A MAN known as the dodgy lodger in Huddersfield has now started to sell log cabins – and ended up with at least one furious customer, unpaid suppliers and a court case against him.

And another company has warned people that Alan Beaumont, 58, has been using its name and logo on publicity material.

But he claims all the hassle is sending his blood pressure sky-high and making him ill.

And when he was being interviewed over the phone about the complaints against him, he said he had to hang up or his head would ‘explode’.

Beaumont became renowned in Huddersfield for renting homes and then not paying rent or any bills.

Justice caught up with him two years ago after he had first been exposed by the Examiner in 2005 for leaving debts totalling tens of thousands of pounds.

He admitted a deception charge at Huddersfield Magistrates’ Court in September, 2006, pleading guilty to using a false name to get a rented home in Kirkburton.

Beaumont asked for a similar offence to be taken into consideration regarding a house he rented in 2005 in Highburton and the magistrates imposed a 12-month community order. They also told Beaumont he had to do 200 hours’ community work, an alternative to a jail sentence.

Beaumont has had other troubled businesses including building conservatories and swimming pools and appeared on the BBC Watchdog programme in August, 2004.

In more recent times he’s been selling log cabins and was trading as Custom Timber Build after working for a time for a company with a very similar name – and his company has now ceased trading.

But Exeter-based Custom Timber Build (UK) says Beaumont was using its name, logo and pictures on publicity material and adverts – and repeated requests failed to make him stop.

Custom Timber Build (UK) managing director Bill Allen has now spoken out to warn people to steer clear of Beaumont.

“I don’t know what else to do apart from warn people what is happening,’’ he said. “We are a successful company with many great projects on the go and we resent that someone like Alan Beaumont is using our good name.

“He has absolutely nothing to do with us at all.’’

Custom Timber Build (UK) recently won a £600,000 contract to build 12 luxury timber lodges at a Devon golf hotel and another contract to build 25 lodges for a holiday company in Scarborough.

Mr Allen said that after Beaumont had advertised in a newspaper called Farmer’s Guardian, Custom Timber Build (UK) Ltd had received calls from people who were dealing with Beaumont wanting to check him out.

“Some had been on the verge of handing over deposits,’’ said Mr Allen.

But Beaumont still owes the Farmer’s Guardian for unpaid adverts.

Meanwhile Lancashire couple Melvyn and Elaine King spotted the advert and contacted Beaumont about him building them a cabin. They sold their home to move into it.

They say what happened next has led to terrible stress which has put their marriage under severe strain.

The catalogue of problems with the cabin includes:

l The base was built too small and had to rectified.

l The cabin they ordered was not the same as the one delivered; it came minus the front veranda.

l The roof was not fitted properly.

lThere were problems with the plumbing and electrics.

l Water is seeping in through the walls after the wood shrank and the entire building will now need re-cladding, which could cost up to £10,000.

l The roof has become infested with bugs caused by a fungus mould forming. The whole roof will have to be replaced.

Mr King, 52, says Beaumont took £33,550 from him even though the work was unfinished.

Two companies that supplied materials for the same job have both not been paid. One has had a successful county court case against Beaumont.

The cabin has been built on land off Burnley Road at Bacup in Lancashire. Beaumont told Mr King the cabin would cost £39,000 in staged payments and he agreed after seeing glossy brochures with Custom Timber Build (UK) written on them.

Mr King paid him 10% – £3,900 – upfront and organised the planning permission.

The foundations were built – Beaumont charged them £3,000 for that – but then had to be redone when Mr King and his 49-year-old wife, Elaine, discovered they were too small.

The couple have an 11-year-old son, John, and had to sell their home in Weir, Lancashire, to fund the log cabin project and moved out last July.

They were living in two old touring caravans on the site from last July until they finally moved into the cabin this April, months overdue.

Initially the couple persevered with Beaumont and paid him a further £16,400. He wanted the cheque made paying out to himself personally.

He promised to send a receipt, but never did.

Mr King said Beaumont told him the cabin would be there by the end of September and would be built within six weeks – but nothing had arrived by early October, even though the couple kept contacting him.

“He just came up with excuse after excuse,’’ said Mr King. “It got to the stage where I couldn’t get hold of him.’’

So he lured Beaumont back across to Bacup by texting him saying he was going away and he wanted to pay him some more money before he went.

“Beaumont rang me within 10 minutes,’’ said Mr King.

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They paid him a further £10,250 in October last year when the cabin arrived and sub-contractors from Huddersfield arrived to build it.

The work went on until the second week in January when the sub-contractors wanted a further £8,000 to buy materials and ‘white goods’ such as fridges even though it had no central heating or kitchen and parts of the roof were unfinished.

When Mr King refused to pay any more, the sub-contractors left the site.

He said: “There was no way I was paying any more money. I had made the staged payments, but would only pay the final payment when the work was finished. I didn’t feel I ought to pay for something I’d not got.

“In the real world people get the final payment when the job’s done.’’

Mr King brought in a friend who is a builder and discovered the central heating pipes were in the wrong place and the electrics had only been installed for sockets next to the floor, with nothing in for lighting or outside lighting.

Mr King spent a further £14,000 making it habitable, but after moving in three months ago soon realised there were major problems with the cabin.

“There are gaps in the timber and we have water coming in through the windows,’’ he said. “There have been leakages ever since we got in here and depending on which way the wind and rain blows we run around with towels.

“It will cost a further £10,000 to have the entire cabin re-cladded.’’

He said the total cost so far has been about £48,000 and that was before any re-cladding work.

Mr King said: “Beaumont pushes his luck up to the brink of the law and because you can’t get assistance from the police it’s a civil matter and you stand to lose thousands of pounds in solicitors fees.’’

He organised a meeting with Beaumont and the sub-contractors at the site and gave them a deadline to come up with a plan to put the cabin right. But that deadline passed and he heard nothing from them.

He said Beaumont agreed earlier this year that he owed Mr and Mrs King a £5,000 refund, but has only paid £1,500.

“He owed us this money because this is not the cabin we ordered,’’ said Mr King. “All this has virtually destroyed me and my wife as a couple because of the horrendous friction and strain it’s put on us.

“He has come up with excuse after excuse and I now want the compensation he owes me.”

When the Examiner contacted Beaumont he said: “My main problem is sorting out Mr and Mrs King who have a legitimate complaint.’’

Towards the end of the questioning he said: “I feel as though my head is about to explode. I don’t need more heartache or castigation in the newspaper. I know I’ve had self-inflicted problems in the past. A nightmare has occurred again, but not one that can’t be sorted out. They have got a super log cabin.”

He said he has offered to put Mr and Mrs King’s cabin right – but could not afford to do that and pay them the compensation at the same time.

He would do one and then the other and said he was sorting out wood for the re-cladding. The wood had been left out all winter, which had led to the leakage problems.

“I’m doing my damndest to sort them out,’’ he said. “I can repay the compensation or take the responsibility for sorting the outside of the house – but I can’t do both at the same time.

“It’s a slight shrinkage problem with the wood – nothing astronomical – and it can be sorted out by the end of the summer.”

He accepted there had been problems with building the cabin, but blamed the sub-contractors.

He added the cabin should have had a verandah, but did not have one when it arrived from Romania so they had to make one on site. But Mr King is clear what he wants.

“I set a deadline for all the compensation to be paid and the deadline passed without the £3,500. Only then will I decide what I’m doing. I’ve got a cabin, but not the one I wanted.

“The compensation is for getting the wrong cabin. The remedial work is a separate issue.’’

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MELVYN and Elaine King’s cabin project has been a nightmare for two other companies.

One is Harrogate roofing company Yorkshire Metal Roofing and the other is York roof truss firm Trustspan.

Yorkshire Metal Roofing provided the materials worth £3,200 last November and has had to badger Beaumont for the cash ever since – and is still owed £700.

Angry owner Keith Bradley said: “Alan Beaumont phoned us sounding very plausible. He said he provided log cabins as holiday homes and to caravan sites and asked about our roofing products.’’ He said Beaumont told him he was dealing with a roof truss company in York and asked Mr Bradley to liaise with that company to sort out a quote.

Mr Bradley agreed to provide the Italian-manufactured metal roofing sheets cut to size and organised them to be dropped off at what he was told were building sites at Bacup in Lancashire and Huddersfield on November 26 last year.

After the first drop in Preston the driver was told to pick up the cheque from the Huddersfield site – but that turned out to be Beaumont’s home at Sherwood House on New North Road in Highfields. Beaumont was not there and with no signs of a building site the driver left the materials in the car park.

Mr Bradley said: “We provided roofing materials for two jobs. We know where the Lancashire one is, but he’s never told us about the other one.’’

Beaumont initially paid £800 and £1,000 by bank transfers and only stumped up another £270 in cash after Mr Bradley went over to Lancashire to confront him at the site. He’s never seen another penny.

“The deal was to pay on delivery,’’ said Mr Bradley. “We delivered, but were not paid anything. What made it more annoying is that when I finally caught up with him he was driving a Range Rover with a personalised registration plate.’’

Trustspan managing director Les Forster said Beaumont paid the first four bills up front to gain their confidence – including supplying roof trusses for the job at Bacup. The bills for these jobs ranged from £600 to £1,200.

But when they gave him credit for the fourth for £1,900 plus VAT he failed to pay and has then proved hard to contact.

“He sucked us in,’’ said Mr Forster. “We thought he was a regular guy and came on as nice as pie. He has now proved hard to contact and when we have spoken to him has come up with all kinds of excuses.”

This company also delivered materials to the car park at Sherwood House.

The company won a judgement against Beaumont at Northampton County Court earlier this year for the original debt plus interest and court fees.

The total is £2,019 – but not a penny has been paid so far.

When contacted by the Examiner, Beaumont said he had not been using the name Custom Timber Build for four months and was now going under the name Timber Build – but accepted that was not a registered company.

He said he was paying the Farmers Guardian back for the adverts and claimed he only owed the two roofing companies money.

He said Yorkshire Metal Roofing would be paid by the end of this week – but Mr Bradley confirmed yesterday that no more money had come in.

Beaumont was less forthcoming about Trustspan. “Trustspan are a creditor, but they have not put me under any pressure for the money. You tend to put creditors on the shelf if they’re not badgering you.”