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Pricing jobs

  • Thread starter Thread starter sengaul
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sengaul

hi all,

I was wandering if anyone could offer some advice on how to go about pricing jobs?

I understand it depends a lot of factors i.e. the area you work in, prices of competition, but i don't know which jobs should have a 'fixed price' so to speak like changinga TRV, installing a shower cubicle, installing water filters etc. I have researched a bit for prices in the area but still a bit uncertain on how to go about it.

Any ideas or advice will be greatly apreciated.

Thanks.
 
Hi. Its what the market will stand. Price a few, if you get the work and are happy that's the right price. Good Luck
 
In my experience, hardly any plumbing jobs will be a fixed price.

There are too many differing factors involved, from time taken travelling to and from the job, parking, space to work in, time of day and all these are before you've even got your spanner out.

Take a simple task - changing a WC inlet valve. This could take 15 minutes from opening the van door to closing it again, having been paid.

But what about next door? Their WC doesn't have a service valve or it doesn't close properly when you try shutting it so you need to turn the water off. No water storage so it is supplied from the mains.

The stop tap isn't under the kitchen sink and the customer looks blank when he says the water's never been turned off. Then the customer remembers there's a tap in the next room behind a cupboard.

But the cupboard is packed to the gills with a few bottles and egg boxes for recycling, spare washing up liquid, clothes pegs, cat food tins, a dead mouse, some curtain rings, a couple of childrens toys, a "Good grief, I've not seen one of those for years!", etc, etc.

So you find the tap in the corner where the person who installed the cupboard has left you space to get in two fingers and a thumb to turn the tap off.

And it's stuck.

And your spanner won't fit in the small space to help with leverage.

Back to your van to look for a small saw to make the hole bigger.

And this has taken half an hour, just to get to this stage and you've not even lifted the lid off the WC's cistern yet!!

Another (true) example is I drained a heating system in a house (twice as it happened). The first time took me 3 1/2 hours and the second took me 3 hours. I learned that a plumber in the next door property also took this time to drain their system. And yet in bigger houses it can only take 20 minutes or so.

Experience will tell you how to price jobs.
 
I totally agree with I dontknowitall I had same prob when I started my own business 2 yrs ago. It has got to come down to experience. Dont feel guilty about charges you make as long as they can be justified.
 
pricing jobs can be a bit of a nightmare. you think this job will take 2 hours and before you know it yove been there 4 hours
 
Agree with above posts.
For larger jobs (install heating system, install bathroom etc) You can estimate how many days easily enough. But on smaller jobs that take hours not days can be pretty impossible until your start to know how long it will take.
If you are not sure, charge by the hour and let them know how long it would usually take before hand but make them aware there are many unforseeble circumstances which could make it take longer.
What many do for fixed price jobs is charge slightly more than what the average would take, if it takes longer you take a hit if it doesnt you are up, on average if you get enough jobs you are up.
 
dontknowitall said:
Another (true) example is I drained a heating system in a house (twice as it happened). The first time took me 3 1/2 hours and the second took me 3 hours. I learned that a plumber in the next door property also took this time to drain their system. And yet in bigger houses it can only take 20 minutes or so.

Experience will tell you how to price jobs.
Click to expand...

House or a Hotel?

Did you open the vent on highest rads?

Never had anything drain that long.
 
I totally agree with CarlH these prices seem to be on the side of the customer
 
Mario - vent the highest rads? Yup - all of them!! And used a wet vacuum to try and speed the process up.

It was the layout of the pipes and filling the system took ages as well. From what I could make out there seemed to be a couple of 15mm pipes up from the boiler and as soon as they reached the ceiling everything was supplied in 10mm.

Drained a few houses now and most seem to take 20-30 minutes.

Just looked at those prices - £150 to repair a ballcock? I only usually charge £40 including call out and materials.

And then there's a shower tray fitted and plumbed in at £50. That's at least £100 for me depending on the room, space, what's to come out, how easy it is to get a new one in, etc

Where do these people come from?
 
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Disney world maybe ! Seems to go from one extreme to another. I think there prices should be more consistant.
 
EXACTLLY what i was thinking d.n.it.all,
thought i was under charging for ball cock at £50in. £150/ i wish, 4 a week and stay at home for the rest.
some of the prices are spot on, some way of, but you could use this as a basis on how much to charge with common sense i suppose.
 
Hi. For those of you that play football for the local pub team on a Sunday. Have you ever wondered why they don't pay you £50000 a week like the premier league players?
The building trade is the same albeit at a reduced reduced pay. There are a few self employed plumber earning a couple of grand a week and many more earning less but charging more. What do you think your worth is at this stage of you development? Too many chances base it on the fact they have a £1200 pound a month mortgage the wife needs a nice car etc. As you progress you learn of quicker ways to doing things and get better at identifying risk. Why not price at half days instead of hours?
say £80-00 . If you get embarrassed because it only took an hour, discount it to the client or ask if there is any thing else they would like you to look at while your there. Once youve got some time in doing this you will find it a lot easier pricing and earning descent money. Good Luck
 
Coincidentally, I too have started estimating by the half day/full day instead of "hopefully a couple of hours or so". I get whacked out doing three 1½ hour jobs in a day and earning £40 for each while spending around another 3 hours driving from one to the next and back home again.
 
Good Policy JustLead 1

The problem is many seem to look at the Plumbing/heating/gas market as a means of making as much cash as possible. So reasonable pricing goes out the window and seems to be replaced with "Get as much as you can, for as little as possible".

Now when you have got customers over a barrel, because of things like GasSafe registration you can get away with it, the customer has no alternative.

So its no use moaning about "bankers bonuses" if we would do the same ourselves.

The problem is, if something else eventually comes in to replace gas registration, and makes for more competition, then those companies who had been accustomed to making heaps of cash off a few jobs, will find they are up against it and heading for bankruptcy.

How many times has it happened in British industry?

We ain't got a volume Brit car industry, but still make a million volume cars a year?

Why?

The Germans, Japanese and French took them over and invested money in them as well as keeping running costs down. They also sell them at a good price. Perhaps not shed loads of profit on each car, but lots of profit on volume.

I know for small companies costs have to be covered, but does it include two jags, helicopter and the like?

What are your real a costs, how much do you want to make and what is fair to the customer?

Lets be reasonable, consider the customer.

🙂 🙂

I'll just put my tin hat on, for the fall out from the bankers! 🙂 🙂
 
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Yeah, well said! All Bankers should be executed in public, then set on fire!
along with those thiefing politicians.😀
 
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