It is always best not to look too closely at construction! I've discovered that every tradie seems to have the same way of solving problems: "do the first thing I can think of". Sometimes it is fine, other times not. Our stone benchtop is being fitted tomorrow and I'm going to *try* not to look underneath!! Sorry, no actual advice...

I found this article when I was looking at benchtop material for a family member Porcelain sheets are the way forward, non staining and of no danger to the craftsman/maker Porcelain is more expensive than Quartz (both in raw material and in installation costs), but then so is marble. I am using a lot of Neolith in my house, so I shopped around to find a stone cutter who was crafty with maximising the use of each sheet of Neolith (to avoid wastage and minimise the number of sheets needed). It made a huge difference. My house was also designed around the sheet size - Neolith sheets are 3.2 metres long (so you can have a 3.2 metre benchtop or island without needing a join). You need to use 12mm (or thicker) sheets for benchtops. (Splashbacks and showers use 6mm thick porcelain sheets - Neolith does 2 different matching sheets for each marble design, so you can bookmark and pattern match the splashback). Also be aware that the marble pattern is only printed on the top of all of the brands of porcelain. If you want to continue the pattern on the “lips” of your benches, this needs to be a beveled edge (which you also need to do with quartz or marble if you want any thickness of “lip” to your benchtop). So you also have to factor in the stone cuts needed to create the benchtop “lips” when calculating sheet cutting and usage. I am not having edging on my benchtops and am instead going for the slim European look of “floating” benchtops. I am not worried that the 1.2 cm edge all the way around the benches will be plain white.

We got an engineered stone resurfacing in marble for our bench and splashback. Looks amazing. We went with Granite Transformations in Taren Point (Sydney), very happy with their customer service and speed of installation. We changed our sink and that could be easily done with the benchtop overlay. You could get rid of the ugly bullnose and get a straight edge too. They also do stone, which is a bit cheaper, but marble looks so good. Granite Transformations Sydney South

When anything goes wrong it’s what is written on the paper that prevails. If the quotation you accepted says drop in and that is the supporting document then you’re out of luck. A total redo would be at your cost. You may be able to negotiate that they do it at a discount out of goodwill.