A LANDSCAPER must pay thousands of pounds back to a couple whose garden was left a “mess”, a court heard.

Ryan White, trading as R&J Landscapes, must pay £3,578.54 to Drexel and Alicia Santi to cover materials they never received or had to pay for, as well as for damage to their property, a judge at Darlington County Court has ruled.

After responding to a social media post by Mr White, who did not attend court, where he offered landscaping without a labour charge to build experience in the area after relocating from Carlisle to Newton Aycliffe, Mr and Mrs Santi “thought they were helping him with his portfolio” but instead found themselves in thousands of pounds of debt.

The Darlington-based couple took out a loan to put Mr White’s work right. He originally agreed to dig foundations for a work shed or summerhouse and lay 85 feet of block paving from the foundations, at the bottom of the garden, to the house.

They had planned to reuse some flagstones already in the garden “to keep costs down”, but 80 per cent of these were broken during Mr White’s work.

A white wooden door and its handle were also damaged, with the handle mechanism broken and some wood “gorged out”.

Mrs Santi, 56, who, with her husband, 41, paid £1,600 up front which they believed would cover everything, said she had requested the work be carried out within a week, to which Mr White agreed it would be one to two weeks.

On top of the initial payment, Mr and Mrs Santi paid over £1,000 for materials such as yellow sand, gravel mix, soil and cement. They also bought tools, which Mr White told them he already had.

“I was coming home from work and seeing no progress, just mess,” Mrs Santi added.

“He even tipped over a barrel with petrol in it and just laughed. He said this is what happens on a building site, but it isn’t a building site, it’s my home.”

Over the three weeks Mr White attended the Santis' home, Mrs Santi “wouldn’t say he was working”.

District Judge Lindsay, who thanked the couple for “helpful” documents they had sent in, including receipts, photos and text messages, said the court had not heard from Mr White since he sent in his statement, which claimed there was no timescale for the work set out in a contract.

The court found that a contract, in the form of an email on Feb 25, 2019, was in place and therefore implied protections.

Mrs Santi told the court she asked Mr White to finish the work, offering to pay for labour as he said he needed to prioritise paying customers. He allegedly offered to work one day a week until the job was completed.

The judge said it was “not unreasonable to refuse” the offer.

The partially completed work, which used the few materials delivered to the couple or that were bought directly from a third party, were found to be “useless” and had to be dug up, as foundations were too deep, while some materials were not correct for the job.

The court found Mr White carried out contracted work in a “negligent manner” and “without reasonable care or skill”.