Customer Care

If you have an emergency:

If your enquiry relates to an emergency during office hours (between 9am and 5pm weekdays), please contact the After-Sales team using the information provided above.

If you have an emergency situation outside of normal office hours (i.e. between 5pm and 9am weekdays or during weekends/public holidays), please use the contact details provided on Page 5 of your Completion Manual.

Please note, the following situations constitute an emergency:

• Complete failure of the heating systems and/or hot water system*
• A water leak or flooding that cannot be contained
• A complete failure of the electrics*
• Flooding caused by blocked drains that threatens to enter the home
• Security - a fault to a window or external door causing a loss of security
• Any other situation that causes a risk to life

*Before reporting an emergency, please ensure that the problem is not caused by a general failure in the area.

Running in your new home:

During the first few months, your home will need to ‘settle’. This includes allowing it to dry out gently. During construction, a new home is subject to the weather and many thousands of litres of rainwater can be absorbed by the structure before it is made watertight.

As the structure is drying out, you may notice minor cracks in interior walls (shrinkage) or white deposits on any brickwork (efflorescence). Shrinkage happens when timbers and plaster contract as they dry out. Efflorescence deposits are natural salts that come out of the wall materials and are quite normal. These salts are not harmful and usually disappear over time.

Shrinkage and efflorescence may occur regardless of what you do, but there are steps you can follow to try and minimise them:

• To keep cracks and gaps to a minimum, you need to allow your home to dry out gradually.
• Leave windows or trickle vents open and use extractor fans in kitchens and bathrooms to help to ventilate your home and allow moisture to evaporate more naturally. This will also avoid condensation forming which can damage timber and paintwork.
• The length of time your house takes to dry out depends on how it was built and in what sort of weather conditions. Generally speaking, it will take around nine months to a year.
• After this time, shrinkage can normally be put right very easily with ordinary filler and a simple lick of paint during routine redecoration.
• Shrinkage is accelerated by heat, so try to keep an even temperature throughout your home.
• If you move in during winter, it may be tempting to turn on the heating to its highest setting. This is not recommended as the high heat may accelerate shrinkage.

Snagging Issues:

Your home has been constructed by a number of different trades in accordance with relevant Building Control requirements. Although every care has been taken to ensure it is handed over with no problems, there can occasionally be some minor issues that only become apparent once the home is occupied. These are known as snags or snagging issues and they are covered by the two-year Builders’ Warranty.

If you identify any snags, or believe something could be a snagging issue, please contact the After-Sales team using the details above. They will log the details and either arrange for a repair, or in the event it is a more complex issue, they may arrange for somebody to come and inspect the problem in order to confirm the appropriate next steps.

Under normal circumstances, we expect to resolve most snags within 30 days. Where this is not possible, for example, due to having to order materials which have a longer lead time, we will keep you regularly updated and confirm an anticipated date for the repair as soon as we can.

Homeowner Maintenance:

Some elements of your new home will require regular maintenance. These are not snags and are part of routine homeowner maintenance. These could include areas such as annual servicing of your central heating boiler, protecting any garden fencing, or painting external timber or render. Please review the warranty and service information we have provided and contact the After-Sales team if you have any other questions.