We have had independent inspections at every stage, and are very glad we have.
Some of our trades have been excellent, others are carnage. Our chippy was terrible and I don't know how he still has his ticket. There were some really big omissions at framing / pre-plaster that were picked up that us amateurs don't have the knowledge to call M out on.
Our site manager is very good, but he is one small cog in a very big chain.
It’s a case of no tradies and SM paying attention to details and using their standard response “it’s within Building Tolerance”. So far our SM has said that they will address the issues as we bring them up. It would be nice for it to be picked up as part of the build process and not have us that raise it up.
Thankfully our SM has never used the "it's within tolerance" line. If he knows something is rubbish, he will get it fixed, no matter how much the tradies whine about it. With a couple of the frame defects he was so frustrated, as it was the 4th time he'd had the chippy back for it. Obviously there aren't enough good chippies getting around, so they still have to use him.