Builder in dock for rogue work (From Gazette Series)

Builder in dock for rogue work

A ROGUE builder who left a £600,000 trail of unhappy customers throughout Gloucestershire and South Gloucestershire has finally been brought to justice.

Mark Dixon, 38, of Longlevens, Gloucester, had taken advance payments for building work from people in a dozen counties across the South West - but then left the projects unfinished.

However, after months of investigation, Gloucestershire Trading Standards this week celebrated a court order which it hopes will put a stop to bankrupt Dixon's dealings.

Dixon was able to continue profiting from unfinished jobs because he operated under a variety of different business names including LD Construction, Mosscom, C & G Construction, Eastview Ltd, and Crestmere Ltd.

He used planning applications published by local authorities to identify potential customers.

He would then promise an early start and finish to work, and put forward competitive prices to win customers.

"However, his demands for payment far in excess of work actually completed resulted in complaints from consumers in Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Bristol, Gloucestershire, Hampshire, London, Oxfordshire, Somerset, South Gloucestershire, and Worcestershire," said a trading standards spokesman today.

"When Trading Standards officers investigated the companies concerned they identified Mark Dixon as being the common factor in all of them."

Last Friday, Bristol Mercantile Court ruled that Dixon must not make false statements to induce people to agree to work, must not leave work incomplete or carry out work of a poor quality or fail to supply fittings and fixtures for which consumers had paid.

The order means that if any Trading Standards service in the country receives further complaints about Dixon he could face jail.

Making the Interim Order, Judge Havelock-Allan said consumers were at risk of continuing harm from Dixon's trading practices, which he said had already caused a good deal of distress and hardship.

Roger Marles, head of Gloucestershire County Council's Trading Standards, said: "This has been an unusually extreme example of a trader exploiting the public.

"While individual consumers lose life savings and hard earned money to such deliberate and cynical exploitation it also damages other legitimate businesses by association.

"We are pleased to have been able to use the new powers from the Enterprise Act to rein in this man's practices and hope that it tells other rogue traders that we will take action to protect consumers and traders from unlawful and undesirable trading practices."