Imagine being a builder hired to work on a construction project. What would you do if you looked at the blueprints and saw a huge problem? If you tried explaining the problem to the company but they didn’t take your concerns seriously, would you go ahead with the building project or refuse?

The correct answer is to get it in writing, and that’s exactly what the builder in this story is smart enough to do. He’ll need that evidence when he ends up in court.

Keep reading for the whole story.

“You’re only a builder, what the hell do you know? Just build the damn thing to spec!”

I grew up in a small community on an island off the coast of a thriving metropolitan area. It had its ups and downs, but was generally a pretty quiet sort of life.

The community had a fairly large immigrant population from various European countries, and one of those was, well, let’s call him John. John the builder.

He and his numerous brothers had all moved to the island together, and started a construction company.

John sounds like a great guy.

John was a big affable man, easygoing and always smiling. He spoke excellent English, but with a thick accent. Sometimes people assumed his accent meant his grasp of business was lacking, but usually not for long.

Within a decade or so of moving there, John and his brothers were pretty much the only builders of note on the island, and anything bigger than a garden shed would go through them.

Around that time, my grandad retired and moved to the island with my grandma. He contracted John to help him build his retirement house, and they bonded over their mutual appreciation of a really good concrete mix and pour.

By then John’s family were good friends of ours too, so John and my grandad kept in touch regularly, and would often get into involved discussions of building methods and the like.

John was hired for a big job.

Some years later, the old couple running the main petrol station in town decided to sell up and retire, and the place was bought by BigFuelCo.

BigFuelCo decided that the quaint old station and garage was in dire need of a complete makeover and modernisation, and drew up plans accordingly.

After putting the work out for tender, they grudgingly accepted that with the cost of relocating a labour force from the mainland to the island for the work, John’s construction firm was by far the most cost effective.

They weren’t happy about it though, and made it clear that they thought John and his brothers were a bunch of rural cowboys who couldn’t be trusted to nail two planks together.

John was concerned about the blueprints.

Still, the contracts were signed, and the blueprints delivered to John.

As well as the usual amenities, the new station was to have a high, artistically stylish roof over the fuel pumps, held up by two support pillars – you know the sort of thing.

John read the plans, thought about the stiff sea breezes the location was subject to, and frowned. He took the blueprints around to my grandad and discussed them. Possibly not entirely within the bounds of the contract, but John was concerned.

BigFuelCo didn’t want to listen to John.

The next day, John rang BigFuelCo’s contact, and said, in his thick accent, “This roof isn’t going to stand up. The support pillar footings are too shallow, and the roof itself is too large for pillars of that size. Plus you haven’t factored in the strength of the winds we get there. Everything else is fine, but you need to redesign that roof.”

“Rubbish,” scoffed the BigFuelCo guy, “We had it designed by a very exclusive architect, and our engineers signed off on it. It’s fine. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Maybe,” said John, “But I’ve been building here for 20 years, and I think you should go over the design again.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. You’re just trying to get the contract extended. We don’t need to check the design, now get building.” click

John wanted it in writing.

John, being a genuinely nice bloke, thought that maybe this was just one person being difficult, and also felt that this sort of thing should probably be in writing, sat down and wrote a clear letter expressing his concerns about the fuel pump shelter, and sent it overnight to the BigFuelCo office on the mainland.

The next day he got a call from the BigFuelCo office, from someone further up the ranks.

“What the hell is this? Who do you think you are, trying to tell our architects and engineers they don’t know what they’re doing? You’re only a builder, what the hell do you know? Just build the damn thing!”

“Could you put that in writing, please?” asked John. (This is the point at which a sensible manager would be given pause. When the contractor specifically asks for it in writing, you should probably ask why.)

Uh-oh!

“Fine,” snarls the BigFuelCo guy, and faxes through a terse note that he’d read the letter and considered it mistaken, and to get on with the construction.

John shrugged, carefully filed the note, and went ahead with build.

A little over a month later, the new station was finished, roof and all.

On a pleasant gusty day, perfect for sailing, the BigFuelCo bigwigs flew over to see the result. Standing there with John and a curious crowd of locals, they watched as the shiny new stylish roof danced and swayed in the wind, in a manner decidedly unlikely to reassure anyone thinking of refueling their car underneath it.

The boss tried to blame John.

“WHAT THE HECK IS THIS?!” enquired the BigFuelCo boss.

“Just what I tried to warn you about,” replied John.

“Nonsense! You messed up the construction and now you’re trying to pin it on us! We’re not paying for this, you’re going to need to tear it down at your expense and build it right!”

“It’s built exactly to your blueprints,” said John. “If you want it rebuilt, you’ll have to pay for it. Preferably with a new design.”

They went to court.

“Not a chance. This is on you, and if you try and dodge responsibility for it, we’ll sue!”

“Sounds good,” said John, “See you in court.”

So the fuel station was cordoned off, and legal proceedings went ahead. I don’t know much about them, but at some point I do know something like this happened:

Judge: Defense, you may call your first expert witness.

OP’s grandad took the stand.

John’s lawyer: Thank you, your honour. We call Professor [Thornae’s Grandad], internationally recognised civil engineer who chaired the report into the [redacted] Bridge Collapse and was head of Engineering at [redacted] University for 25 years.

BigFuelCo’s legal team: Uh…

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John’s Lawyer: Thank you for joining us, Professor. Would you please tell the court how you first learned of the project in question?

My grandad: Of course. John first approached me with his concerns directly after receiving the blueprints. I agreed with his assessment, and I have since drawn up a brief report on the problems of the roof design. The details and supporting calculations are in pages four through sixteen, but if you don’t mind I’ll just read from the summary. I noted the following problems…

BigFuelCo had to pay.

BigFuelCo’s legal team: oh no

What with that and the note John had, it didn’t take long to be settled. BigFuelCo was on the hook for all of it, plus legal fees.

They had to pay John to tear down the unstable roof and build a new one – designed by a different architect and checked by off-site engineers.

Nonetheless, when John got the new plans, he rang BigFuelCo and said “Hope you don’t mind, I’m just going to run these past the Prof before we get started.”

I’m sure that was a very easy case for the judge to decide. BigFuelCo really messed up.

Let’s see how Reddit responded to this story.

This is a good life lesson.

This is a good point!

It would’ve been interesting to be in that courtroom!

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a man who gets revenge on his company after they fire him and try to steal his custom program.

This person knows to listen to builders.

The company really messed up by not listening to John. When he asked for it in writing, that should’ve caught their attention. It goes to show that you shouldn’t underestimate people. He has the knowledge and experience to know what he was talking about. His concerns were very valid.

Good for him for getting it in writing!