We have received reports of a possible scam in the neighbourhood, where some men offer to repair front walkways and do other outdoor maintenance work but after receiving partial or full payment, they leave the work unfinished or in disrepair.

Standard cautions apply that anyone offering unsolicited services to you at your door should be appropriately vetted before any payments are made. Some methods to verify a contractor’s background are to check with the Better Business Bureau or other reputation-checking services such as Home Stars – or you can ask for references from other local clients.

The recent incidents reported to us involve two men with Irish accents and a third man with an English accent. We have advised the residents to report these incidents to the police. There are sometimes two sides to a story, so if anyone thinks that this is possibly just a client/contractor disagreement we will be happy to post the contractor’s opinion once provided to us.