After a viral TikTok video wrongly portrayed a woman’s driveway being destroyed due to an unpaid bill, the contractor responsible for the clip has confessed to losing his job as a result. He acknowledges that the blame for his situation lies solely with him.
Alex Gray told MailOnline he had ‘more than learned his lesson’ after sparking outrage with a stunt that was viewed almost one million times.
The video, which has since been removed, featured workers purportedly working for Kendall Contractors Ltd removing a tarmac driveway in Leeds, West Yorkshire. The caption accompanying the footage read: ‘Can’t pay? We’ll take it away.’
Despite the fact that the homeowner had settled her £3,800 bill in full the previous year, she was deeply upset by the misleading nature of the video, which unjustly portrayed her as someone who avoids paying bills.
Mr Gray, who posted the clip on TikTok, revealed he had walked away from the Leeds-based groundworks firm and accepted ‘full responsibility’.
He said he had offered his resignation to boss Tony Kendall, whose daughter Sophie Kendall is listed as the company’s the sole director.
Mr Gray said: ‘I’ve more than learned my lesson – I’ve lost my job because of it.
‘We’ve parted ways. I just said I’m sorry and I’ve walked away.
‘I didn’t want to bring the issue to his family because it’s got nothing to do with them, so I thought I’d walk away.
‘That was the best thing to do.’
The footage falsely implied that the driveway was being destroyed in revenge over non-payment of a £3,800 bill.
But the woman, in her 60s, paid the original cost in full last year and had been waiting for the surface to be repaired after a burst water main and gas pipe issue led to the new driveway being dug up.
She said the £1,600 compensation from the gas board had been sitting in her bank account, and Kendall Contractors had only just returned to complete the remediation work.
It is that resurfacing work which Mr Gray posted online as a ‘revenge stunt’ in an apparent bid to gain viral clicks.
The footage appears to show a man with a chainsaw tearing into the newly-completed tarmac, set to music. A digger is then seen destroying parts of the driveway.
Mr Gray said he had personally been to the homeowner’s property in north Leeds to apologise with flowers.
He said he could ‘absolutely’ understand her anger and admitted he had ‘100%’ realised the stunt was a ‘daft thing to do’.
‘I went to her house at 9am this morning, just to apologise. But I’m done there now. That’s why I’m at home.
‘Like I say, it’s a lesson learnt, isn’t it? You don’t realise how powerful social media is and that’s a lack of intelligence on my own behalf.
‘So I’ve got to take it on the chin.’
The church-going homeowner had no idea the video existed until being approached by MailOnline.
She said: ‘They’ve posted a video on TikTok suggesting that I’m someone who dodges their bills, so they’ve ripped up my driveway. The truth of it is, they’ve just done it for a laugh.
‘We’ve all watched TV programmes about this kind of thing. But that is not me.
‘That is not the situation whatsoever. The fact is, yes, they were taking up the drive, but they were taking up the drive because it needed repairing.’
She added: ‘They’ve put me in an awful position. People online think I’m someone who doesn’t pay their bills.’
The video has since been deleted, and Kendall Contractors posted a follow-up clip admitting the information was incorrect.
The company said: ‘We would like to clear a few things from our latest TikTok that has now been removed due to it circulating virally.’
This driveway was completed last year, the customer did pay in full. The reason the driveway was taken up due to the gas board completing works on the property and having to dig up a part of the driveway.
‘We were then asked by the customer to go back and rectify what the gas board had done to the new driveway. I have apologised to this customer personally as it has gained some unwanted attention.’
When initially approached by MailOnline, Mr Gray described the video as ‘fake’.
It read: ‘We was relaying it [the driveway] for gas men.’
