NOTE Nº 0612 · REV A

Consumer Rights Act 2015 & Building Work Explained

How the Consumer Rights Act 2015 protects building work: implied terms on skill, price and time, statements that become binding, and the remedies available.

By The Renovation Notes Team · 3 min read · Published 23 August 2026

Construction worker wearing helmet and gloves uses a power tool to fix a wall.

In short

The Consumer Rights Act 2015 writes four terms into every building job you commission as a consumer: reasonable care and skill, a reasonable price where none was fixed, a reasonable time where none was fixed, and binding status for things the trader said that you relied on. Its remedies, repeat performance, then price reduction, are the legal spine of nearly every homeowner building claim.

One statute does more work in homeowner building disputes than every contract clause combined, because it applies even when there’s no contract document at all. The Consumer Rights Act 2015 is short, readable, and worth knowing precisely, because invoking the right section at the right moment is often all a dispute needs.

When it applies

You’re a consumer (acting outside a business) buying a service from a trader, which covers essentially all domestic building, plumbing, electrical, decorating and landscaping work, whatever the paperwork looks like. Where goods are supplied with the service (a boiler, a kitchen), the Act’s goods provisions run alongside: satisfactory quality, fit for purpose, as described.

The four implied terms

1. Reasonable care and skill (s.49). The work must meet the standard of a reasonably competent member of the trade, measured in practice against Building Regulations, British Standards, manufacturers’ instructions and normal trade tolerances. This is the section defective work claims stand on.

2. Reasonable price (s.51). Where no price was fixed in advance, you owe only what the work is reasonably worth, benchmarkable against trade day rates and market costs. This is the shield against the invoice that materialised at triple the estimate.

3. Reasonable time (s.52). Where no completion date was agreed, the work must finish within a reasonable time for that kind of job, the fallback that makes even a date-free contract’s overrun actionable eventually.

4. Information that binds (s.50). Things the trader said or wrote that you took into account, “that’s included”, “we’ll match the existing brick”, “building control won’t be needed”, are treated as terms of the contract. Verbal assurances stop being deniable atmosphere and become enforceable promises; one more reason to confirm conversations in writing as you go.

The remedies, in order

Repeat performance (s.55): the trader must redo non-conforming work at their own cost, within a reasonable time, without significant inconvenience to you. It’s the statutory version of “come back and fix it”, and your opening position in nearly every quality dispute.
Price reduction (s.56): where repeat performance is impossible, refused, or botched again, an appropriate reduction, up to 100% of the price. Practically, this is the right that lets you withhold proportionately or recover the cost of another firm’s remedial work.
General damages for consequential loss (the ruined carpet, the hotel nights) run alongside under ordinary contract law.

The Act doesn’t hand you termination for every flaw, minor defects get fixed, not contracts ended. Where breaches are serious enough to end the relationship, the termination framework does the heavy lifting.

Invoking it well

You don’t file anything; you cite it. A complaint that says “under s.49 of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 this work should have been carried out with reasonable care and skill; the attached items fall short; I require repeat performance within 14 days” moves differently from “not happy with the tiling”, it tells the trader you know the framework and forecloses the usual deflections. Escalation from there follows the standard ladder, with the Act as the consistent legal spine, and its six-year enforcement window and interaction with older, longer regimes are mapped in the construction law pillar.

This guide is general information for homeowners in England and Wales, not legal advice.