Gardening & Landscaping

Has the person who paved my garden done a bad job or am I too fussy?

Anonymous user 09/03/2024 - 2.34 PM

I've just had my back garden, which was grass, paved over. It's not a big area, but in the middle was a manhole, which protruded up from the grass. Now the paving has been done. the paving is about 4 inches higher than the manhole, leaving what is basically a 20 inch or so square hole in the middle of the garden (right in the only suitable place for a table and chair set). Further, where the garden joins my neighbours, there is just a wire fence, and he has paved about 5 inches short of the fence, but has left it very uneven and messy looking with a trench at the end, nothing to finish it off. I did complain, and his solution was to put gravel in the trench (which no doubt will end up over next doors garden since there's nothing to stop it sliding through the big gapped wire fence), and to put a flower pot on the manhole! Am I right to believe that he should have put some sort of edging at the end of the paving if he wasn't going to go right to the fence (rather than leaving it looking raggedy and unfinished) and would it be normal to leave a hole where the manhole is (surely it will fill with rain and erode the 'cement' he's put around the inside (I think it's sand myself). I'm sure any paver who knows what they are doing would put a cover over the manhole, not leave a big hole in someone's garden. When I said I would have thought he would have put a cover over it, before suggesting the flower pot 'solution', he said he could put a board of wood over it, but it could collapse. It was almost as if he didn't know what I was going on about when I mentioned a proper manhole cover. I can't help thinking this has been a bodge job and would just like some thoughts/advice. Thanks