A married couple in Warrington, Cheshire, returned home to find their house covered in scaffolding they said they had not ordered, after Ring doorbell footage captured three men unloading equipment and one man leaving an unusual voicemail.
Mike Keeling, 56, and his wife Leanne Smith, 45, say they discovered the staging on Saturday after being out. Doorbell camera footage released by the couple shows three men taking scaffold tubes from a flatbed truck while another man presses the doorbell and, when prompted by the device to leave a message, replies "hello, Chinese takeaway." The men wore no identifiable company clothing and the van shown in the footage bore no logo.
Keeling said he initially thought the work was being done at another property and only realised it was his when he turned into the road. He canvassed neighbours, called local scaffolding firms and knocked on the number 13 properties on surrounding streets but said he has not located the workers or identified the company responsible.
"Quite a few people had seen this work being done, but the guys who'd done it had absolutely nothing on them to identify who they were," Keeling said. He added that typical scaffolding installations usually carry a sign identifying the firm, but that was not the case at his property.
Other tradespeople have offered to remove the equipment or to accept the poles as payment for removal, Keeling said, but he has hesitated, saying he would feel uneasy disposing of property that does not belong to him. He noted the scaffolding boards alone are worth "hundreds of pounds." He also said the staging has blocked access to his wife's home charging point for their electric Mini, forcing them to use a public charger that costs more.
There is no suggestion at this stage that the incident was part of an extortion attempt, but police and consumer authorities have in the past warned about rogue traders who erect scaffolding without completing work and then demand payment to take it down. In 2023, Hertfordshire police issued an alert after traders in St Albans put up scaffolding, carried out no agreed work and sought further money to remove the equipment. Other incidents reported in recent years have involved elderly homeowners who were pressured into paying for roof or scaffolding work they did not request or need.
Keeling said he hopes media attention will help reunite the equipment with its owners or prompt the responsible firm to collect it. "We were hoping that maybe some building work was going to start — a team of roofers would turn up at another address and realise there's no scaffolding there, they'd phone the guys who did it and they might come back and take it down," he said. "But how long do we leave it for?"
Local authorities have advised homeowners confronted with unexpected work or materials to contact their local police and trading standards office and to avoid making payments on the spot. Keeling said he has contacted nearby scaffolders and neighbours but has not yet involved the police. He said the primary concerns are security, the financial inconvenience of losing their home charge point temporarily and uncertainty about legal responsibility for removal.
The couple continue to seek information about who placed the scaffolding and whether it belongs to a firm that mistook their address. They have not accepted offers from other companies to take the equipment down and said they will wait for the responsible party to reclaim it or for official guidance on disposal.