Construction of a house is a long process, spanning over 18 to 30 months and there are times when the house builder feels fed up with the everyday material requirements by the workers, procurement of items, site visits, meetings with the Architect and many other activities. During such moments, his sincere wish is to see off all the workers, take a break from the tedious routine and rest a while. The desire grows stronger when the house is nearing completion but working gangs, especially carpenters and painters continue with their work endlessly. It’s important to overcome such moments and review all activities with a cool mind to avoid trouble at later stage. Let’s, therefore, have a look at the checks to be made by the house builder before bidding goodbye to the working gangs:
Woodwork gang: The carpenters engaged for doing woodwork in the house have many activities in hand. Apart from the major activity of providing door and window frames and shutters, they have to provide cupboards, kitchen cabinets and drawers, bathroom vanities, LCD panels, stair railing, front and back railings if in wood, main gate wooden components, if there and joinery fittings. All these items should be checked carefully as completed in all respects.
The items often missed out may be some joinery fittings like tower bolts or door stoppers, curtain rods, moulding parts around the door frames, tightening of hinges or other screws, pasting of laminates in a portion, locks or handles in cupboards and vanities, drilling of holes in LCD panels to pass wiring, ensuring smooth running of drawer channels, fixing of tape on shelf edges and so on. All items should be thoroughly examined by the house builder, preferably at a time when the workers are not on job and a room wise list of left out items should be prepared by him and handed over to the head carpenter for removing the incompletions. All tower bolts, handles, lock bolts, door stoppers, eye hooks, cupboard catchers should be fixed in position and working smoothly. Provision of curtain rods over doors and windows along with supporting brackets should also be checked. And don’t miss the provision of hanger rods in the cupboards.
Electrical Work gang: Laying of conduits and fixing of switch boxes is completed by the electrical work gang at much earlier stage. High vigil is required at this stage through careful planning of lights, conduits for electrical wires, AC copper piping, Dish cables, landline phone cables if required, FTTH cables, CCTV wiring and inverter wiring. Wiring work is also completed by the electrician well in time. However, there are items that need careful checking by house builder before saying goodbye to electrical work gang.
After the provision of modular switches, MCBs, ELCB, lights and fans, all items should be carefully checked to be functioning properly. A methodical checking should be carried out from room to room. The sockets and two way switches should be especially checked to be functional. There should be no sound of spark behind any switch plate which means some loose wire is there. It should be checked that no wiring is visible at LCD panels and sockets are available to plug in the LCD, set box and other items. In case you have made provision of submersible pump and pressure pumps, these should be working properly and the submersible provided with auto cut system. Electrical gang should remain available till the ACs and other electrical gadgets are fitted in the house and run properly. It’s very difficult to call the electricians after seeing them off as they get busy with the next job in hand.
Last but not the least, check that the water filter and inverter are functional. Ensure to provide good earthing system for the house and make no compromise over it.
Plumbing gang: Before the plumbing gang leaves the job, all sanitary fittings should be checked to be functional. The mixers, faucets, stop cocks and diverters should be tested well. It should be ensured that all WC cisterns are working effortlessly and effectively. Next, the provision of towel rails, showers, soap dishes, mirrors, hooks and shelves should be checked. Seats jets should be working well. All cisterns should be checked to be working well and having a water seal in them. A piece of toilet paper can be thrown and checked to be flushed away in all WCs. None of the fittings should be leaking.
It should be further checked that all the drainage pipes are working effectively. Outlets of all drainage pipes in gully traps and inspection chambers should be checked to be opened as sometimes, plumbers insert gunny bags in them to block entry of any reptiles or debris. All the chambers should be checked to be clean and without any debris inside them. All Gully traps, inspection chambers and manholes should be provided with well fitted covers. All rain water pipes should be provided with gratings at the top and got tested to be through for drainage of rain water. Rain water harvesting system should be checked to be functional on some rainy day. See that all the vent pipes extended above the walls have been provided with cowls. Pipes left without cowls may invite stones or debris and may get blocked. It should also be checked that 2 inch diameter conduits inserted in walls for AC copper piping are sealed well at the top with caps to avoid entry of rain water or insects in them.
Painting work gang: Before the painting work gang departs, all internal and external paint and polish work should be checked to be given final finish, without any spots or smudges or brush marks. Examine all polish work minutely. Every polished surface should have velvet like finish especially the stair railing as you have to often run your hand over it. No door and window fittings should have any paint or polish mark on them. The grills if provided should be painted well in desired colour. All floors should be checked against any paint droppings. The window glass panes should be got cleaned of all paint or polish stains on them.
Carrying out above checks before clearing the accounts and making final payments to the working gangs will help the house builder in having a trouble free living after their departure.
