Leak from our Ensuite shower

Hi Guys,

We moved into our house in september 2007, this was a new build, the night we moved in i had a shower and we noticed water coming through the celing in the sitting room, called in the builders and they said the seal around the shower wasnt done properly, so they done this and fixed up the celing in sitting room by scrapping the wet patch (dry when this was done) and replastered it and painted it.

This happened 2 or 3 times more since then and they came to fix it up, last sunday Hubby went to have a shower and i went in to tell him to turn the water off something wasnt right and when you turn the water on you can hear water as if its hitting the boards upstairs in the ensuite bedroom and then the same spot in the celing has started to show water mark again and bubble up, just had builder in to say they have NO record of ever been in this house to fix a problem with shower even though we could give the name of the lad that was fixed it time and time again and they are saying that they dont have to fix it.

Where do we stand with this or what not??

We've had two leaks in the en-suite shower over the years - one when the tray cracked (showering is really a solo sport!) and one when tiles came away from the wall.

It is very difficult to get builders back to address jobs like this in the best of times, but particularly now when they are suffering financially. You probably need to make a pest of yourself - get down to their offices, get in their face a bit.

Re-sealing won't help if this is a standard plastic tray and the problem is that its coming away from the tiles - it'll just fail again.
It seems clear that the repair hasn't worked, so getting the builders back in seems pointless, if cheap.

Some personals.
Showers are made of plastic and plastic can deform under load - so, are you very heavy?
Sometimes shower baths need timber carcassing to support their base on the "inner" sides, or else these can deform - was this necessary or was it done if it was?

Some advice.
This problem has gone on for a while now.
If untreated softwood substrate was used, this could be affected by the leaks.
I'd ask the builder to open up and prepare a record of who attended on what dates.
It could be that it was the plumber or his mate, not the builder and no records may have been kept.
If you can show this problem was not sorted from the outset and has continuously recurred, you may have some comeback.
However its more than a year since you moved in and the defects liability period is usually one year, so you may be out of luck.

FWIW

ONQ.

[broken link removed]

Hi Guys

Thanks for your replies, welll after been on to the builder and telling them the name of the person who was fixing it the last few times he went to him and he remembered so they are going to take the bottom tiles off the shower and the base and see what the problem is, fix in new base and new tiles and fix the celing.

Oh and im only 8st and hubby is only 12 so not heavy at all.

it may be the water supply or drain either, don't dare to assume that it's a leaky tray just cause he say's it is, his record is not great to date. This assumption can cause your case to drag on. Get them to test the water supply & the water drain while they're rooting around in there.

good luck.