Spring 2011 Issue 004

THE FINISHING LINENews and views on specialist repair services for construction and house builders.

Rob Mouser Talks“Since the last newsletter, I can report that March was the most successful month for Plastic Surgeon ever; and this, I feel, must be indicative that the construction industry is beginning to recover, albeit a slow and gradual process.

Indeed, the Government is returning decision-making powers on housing and planning to local communities where ‘local people will determine where best to build the new homes … and powerful incentives will mean that local people will see the benefit in building new homes and we (the government) will continue to invest in affordable homes.’

Powerful words, but maybe the changes in planning permission legislation are beginning to make a difference to the industry, combined with the fact that mortgage product availability has increased by 13% since April. This is the fifth month in succession that there has been a rise, bringing the total number of live mortgage products to 11,748, according to data from Mortgage Brain.

So, I feel like being positive about our future – housebuilding is making a tentative recovery, our March figures have proved this. Customers rightfully expect their brand new home to be absolutely perfect, and interestingly, Barratt (one of our clients) has won the highest five star rating for customer satisfaction from the Home Builders Federation for an unprecedented second year in a row. I am delighted our repair services have helped the housebuilder achieve this accolade. And even though UK house prices continue to decline, many people are staying put and instead are using our services to ‘improve rather than move.’

To conclude, we are doing well in both the newbuild and refurbishment marketplaces, successfully undertaking repairs for the one-off, individual home to snagging for large scale private housebuilders and the public sector, local authority social housing providers and housing associations, as well as our retail and commercial customers.”

Rob MouserManaging Director

Customer Case Study

RSL EMBRACES PLASTIC SURGEON REPAIR SERVICE

A leading RSL in the north-west of England has formalized an arrangement with the specialist contractor, Plastic Surgeon to carry out all necessary minor cosmetic repairs internally and externally to its stock of over 18,000 homes. Initially, New Charter Housing Trust recruited Plastic Surgeon just to take over the work on its void properties after a rival repair company had failed to honour its commitments. By contrast, with a dozen of its highly trained finishers stationed across the region, Plastic Surgeon proved so reliable that the client extended the scope of the work to include all of its tenanted properties as well. Aside from the quality and consistency of the repairs carried out by the Plastic Surgeon’s finishers, the other important aspect to the company’s service for the social housing provider, is the way tenant liaison is managed. Once the client has communicated a repair instruction to Plastic Surgeon’s national call centre by email, the customer care team sends out a letter the same day by first class post: giving both the time framework for the appointment and details of which operative will be carrying out the work. This includes their name, photograph and van registration number. A definite appointment is then made by telephone and the work carried out. Typical repairs executed for New Charter Housing Trust on the void properties have included making good chips, scratches or other

FINISHER CHALLENGESpecialist repair job for the Environment Agency New central booking system

Beyond French Polishing WOOD - Top 5 ‘watch out’

TECH TALK

RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT THE ‘F’ WORDS

AT A GLANCE

Continued overleaf

‘Waste Minimisation’

Exeter Business Awards – Winner ‘Excellence in Customer Service’

‘Best use of Technology’

THE FINISHING LINE

Tech TalkRoss Gardner - IT Manager, Plastic Surgeon

NEW CENTRAL BOOKING SYSTEMAfter months in development, Plastic Surgeon is nearing a full roll-out of its new Head Office central booking system.

The system, developed by the in-house IT team, is at the cutting edge of technology, and will enable customers throughout the UK to call a central number, to book all their fine finishing and cosmetic repair services.

The system uses automated mapping software to calculate the optimum route and appointment time. Not only will it allow Plastic Surgeon to provide an appointment at the time of booking, but will also aid in getting a finisher to site faster. Plastic Surgeon believes it is the only sub-contractor to offer a UK wide centralised booking system to the construction and house building industry. Customers will benefit from:

• Fasterappointmenttimes• Singlepointofcontact• Simplifiedbookingprocess• Easeofcommunication

damage to doors, work-surfaces, kitchen units, window frames and bathroom suites. In most cases these are dealt with by first preparing and then filling the affected area, before it is rubbed down with a graduation of abrasives. Currently Plastic Surgeon’s contract covers New Charter’s 14,000 units in Manchester’s Tameside area, 200 of which are currently unoccupied. Void Maintenance Manager, Dawn Reynolds, explains the rationale behind the appointment. “Due to problems with a previous supplier, we were looking for a company to take on our repair requirements. When Plastic Surgeon approached us, we were impressed by their emphasis on repair rather than replacement, which has already saved us time and money in terms of tipping charges and replacement costs. No other company could offer us this service.

“In just four months, they have carried out 96 repairs, and repaired rather than replaced 31 items. We have saved three-quarters of a tonne of environmental waste and our average repair cost has dropped from £250 to under £30.”

Read the full case study at www.plastic-surgeon.co.uk/casestudy

Download our white paper: Sustainable Repair & Maintenance for Social Housing

www.plastic-surgeon.co.uk/whitepaper

‘The changing face of affordable maintenance – Life after ROK and Connaught’

Read the article at www.plastic-surgeon.co.uk/article

Customer case study cont. Finisher Challenge

SPECIALIST REPAIR JOB FOR THE ENVIRONMENT AGENCY

Never one to turn down a challenge when it comes to specialist repairs, Plastic Surgeon jumped at the chance to provide a solution when they received a call for help from The Environment Agency in Cornwall to assess damage to a fish counter on the Gunnislake Weir on the River Tamar in Plymouth.

After an initial assessment, Plastic Surgeon sent a team of finishers to complete work repairing the fish counter to prolong its life and help prevent further deterioration in the future.

The River Tamar in South West England, is set in an area of outstanding natural beauty and forms most of the border between Devon (to the east) and Cornwall (to the west).

Fish counters, such as the one on on the River Tamar, provide a measure of the number, size and age of salmon and sea trout returning to the river. They also provide information on the timing of fish migrations in relation to environmental factors such as river flow, water temperature and tidal cycle. Information from fish counters is used to assess the health of salmonid populations and to formulate effective management plans.

The repair was on a resistivity fish counter, a specific type of counter which uses three stainless electrodes to detect the size and direction of travel of the fish.

The electrodes are set into a sheet of white polypropylene. It was the joints and inserts in this sheeting that needed repairing with a specialist polyurethane cold weld filler which is only manufactured in black. The Environment Agency need to collect video footage of fish passing over the electrode array to assess the detection and sizing efficiency of the counter and to investigate anomalies in the counter data. A dark filler would have given the fish counter an unsightly look and could have made it difficult to pick out fish from the video footage, so Plastic Surgeon developed a bespoke translucent version of the specialist filler with the manufacturers.

The repair work was carried out in unusual surroundings – within the fish pass itself at Gunnislake. This meant that additional considerations for health and safety had to be made. Unusual PPE was worn by the finishers, in the form of lifejackets and wellies!

Repairs were carried out on the polypropylene sheet and inserts that housed the electrodes for the fish counter. The experienced finishers removed the original welded plastic on the fish counter before beginning the filling process with the bespoke translucent polyurethane cold weld filler. After masking off the surrounding areas, the finishers sanded down the areas to complete the repair.

Rob Mouser, Plastic Surgeon Managing Director loves a challenge: “This was an unusual request and not our normal type of job or repair. It does demonstrate our flexibility and our ‘can do’ approach which applies to all our customers. We always try to solve a problem and our highly skilled team of finishers look for new ways of approaching problems, even if they haven’t tackled a similar repair before.”

The Environment Agency was very impressed with Plastic Surgeon’s work, which avoided them having to take the fish counter out of service during a busy monitoring period.

Spring 2011 Issue 004

Environmental FocusThe sustainability debate and the roll out of the Code for Sustainable Homes has put carbon reduction at the forefront of almost everybody’s mind in the construction industry, though there still remains a great deal of uncertainty as to the right course of action to follow.

Even in relation to the Code – which is now just five years from full implementation – there is continuing debate about what constitutes a ‘low or near zero’ dwelling, with much of the disagreement focused on the importance of embodied energy, compared to that consumed during the lifetime of the property. Even the Building Research Establishment’s Green Book has failed to settle the arguments between the manufacturers of dissimilar building materials. Being specialists in the repair of virtually every type of building component from a cracked shower tray to dented cladding panels, at Plastic Surgeon we can take the stance of concerned observers: in that we do not influence how properties are built or heated. Yet we do still see ourselves as having two important roles to play in the process of carbon cutting: both for our own activities, and for helping our clients reduce their own environmental footprints.

Read the full article at www.plastic-surgeon.co.uk/environment

Construction Industry Focus

GDP FIGURES ‘SKEWED’ SAYS PLASTIC SURGEONSuch is the importance of the construction industry to the UK economy as a whole that its relative ‘health and wealth’ has the ability to significantly affect the figures for GDP. Just as when the country finally climbed out of recession in the second half of last year, construction led the way with a strong performance, so the dreadful weather leading up to Christmas contributed to a fall off in the following quarter.

What was surprising to most of those inside the industry, however, was to be told that the lacklustre 0.5 per cent growth in GDP for Q1 this year, included a set back of more than four per cent for construction.

Read the full article at www.plastic-surgeon.co.uk/construction

Paul Elsmere from the Environment Agency’s Environmental monitoring team in Cornwall commissioned the works having found out about Plastic Surgeon’s specialist repair service by searching the internet:

“We called upon Plastic Surgeon because they did not dismiss the job out of hand. They were willing to work with us, take on a job that was not within their normal remit and come up with a workable solution. I would certainly use them again and would recommend them to other people.”

Research and DevelopmentBEYOND FRENCH POLISHING

When a timber door or kitchen cabinet gets a nasty scratch on it, and the customer watches one of our finishers undertake a repair of the damage, it is not at all unusual that they think our operative is a French polisher.

In fact, they are not far from the truth; the only difference is that Plastic Surgeon has taken the basic processes of French polishing several steps beyond, adapting it and extending the techniques involved, so as to suit today’s modern surfaces and materials. So what exactly is French polishing? It is a wood finishing technique that results in a very high gloss surface, with a deep colour and chatoyancy (finishing wood so that it retains the ability to change colour at different angles). It consists of applying many thin coats of shellac - dissolved in alcohol - using a rubbing pad, and most experts agree that the term “French polishing” probably earned its name from the extensive rubbing that is necessary to apply shellac smoothly and perfectly.

The trouble with this type of finish, however, is that it is impractical – a glass of wine spilt onto it will ruin the surface; while the technique of French polishing itself is highly labour-intensive.

Hence we saw the emergence of new surface finishes in the early twentieth century. Polish, applied with spray guns; the development of varnishes, which later became water-based; and the birth of power tools to take the elbow ache out of the process of timber treatment.

Indeed, our finishers have often been asked to take over when French polishers have found their limited armoury of materials is simply not up to the challenge. Our operatives carry a huge selection of fillers, abrasives, smoothing compounds, pigments and sealers. All may look similar, but combined with our power polishers, we can gently remove scratches out of glass, PVC- window profiles and enamel baths; as well as timber.

Repair Resources‘Sustainable Repair & Maintenance for Social Housing’ www.plastic-surgeon.co.uk/whitepaper

Read repair articles at www.plastic-surgeon.co.uk/articles

Read customer case studies at -www.plastic-surgeon.co.uk/casestudies

‘Rob Mouser discusses sustainable cosmetic repairs’ View this and our other videos at - www.youtube.com/FineFinishers

Sign up to our blog at -www.specialist-fine-finishing-repair-services.co.uk/

Follow us at twitter.com/#!/finefinishers

Follow us at www.linkedin.com/company/plastic-surgeon

Spring 2011 Issue 004

Customer Case Study

BUILDING REPAIR TO FIRE DAMAGED HOUSEWhen a blaze broke out in a group of retail units on Canvey Island, not only were the half dozen businesses completely destroyed, but there was also considerable damage caused by smoke and heat to the residential building next door.

Evacuated by the emergency services at 5-30 in the morning, the occupant, Lynda Cain, was shocked to see the state of her

home after the fire had been damped down and was not sure whose responsibility it was to clear things up.

Fortunately her insurers – one of the UK’s top five companies - has a national agreement with the building repair specialist, Plastic Surgeon; enabling swift and effective action to be taken.

Given the extent of the damage to the two storey house – including blackened and buckled roofline fittings, windows caked with combustion residue, and other staining – Plastic Surgeon included the erection of full scaffolding within its detailed quote.

The contract commenced with two of Plastic Surgeon’s highly trained finishers, together with the regional operations manager, employing detergent and elbow grease to clean away the worst of the smoke and tar deposits. This was followed by more thorough cleaning with special solvents to remove the more stubborn stains, which also revealed the full extent of the physical damage.

Some sections of fascia and soffit had broken loose due to the extreme heat popping fixings, while other sections had warped. New screw-holes were drilled and the profiles secured before the rough old holes were filled and smoothed back. And in a couple of areas, the finishers employed a technique Plastic Surgeon pioneered to reshape the distorted UPVC using heat guns.

Read the full article at www.plastic-surgeon.co.uk/fire

The ‘F’ WordsWe regularly encounter the same causes of damage to the same surfaces, the type that happens so easily, usually resulting in a few choice words. We compile a ‘top 5’ of the regular offenders in each issue, so you can take steps to avoid them. But if you do have a surface that gets damaged, just remember the ‘F’ words, fine finishers.

WOOD – Top 5 ‘watch out’

1. Impact damage – wooden surface being hit with an object

2. Scratches – dragging things such as toolboxes across surfaces

3. Poor joints – either poorly fitted joints, or the wood settling to its environment and either swelling or shrinking due to temperatures

4. Wrongly fitted items – handles, signs etc that leave damage and marks when removed

5. Water damage – where the wood has come into contact with water and it has soaked up the wood, making it first blow, and then leaves stain marks.

About Plastic SurgeonAs the UK’s leading experts in cosmetic repairs some of the most respected names in UK house building and construction rely on us to get the job done. We employ over 100 staff, and provide full coverage of mainland UK.

Telephone 0845 141 0000 Facsimile 0845 143 0000

Plastic Surgeon® Ltd. Blue Waters House, Pottery Road, Bovey Tracey, Devon TQ13 9DSenquiries@plastic-surgeon.co.uk

www.plastic-surgeon.co.uk

Tonnes

London 548

Bristol 497

Glasgow 301

Manchester 291

Leeds 243

Swindon 239

Finishing Facts Since 2005 Plastic Surgeon has:

• Saved 16,979 tonnes from landfill

• Repaired 1028 doors in Dundee

• Repaired 1009 showers in Salford

• Repaired more toilets in Glasgow than any other city!

The cities who’ve benefited by saving the most from landfill, saving around 2,000 tonnes between them through our repair service are:

For every £1 spent on repairs with Plastic Surgeon, you save £3 on material replacements, and that’s excluding labour costs.

!

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Housebuilding Industry Focus

HOUSING SECTOR SEEKING NEW WAYS TO SELL Experts at the Halifax building society are predicting a 4.5% fall in house values this year, meaning that prices are approximately 20% lower than the 2007 peak. This drop may seem alarming in itself, but one cannot ignore the fact that the average cost of a home, at over £160K, is historically still very high, and out of reach for many first-time buyers looking to get on the property ladder.

Read the full article at www.plastic-surgeon.co.uk/housing