HHGE MAJOR WORKS CONTRACT: On 4 February 2019 Ian Collier Chairman of Hanger Hill Garden Estate Limited (HHGE) Co. # 2159813 signed a contract with JFC Associates Ltd Co. # 09764608 to act as the Contract Administrator of a proposed refurbishment program for the HHGE Flats including repairs to most windows.
SCOPE OF THE WORKS: This proposal involved both internal and external repairs to the Critall windows and their wooden frames. The principle director of JFC Associates was John F Chandler (Chandler) an experienced RICS registered buildings surveyor. As well as acting as Contract Administrator Chandler was also listed as being CDM Designer and Quantity Surveyor for all the works. See below
CONTRACT AWARDED TO ARMOUR HART: After Chandler had drawn up a specification of the works three tenders were obtained The contract for the work was awarded to the lowest bid provided by Armour Hart Group Ltd Co.# 03161192 at a total cost of £494.442.72 including fees and VAT.
Just over a year later on 7 September 2020 in an HHGE newsletter Collier announced that the HHGE Board had already paid an additional £50,515.86 to Armour Hart for extra work approved (certified) by John Chandler. Ian Collier stated that the total cost of the whole project was likely to rise from the original £494.442.72 to over £700,000+ an increase of over 40%.
PROBLEMS WITH THE WORKS: The work was scheduled to start on 01 July 2019 and last 14 months (until September 2020). However by August 2020 less than one third of the work had been completed, and it was apparent to many flat owners that there were serious persistent problems. On 12 August 2020 a public meeting including two HHGE directors Azad Ali and Ian Collier, contractors, surveyors, materials suppliers and flat owners was held outside Essex House. Among the many complaints there were allegations that;
- Incorrect inferior unspecified materials were being used.
- Rotten wood was being painted over or covered up.
- Repeated complaints about poor workmanship were being ignored.
- The original specification was not being followed by the contractor
- Chandler was rarely seen on the site.
WORK ON THE WINDOW REPAIRS CEASED in December 2020 due to winter weather and the onset of COVID early in 2020. Due to COVID no building work was carried out in 2020.
In December 2021 Ruvina Sekhon of JFM Managing Agents organized for an RICS building surveyor James Paul of Earl Kendrick Surveyors to carry out a full review of all the work carried out under the contract with Armour Hart. The Earl Kendrick report was commissioned by the HHGE Board but paid for through the Service Charge. As of November 2022 the Earl Kendrick report has been sitting on the shelf for 11 months and the HHGE Board have repeatedly refused requests to reveal the contents of the report to the HHGE flat owners.
According to a source who does not wish to be named, the Earl Kendrick report is highly critical of the quality of the work carried out by Amour Hart and the supervision by John Chandler. I have approached Azad Ali (HHGE Director) for his comments but his only response has been that all the HHGE board discussions and reports commissioned by the HHGE Board are confidential. Note: As yet I do not have access to the report so I am only reporting what my unnamed source has told me.
CHANDLER (JFC) CONTRACT: One extraordinary aspect of the JFC Associates Ltd contract with the HHGE Ltd Board signed by Ian Collier on 4 February 2019 to supervise the work (as mentioned above) is that it contains a liability cap of only £10,000 on a project costing nearly £500,000. See document below. This is an extraordinarily low amount and quite unreasonable in the circumstances. In view of subsequent events, it appears that the HHGE Directors who approved the JFC contract were grossly negligent in agreeing a £10,000 liability cap. The question is why ?
On 24 March 2021 John Chandler closed his surveying business and left for his house in Spain leaving behind an uncompleted contract with multiple problems with extra costs likely exceeding £400,000 and with 60% of the proposed works not even started. Remember that the the original contract was to cost just under £500,000 for 100% of the works.
Even today in 2026 the HHGE flats are bedeviled by the poor quality of the window repairs carried out by Armour Hart between 2019 and 2021.
The HHGE Directors directly responsible for the Armour Hart contract, Azad Ali and Ian Collier resigned on 14 December 2021 with over 60% of the proposed works uncompleted.
