Legal Question in Civil Litigation in India

My architect is creating problem, I had signed an agreement with an architect in Bangalore for remodeling my existing home and our budget was 15lakhs. Before going to this architect i had been to couple of architects and they did not take the project because it was a very small project. Since this architect took up the project i was happy. I paid 50000 as a retention fee to start the work. After two months i got a plan from them. They told that will start getting the quote from the contractors and asked us to provide one contractor from our side as well. We got a first bill of quality for 24lakhs from them. Later they informed that the contractor will not be able to take up the contract. They suggested that they have few more contractors from their side and will provide us the BOQ. This time they sent us a BOQ just like a template with all square feet and rates already fixed in it. The contractor had to just multiply and fill the rates. The BOQ came for 36laksh this time from my contractor. They converted the 36 to 43 lakhs. They sent us three quotes for 43, 45 and 62 lakhs for constructing just 8-10 squares. Since the rates we very high we did not want to continue and asked them to send the invoice so that we could settle our bills with them. They sent us a bill of 2lakhs rupees on the 43 lakhs of the BOQ, which we never agreed on. My contractor came back to us and told that this project is just 14 lakhs and he would provide us the services. Now they have been threatening us to pay or send people to my house or go legally. Since we had not agreed on any of the BOQ we felt that it is not right to pay them soo much for just working on the plan, and just pay them for the plan they provided till now for us.

Please advice.


Asked on 7/16/13, 1:59 am

1 Answer from Attorneys
Fca Prashant Chavan Expert Edge LLP

16.07.2013

Dear Sir / Madam,

You should tell your Architect / Interior Designer point blank that the fees of Rs. 50,000/- that you paid him was towards designing fees for the layout of your house and ask the Architect to give you a receipt. You should engage your own private contractor to actually carry out the interior work to design, so that you retain the control over the progress of the work, it turns out to be cheaper and will fit your budget.

Regards,

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Answered on 7/16/13, 5:18 am


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