His second victim paid him $11,000 for various works in her Baulkham Hills home, before conducting a licence check and discovering he was a fraud. The initial stage of Anila's laundry conversion. "It was just a mess," said Anila, who was pregnant with her third daughter at the time she engaged Mr Issa's services. "The main thing we wanted was for our laundry to become a functioning bathroom. The whole point was to have the laundry done before I had the baby." As well as the laundry conversion, she had requested a variety of plumbing and lighting works around the home.

"When he started the laundry he took a deposit of $6000, then we discussed a second payment of $5000 upon half the work completed and then another $4350 when all work was completed." "The plumber laid down the plumbing work and the concrete base and then there was there was no progress at all:" Anila, who engaged Mr Issa's service in her Baulkham Hills home. At the time Anila was unaware that the deposit Mr Issa was requesting was well in excess of the permissible 10 per cent of the total contract price for building contracts worth more than $20,000. "He just kept delaying everything. We had a demolished laundry, then the plumber laid down the plumbing work and the concrete base and then there was there was no progress at all...just excuse after excuse." Before: Anila's laundry before works began to convert it into a bathroom.

After calling Fair Trading, Anila was advised to check Mr Issa's license number, at which point she realised he had an expired license for waterproofing only. Fair Trading Commissioner Rod Stowe described Mr Issa's behaviour as dishonest and evasive. "He deceived people, he has so far refused to give victims their money back and he is a menace best avoided," he said. Anila said she and her husband and still waiting for the money they are owed, but she said the point of filing the complaint was never to get the money back. "Our main concern was that he didn't do this to anyone else. If we get the money back, that's good but the lesson is learnt."Homeowners in NSW have been paid out $63 million in the last three financial years, to remedy sub-standard work after their builder died, disappeared or went insolvent.

UPDATE: A company name Mr Issa claimed to work for has been removed from an earlier version of this story because the Herald is satisfied there was no substance to those claims.

