to use French builders, especially as they can be so frustrating with their timekeeping and prices?

[UlsterRugby1999]

I'm not an employment expert, but in your post you say

[quote]I appreciate the rules and regulations that go with having building work done on our house in France and the importance of making sure that the builder is registered etc. which we have done religiously up til now.  But what are the actual implications of using "foreign" builders who are unlikely to be registered in France?[/quote]

Steve - if you break the law then you are entitled to feel its wrath and here in France that will hurt you. If you use these people, then you have no guarantees, no come back in fact nothing. Why haven’t you tried some of the many Ex Pat registered builders that are legal and tried and tested here in France? There are many who will give you excellent work, at much less than our French colleagues will cost you and are pretty much up to date with clocks and calendars with regard to start and finish times.

One thing to keep in mind, your friends Spanish lads were working in their own country. Did they comply with Spanish laws there? I bet they did. So why would you want to bring them here and possibly break the laws of this country and stick fingers up to the likes of us who deliver very good work, who are registered and comply with the laws of France.

[Callie]

I agree with the above. Also bear in mind that you as the employer of a person working on the black, there will be no insurance if there is an accident on site.

If these eager Poles are so good and can get the work, why don't they register themselves and make themselves legal ?

I believe that if someone gives a seemingly ridiculous quote it's because they either don't want the job or that they will do it if someone is prepared to pay over the top.

If you employ an expat registered builder, DO get some recommendations or see the work they have done. There are one or two registered people round here that call themselves builders but were probably just a brickie's mate in the UK.

[AnOther]

Arguably insurance is the most important factor so for 'implications' think fines, bankruptcy, prison even.

If someone working for you on the black and met with an accident, or God forbid was killed, then it could potentially result in any or all of the above.

I would imagine that in the current situation with so many Brits hurting financially and not spending on optional building jobs there must be any number of bona fide ex pat builders crying out for work you just need to find them. In this month's issue of a well 'connected' English newspaper for instance there are dozens of adverts from such companies and individuals.

Don't forget too that you can be pretty sure that if you did bring in a gang of Poles/Spanish/Roumanians WHY the local artisans will find out and cheerfully shop you to the Gendarmes.

I sympathise with your frustration but with the stakes set so high there can only be one way to do things.

[jondeau]

You're on the wrong site to ask such a question.......their a pious lot on here.

Would I do it ?.......yes absolutely, you know their working standards............use a bit of discretion, and get on with it.

 

 

 

[Poolguy]

[quote user="Steve"]

I appreciate the rules and regulations that go with having building work done on our house in France and the importance of making sure that the builder is registered etc. which we have done religiously up til now.  But what are the actual implications of using "foreign" builders who are unlikely to be registered in France?  Some friends of our in Northern Spain have had some fantastic renovations done to their old farmhouse - it is simply stunning and took the spanish builders 5 months to complete which was on time and budget (a fraction of what we have spent on our house). 

We have been trying to get a small extension built for the past six months but even trying to get a quote is so time consuming and the 2 French builders we have in mind have quoted a ridiculous amount of time to build it and the price is even more ridiculous.  They initially promised to start (if we employed them) in March 2009; but this has already been put back to June!  Our friend's builders are currently without work due to the downturn in Spain and can complete the job in half the time quoted by the French guys at almost half the price.  Alternatively some other friends in Spain have recently employed some Polish builders who are equally enthusiastic and reasonably priced.  Do we really have to use French builders, especially as they can be so frustrating with their timekeeping and prices?

[/quote]

 

Another point of view.

It is perfectly legal to employ these people if they have a registered business in their own country and you are engaging that company to undertake work in France. Europe is after all the ONE COUNTRY from a free exchange of goods and labour point of view. If you wish to explore this route than you will need to ensure that these foreign companies who have quoted for the work, register their presents in France for this project at the Marie and Hotel des Impot. Having done that, and received no objection (Spanish should be OK but the Poles tend to have trouble in this regard) then you are free to proceed and there is not a blind thing that the local artisans can do about it. Its competitive business after all, and provided that their work conforms with codes and norms, (something which rarely happens with French artisans anyway) then nobody can complain. Interestingly, you will be obliged to pay their bills into their Bank in their country along with the TVA on labour, but if they supply materials from their country as well then you don't pay the TVA if you are tax registered. If your not tax registered then you pay their TVA on everything.

Do not however short-circuit this system, for as correctly described above, the consequences of 'travail noir', are grave indeed and not worth the savings. Do it right and you can sleep soundly at night, if you cross the line then no one can help you.

Good luck

[Bugsy]

[quote user="jondeau"]

You're on the wrong site to ask such a question.......their a pious lot on here.

Would I do it ?.......yes absolutely, you know their working standards............use a bit of discretion, and get on with it.

[/quote]

Really ?, well if you think you can get away with it and will not be reported by others, dream on.

Ask the guy from Ruffec who employed 'black workers' a couple of years ago, and found himself fined heavily and deported.

Why anyone would run that risk is quite beyond me.

Gary.

[JMB]

Wow deported now that is ott. Did you know him? Is there any press reports on the case I would really like to look them up if possible.

[Bugsy]

[quote user="JMB"]Wow deported now that is ott. Did you know him? Is there any press reports on the case I would really like to look them up if possible.[/quote]

No, I didn't know him but it made the front page of the 'Centre Presse'.

It happened, from memory, about two or three years ago around the same time that the police raided MMM, the builders merchants, locked the gates and checked every individual buying building materials as to their legitamy.

[Boiling a frog]

Going back to the original question.

I agree with poolguy with a few additional extras

The work must be secondary to their main work ie they carry out the majority of their work in their own country and the work in France is occasional

They are not allowed to have an office or business premises in France.

They are not allowed to employ a French resident person.

If these Spanish builders fulfill these conditions they can quite legitimately work for the OP.

 

As for the horror story about happenings at 3M's

This is an urban myth

There was a fight between two british people working on the black

Several others joined in to try and separate them

The gendarmes arrived  and shut the main gate as by this time the fight had spilled out into the car park

The two culprits were arrested

End of story.

As for the person from Ruffec being deported

I have the Charente Libre (local press for Ruffec) delivered every day for the past 6 years and cannot recall any story about anyone British being deported

[Patf]

I find the deportation story hard to believe too.

We know personally a british builder who was working on the black for nearly 15 years. He was eventually reported and investigated and has to pay back old cotisations etc. He also had to go on a business course and is now working legit.

We also know one of his clients, for whom he did a huge amount of work. And nothing happened to her, she's still around.

[Bugsy]

[quote user="Boiling a frog"]

As for the horror story about happenings at 3M's

This is an urban myth

There was a fight between two british people working on the black

Several others joined in to try and separate them

The gendarmes arrived  and shut the main gate as by this time the fight had spilled out into the car park

The two culprits were arrested

End of story.

As for the person from Ruffec being deported

I have the Charente Libre (local press for Ruffec) delivered every day for the past 6 years and cannot recall any story about anyone British being deported

[/quote]

Well, I must be telling 'porkies' then.[:@]

I was actually at MMM in Ruffec on one day that it happened and it certainly didn't involve a fight. I was outside when the gates had been locked and I asked the gerndarmes on the gate exactly what was happening. They were checking all individuals in regard to what they were doing with purchases made and clearly looking for 'black' workers.

As to the deportation, it was reported, as I have stated. With hindsight it may be that the individual concerned was threatened with deportation at the time. Whether it actually happened, I don't know, nor, incidently, do I actually care.

All this, of course, could have been just a dream..........................[;-)]

.

[darnsarf]

Maybe I'm confused but I'm not sure the original poster mentioned using black market workers. He was discussing the possibility of employing other EU workers to work on his renovation. As Poolguy mentions, there's absolutely nothing to prevent him doing so, in france or any other country in the EU. He may not get the security of insurance cover on the work but people no such system operates in the UK and people have been having building work done like this for years. He has already seen an example of their work (which would carry more weight for me than any supposed cover scheme). To ensure compliance with local building regs and the like, the OP could employ a Project Manager to check everything was being done as it should be. He'd still be quids in if he's correct about the price difference.  I would suggest one caution though.... If he has, for example, a new boiler to be fitted and there are problems with it later on, he'll find it much harder to get a local artisan come and fix it if it became known (as it surely would) that he's used non local/french artisans.

[pachapapa]

There are some really competent reasonably priced morrocans with spanish passports around due to the effective stoppage of building works all over spain. Most will of course speak english,french,spanish and arabic so communication is facilitated. They seem to be particularly skilled on renovation work on more traditional southern european architecture.

[Nick Trollope]

You are all missing the point;

Most building trades are (heavily) regulated in France (as they are in Spain, but not the UK). French law requires all building trades to be insured (decenale and public), this insurance is only available to French-registered tradesmen. Of course a large company can employ Poles or Spaniards, provided they themselves are registered and insured. The workers are employees, not self-employed.

So, it is illegal to use workers of any nationality that qre not properly registered and insured - nothing to to with EU law, which does not negate the need to comply with additional national laws.

 

[BIG MAC]

So far I am perfectly happy with our ex pat Builder and his French labour force. We get the degree of understanding we would like combined with putting some bread on French tables. I am involved in building project management in the UK and can report that by listening to what I was being told and giving due consideration to the builders recommendations we will run the current project out for just a few thousand Euros more than if I did the work myself. A properly registered builder who is resident and familiar with what can and can't be permitted, has a relationship with suppliers and has a well established business which employs locals is hopefully a good bet.

Interestingly someone one here (Mr Punchard if I recall correctly) advised to check that our builder was registered to the correct trades for what we wanted. I initially didn't want to as it felt like sneaking about behind the guys back but the warning niggled me so when last in builders office I simply asked him what trades he was registered for and he ran me through it and showed me the docs.

It transpires that in one instance we were getting a bit near the knuckle (Thanks Punch) as in a loft conversion. We wanted pre wired gaine pulling through behind studwork builder has said he will facilitate this, cut holes etc. but did not want in any way shape or form to be getting involved in the wiring. He is a trained telecoms engineer but as far as he is concerned not worth the grief in getting involved. He would rather recommend an aquaintance who is fully registered (Whom he is thinking of taking on as an employee at some point in the future I think)

I have used Polish labour on sites in London, there's good and bad. I have had to empty a site of Latvians by the simple expedient of sounding the alarm...everyone stood looking gormless had obviously not been properly inducted and a risk to themselves and others.

One thing I haven't explored is looking at a sub-contract situation with a French builder employing foreign labour (If it was a very appealing commercial proposition) I suspect however that if this was such a great idea the French would have cottoned on long ago and Sangatte would be a MacDonalds.

Good luck with your project.

 

 

 

[Will]

Apparently the use of foreign labour by French contractors on big civil engineering projects is a relatively common and highly lucrative scam in France. As previously stated, it's quite OK as long as everything is in order, and as far as the organisations employing the French contractor are cncerned, this is the case. However, what really happens is that as well as some legitimate foreign workers, there are large numbers of 'black' workers on the job, mostly North Africans, who are paid well below the SMIC on a sort of 'truck' system. The contractor, however, charges labour etc at full rates, so stands to make a small fortune as long as the inspectors don't turn up on the site to check the paperwork of all workers. URSSAF is very much involved in stamping out these scams, so don't always have much time for the odd case of British unaware of French labour law.

[NormanH]

[quote user="BIG MAC"]

One thing I haven't explored is looking at a sub-contract situation with a French builder employing foreign labour (If it was a very appealing commercial proposition)

[/quote]

This is quite common.

I know one French-registered (Siret no and all) Romanian who sub-contracts to a Romanian firm he owns. The workers are paid under Romanian contracts (and for 3 months)

The icing on the cake is that they are recruited by an temp agency in Romania, to whom they pay a fee...and guess who owns the agency? His wife...

[Angie]

Believe me, I am not trying to stick fingers up to anyone, ex-pat, French or otherwise.  We have spent a small fortune with both French and British builders whilst in France and have, mostly, been absolutely delighted with the work although one local British guy who has been living and working in the next village to us for 17 years and who we employed last February to tile our bathroom left after 3 days saying he had another urgent job to go to and hasn't been back since.  After waiting 8 months I decided to finish it myself!!  I would not consider myself to be any good at DIY but have had to turn my hand to numerous projects since coming to France just to get the ball rolling.  This certainly was not the idea when I retired - it is so frustrating.

We also paid over 90,000 euros to have a large extension built onto our house by a nationally recognised French building company and have had several problems with things in the past 2 years or so but despite having a 10 year guarantee, the company do not return our calls/emails or recorded delivery letters or even respond to the demands of the people running the guarantee scheme!!  So I think to take a "chance" on some small building works is going to be the least of our worries.  The fact that registered builders are insured is OK in theory, but how long does it take to enforce should anything go wrong?  I suspect that most people would give up long before any court case.

Also a neighbour of ours has just had a woodburner installed by a French registered installer and all the flues have been put in the wrong way - they are now in the process of having it removed by another company because the original one just didn't want to know; therefore I think to say that by using "these people" we have no guarantees doesn't really carry any weight.  The one and only reason I want to employ these guys is just to get the flaming work done (or even started).  It seems as though my wife and I get an idea at the beginning of each year, ask for quotes and then spend the rest of the year waiting for the tradesmen to turn up and frankly our initial enthusiasm with our project is started to wane.  Maybe I am missing something, but I really cannot believe that tradesmen in France (whether French, British or whatever) really think it is acceptable to expect "customers" to put up with this.

Thank you to everyone for your advice and/or encouragement.  Happy New Year.

[mint]

Steve, I'd go along with your view of so-called "guarantees".

When we had our fosse installed, we had a 10-year guarantee.  And, what happened when we tried to get the work finished under the guarantee?  The company director claimed that he'd been involved in an accident, was unable to do any work and anyway was in the process of winding up his company.

When we asked for the warranty certificate supplied by the pump company (Flyght whom we knew well back in the UK), there was predictably no reply from this dishonest knave (to whom I hope the New Year brings very interesting times!)

There, feel better for that![6]

[Victor Meldrew]

Don't know about the guy from Ruffec, but I personally know the guy in Dept 37 who was fined, given a suspended prison sentence, told he can never run a business in France again and WAS deported for 1 year.

Also think about what would happen, if you paid even the first instalment of funds for work to be done and then all the workers got kicked off site and your site shut down.

Is it worth the risk??????????????