A ROGUE builder has been ordered to pay nearly £5,500 compensation to two Halesowen customers - and more than £2,000 in costs - after magistrates heard he threatened to demolish his shoddy work rather than put the problems right.

Simon Pound, trading as Complete Landscapes, of Oak Street, Kingswinford, admitted a total of eight offences, including six of unfair trading and two of fraud, in a case prosecuted by Dudley Council's trading standards team.

Dudley magistrates were told he failed to tell the customers of their rights to cancel their orders, did not provide them with paperwork and "failed to carry out professional diligence" in his work to build a wall and steps and in the laying of paving and blocks.

When the customers complained about the shoddy work and refused to pay, Pound, aged 51, threatened to remove the patio and paving slabs he had laid rather than put right the problems.

Pound, whose home address was listed in Poole, Dorset, was ordered by the court to do 200 hours of unpaid work as part of a 12-month community order and to pay full compensation, amounting to £5,445, to the customers.

He was also told to pay Dudley Council costs of £2,361.

Among the charges he admitted was failing to carry out professional diligence in doing the work on a patio belonging to Steven and Angela Shilvock, of Haden Hill Road, and the resurfacing of the front garden belonging to Patricia Poles, in Badgers Croft.

When the customers complained about the work, Pound threatened to remove the paving slabs he had laid at Badgers Croft and the patio in Haden Hill Road.

In the case of Badgers Croft, he went on to remove the slabs when the customer refused to pay.

Councillor Rachel Harris, cabinet member for health and wellbeing, said: “Dudley Council does not tolerate rogue traders. I hope that this prosecution sends a clear message to whose people that shoddy work is unacceptable and that we will do all we can to protect consumers from whose who flout the law.”

“This kind of activity causes a huge amount of distress to the victims, who have worked hard and saved to pay for improvements to their home and are then badly let down.”