Just had someone on facebook asking if I will go and look at a leak
They have called some else who wants £150 and thats way too much. I said can come tuesday.
I had a call out today.
Heating not working.
I work just whenever, if people need heat or have other important jobs.
I even worked on Christmas Day, briefly.
Money is a joke though
Depends if I've had a tipple or not and If I'm doing nowt else. Unless it is a good loyal customer who uses me over & over again then I make the effort. out of hrs call out week days £80. Saturdays call out £100. Sunday call out £120. Bank Holidays £150 for me to turn up.
I find people often won't be expecting to have to pay the above amounts even in their wildest imaginations and so all you get is a shocked and offended person on the end of the phone (and you quickly discover just how urgent most of these jobs are when they are promptly booked in for the next working day.)
Most people are lucky enough to go decades without having to call a plumber out at 9pm on a bank holiday and so have no clue what the current charge could be. I find customers loitering over you in a mood is off-putting enough so have no wish to add in an air of resentment from someone who thinks you are robbing them blind. I can do without it. So I either don't work out of standard hours or - if I do - I barely increase the amount at all. So a £50 job becomes £75, something like that.
In fact I changed a tap valve for a old cantackerous fart a few bank hols ago (on the bank hol monday) 30 mins after being called and charged him £75. He was very upset at the cost (I am in SE England, not Afghanistan btw) and even reminded me of it today when I went round to look at something else. Would love to see his face if he called one of you lot