Making handyman pay for leak repair

[Scott C.]

This may be a stupid question but I wanted to get some feedback from the community. We are rehabbing our third rental property and I have a handyman doing most of the work. One of the things I needed him to do was to fix a ceiling in one of the bedrooms. As he was trying to reattach these ceiling tiles he nicked one of the radiant heat lines in the house. This leak now needs to be fixed for the heat to work again and the repair is going to cost between $400 - $600 dollars because they use stainless steel pipe in the system. Should I make the handyman pay for this repair? His total work on this job is probably going to run me about $1000 so this will pretty much wipe out at least half his take from this job if I make him pay for it.

I have used this guy before and he does good work and is reasonable on his prices. He is also dependable.

Any thoughts?

Thanks,

Scott

[Jerry W.]

@Scott C. don't cut off your nose to spite your face. Things could go from bad to worse. I would ask him what his thoughts are about the damage, get his side of the story and see what he thinks about who should pay for repairs. If he offers to pay for the full repair, offer to split it. If he doesn't want to pay any decide if his excuse is valid. A truly good handyman can save you thousands. Sometimes things are truly unforseeable, go to cut a hole in drywall and hit a wire or pipe, especially a pex pipe, may be just plain bad luck.