For all of us honest people in this world, sometimes it seems like the scammers get off way too easy.

They bounce from hustle to hustle and never face a single consequence for their crimes.

But stories like these give us hope that there is some sense of karma coming for the crooks of the world!

Because when this contractor realized that a crooked builder wasn’t going to pay him, he refused to do any work until he got his money!

Check it out!

Builder doesn’t want to pay his bill, ends up losing over $1000.

I use to work for my family’s plumbing contracting business.

It was decent sized company doing about 200-400 homes per year across subdivisions and custom homes, as well as some commercial and hydronics work.

My role was pretty broad but my main ones were purchasing, scheduling, dealing with customers, quoting and writing contracts.

Basically an office type job with some occasional trips outside to job sites.

But one of the builders OP worked with was less than pleasant…

This one custom home builder was a bit of a pain in the butt.

Changing schedules last minute, wanting to make changes without paying, disorganized, and just gave me an impression that he would screw you over if he could to save a buck.

The project we were hired to do kind of went into limbo and he ghosted me for over 6 months while owing our company about $1500.00 that had not yet been paid.

He calls me up out of the blue and asks if I can complete the job for him.

We had completed the rough in drainage work and the water pipe, the house needed tubs installed and the rough in inspection completed and passed.

Considering his history of not paying what he owed, OP wasn’t too confident this builder would honor their deal…

This guy had already given me a skeevy vibe so I told him I will complete the work only after I had been paid to.

Which he agreed to and said he would have the money in hand when my workers arrived on site.

He agreed to the amount owing as well but I could tell something was off.

He was agreeing but being very vague when I was giving him my terms, using terms like “yeah” “uh-huh” when trying to iron out details for the job.

And OP said after decades of experience he knew a creep when he saw one!

I had been doing this for nearly 20 years so I could spot a crooked builder pretty easily by that point.

Since I had been already ghosted and burned by this guy. I had written the $1500 off since I hadn’t heard from him in over 6 months.

As well as the fact that even though he owed me $1500, I owed him 3 tubs that totalled over $2500 before taxes not including the work we needed to complete.

So OP began making preparations for the very likely event this man tried to scam him…

I called my supplier to check stock and asked if I could return them without a restocking fee as I think this builder may try to not pay me.

They agreed and said it wouldn’t be an issue as long as the tubs remained in their original boxes, as these tubs were all regular movers for them.

I ordered the tubs and called the builder back to schedule the work for later that week. I reminded him that I will only start work once I had been paid as well as the amount owed.

He responded with a vague yet curt, “uh-huh.”

I told him to have cash or a certified cheque ready for my workers when they arrive on site which again I got another vague acceptance from him.

When the day came, OP was shocked to find the jobsite completely empty…

The day arrives to do the work. My workers arrive there a little before 8am.

Jobsite is locked up and nobody is around. I call the builder and he tells me his wife will be there in 15 minutes to let my workers in. I remind him to make sure she has our payment.

He responds with another vague, “ya, uh-huh.” She finally shows up an hour later and surprise! No payment!

No cash, no cheque, not even an apology for making my guys wait for her for over an hour.

But OP wasn’t sweating it. He even had another job lined up so he didn’t lose a day’s work!

Since I had expected this I made sure to have another job nearby lined up so the work day would not be wasted. I told my guys to pack up and leave for the other job.

I called the builder back and asked him why he didn’t have payment ready. He starts making all kinds of excuses, saying it’s too much, blah, blah blah!

I told him the time to bring that up was a few days ago when we agreed to everything not when my guys were about to start the work.

To which he responded, “I’m not paying that!” I said, “Ok, then lose my number!” Then I hung up the phone, called my supplier and scheduled the tubs for pick up.

And OP said the cherry on top was that he would still have to pay for the labor he tried to scam OP out of!

I don’t know if he thought I was naive, stupid or just so desperate for work that I would cave and work for free.

Either way, his greed cost him well over $1000 in material alone, not to mention the labour for finishing the job.

This is a great example of why you always get paid before you do the work! Too many people out there are trying to scam you out of your hard earned money!

Reddit shared that unfortunately this type of scam spanned all different industries.

This user commended OP on not just getting his revenge, but turning a profit too!

Another person told OP that next time he should just put a lien on the business.

Finally, this user said that if this is how he treats fellow builders, he doesn’t even want to think about how he treats homeowners!

No money? No work! It’s that simple!

If you liked that post, check out this post about a woman who tracked down a contractor who tried to vanish without a trace.