My experience nearly same, except i allowed him to con't, but he did a not so good job intentionally/unintentionally i duno. So i think u did it right, boot out unreliable kontraktor who won't listen to the BOSS & get someone who pleases the customer & not worry whether he will sabotage the property.

Contractor just fall into rough ppl categories and not necessarily gangster. Gangster nowadays also very smart, not just fight but money come into their mind first.

For worst, u just paid them as equal to their job done, I believe that is fair enough. If they have no rugi, they should leave.

2 bad experiences. Settled by acting firm and compromising a bit - 'OK, you just do this last thing properly, I am going to pay you this much less - then don't want to see you again'. Normally they will follow. Also want to cari makan what.

The lesson I learn from 3 times doing renovation - never give whole package at one go to one contractor. And never pay everything upfront (this should be common sense, but my colleague still did this a while ago b'cos contractor was relative. Cabut also in the end...)

Break up the package and do things bit by bit. It cost a bit more, need more time and more monitoring. But less heartache.
my last reno was to redo front proch, inside staircase and backyard extend.
Told the contractor phase 1 porch - if OK will also give him 2nd job. Then if still happy - will give him last job.
Happy with the results although paid 5% more.

Contractors normally go 'bad' halfway thru, after collecting more than 70%, because they want to move on to next job to make more money.

Personally, I wouldn't give in to the demand of the contractor. I had a case where the contractor was supposed to do up three floors of buildings for me. The schedule payment follows and suddenly there is a price increase in material (prior to Beijing 2008) they demand extra. They are already late in delivery and if they had delivered earlier according to schedule, then they would have made enough to cover the price increase. They went on strike and I got another group in to finish up the work for a renegotiated price. I don't mind paying extra but will not pay for people's faults and problems.

It is very furious if we need to pay extra money to cover/repair their SHIT (bad workmanship).....