Browse Forums General Discussion 1 Nov 26, 2012 8:49 am I just got the invoice from my electrician. Job was for 40 metres of mains supply n a prepared trench, running cable for power and light in 2 rooms ( 6M x 6.4M bungalow), 9 power points, 6 lights, fan, switches etc. cable only and a switch board, hardware not done yet. labour was $630 + gst, no problem. materials were $1882 +gst !!!!!!!! i am going to try to cost the materials myself. i reckon he has about doubled what he would have paid for the materials. Does anyone know if there a sort of industry standard or guideline for the mark-up on materials? Or how did your electrician charge you for materials? Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 2Nov 26, 2012 10:25 am mark_sorehands Does anyone know if there a sort of industry standard or guideline for the mark-up on materials? You will always pay the top price for materials as the tradie has to spend time sourcing the items and that may involve several trips. Other regular use materials that they carry and store also have a standing cost impost that they need to factor for cost recovery. As tradies are private business owners, they can charge what they like for goods and services and this is why you should always get quotes but as he has arrived at a total for the materials, he should be able to supply you with the costing if asked. Detailed invoices are commonly not supplied due to the time it takes to write them out and most customers are unwilling to pay for that time. 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 3Nov 26, 2012 9:03 pm I did my own costing and it came to less than $600.00 and he can buy it all cheaper than me. THREE times or more than his cost price!! that's what he's asking. i consider that unethical. no wonder tradies have no reputation. i am disgusted and he won't be getting it. Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 4Nov 26, 2012 10:43 pm Unfortunately, private business is not bound by ethics and some operators take advantage of this when the opportunity presents. I would ask him to itemise the invoice before considering my options (V-CAT). 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 5Nov 27, 2012 11:45 am I think he has changed you twice. It first I thought it was $1800 plus GST for both labour and hardware. IF so this would be ok. However he has charged you labour on top of this. SO i would query this. Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 6Nov 28, 2012 8:02 am I don't know how people can say the electrician prices are hiked without knowing what products were installed. I don't think the price is extreme at all. A power board alone can be around 1000 to upgrade or install. I have just done a room a similar size and the lights alone (purchase only) were around 1000. These were not expensive lights and I shopped around for cheap / discount prices. It could easily have been much more. Fans are generally $100-$200- each. Just one LED globe is $20- or more and globes are an extra cost on the fittings. Ask for an itemised account before you go tradie bashing. Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 9Nov 28, 2012 10:23 am B STAR Mate thats expensive. I did a whole house for 7K and thats with 3 X 32amp Circuits and 40 plus downlights. I did supply all the lights though. Are you meaning mine is expensive? Actually it's not. We used good quality LED downlights, dimmable, plus all other lights have LED globes. At the price I paid, 40 dimmable downlights would be around $2500- (supply cost). It depends on what products have been used. A batten with an incandescent globe might be $10-, but 1 decoractive pendant with a few LED globes could be hundreds. It is not fair that tradies get bagged when so little information is provided. And yes, was there an initial estimate or quote? Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 11Nov 28, 2012 12:02 pm One of the problems is that people call out several tradies for quotes that they expect to get for nothing. Itemised quotes take time and multiple quotes means downtime for all but one tradie and that is if the weekend warrior doesn't end up doing the job him/her self. People also pump tradies for free advice on the pretext of needing a quote for work they always intended doing themselves. It all drives costs up. If all quotes were charged for with perhaps a discount for the quote if accepted, everyone would be better off but that will never happen en masse. 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 12Dec 01, 2012 8:12 pm Hello, i can see your frustration, as there are alot of items that make up a total cost, that a client would not take into account, nor ever see. Here are some items that make up a total price for a job that can be overlooked by a client time to source parts materials time to get to the job tradesman insurance apprentice insurance tool insurance cable cable clips switch brackets screws drill bits tool maintanence unifrom wear and tear tradesman licenses actual materials the client will see ( switches, lights etc ) This is just a snapshot of some items that make up a total costs... all of these items are taken into account when quoting and invoicing, these items are sometimes spread across as ' material mark-up ' or can be included in the hourly rate.. there are many other ways businesses charge these items that you will never see. Unfortunately it is not as simple as ... ' i went to bunnings and saw a switch there for 5 dollars, why is my electrician charging me 15 dollars? ' This is exactly the same as when you buy a packet of cereal.. there are many other costs in the 5 or so dollars ( electricity to power the building you are standing in to buy the cereal, wages, insurances, licenses, advertising, the actual cerial etc etc etc ) Im not taking sides here, but i just wanted to enlighten you on electrical costs and why they sometimes seem more than what they should be.. Ask for an itemized invoice... The electrician should be able to provide itemized pricing for each item used and all hidden items to make up the cost... if he/she cannot i would then start asking questions. I would also think twice about holding payment as this can lead to court battles, especially if there are no quotes involved... i guarentee the tradesman will come out ontop. I hope this shed some light, feel free to ask me any q's you may have chris Electrical - Automation - Smart wiring - New homes - Commercial - Data cabling] 1300 050 315 www.cenemelectrical.com.au www.facebook.com/cenemelectrical Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 13May 04, 2014 7:59 pm I really don't think that electricians can charge on top of retail price for items they use. Sure it takes time to source them and costs to store them, but the do get them at wholesale and gst free. How long would it really take you to order a box of powerpoints and cable? With online ordering, one evenings work would do it for most of a years supply. My contention is for ducting .. $68 per metre!!? Wow, I'm going into the plastics business or importing business. $5 per length you can get it for online, delivered! As for insurances and wear and tear on clothing and tools, that what the $85 an hour is for! Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 14May 05, 2014 1:33 am YassJohn I really don't think that electricians can charge on top of retail price for items they use. Oh yes they can! Any business can. YassJohn As for insurances and wear and tear on clothing and tools, that what the $85 an hour is for! Agreed. cenemelectrical threw standing and job material costs together. Some electricians jobs, like other tradies, could have a large labour component. In those instances, either the minor material costs would need to be hugely inflated or the hourly rate increased to cover the standing costs if cenemelectrical was correct...but the basic fact is that you should always get at least three quotes. mark_sorehands (the OP) never answered as to whether he did this but his posts made the likelihood sound doubtful and his bill with GST has ended up being nearly $2,800. 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 15May 05, 2014 10:59 am mark_sorehands I did my own costing and it came to less than $600.00 and he can buy it all cheaper than me. THREE times or more than his cost price!! that's what he's asking. i consider that unethical. no wonder tradies have no reputation. i am disgusted and he won't be getting it. Your costing is probably right, and ridiculous markups (try ons) are not exactly rare either these days. There is no standard on what markup a tradie can charge, however there is a limit, and they cant just go overboard. IT is a tenet of consumer law that ripping people off is unconscionable conduct. Triple the cost of what you can buy it for as a man off the street would fall under that umbrella in my opinion. A trade discount is in the order of 10%,and if they give you a markup of 10%, thats already a 20% markup on what they paid for it. I think once it goes too far beyond that , a court would rule it is unfair predatory behaviour. My suggestion, 1. inform the sparkie that you demand a more appropriate markup ,and if he refuses, you will take it to the Civil Court in your state (approx $100 application fee, reimbursed by the repsondent if you win). 2. If you end up in court, you'll need to take a day off, represent yourself (no lawyer needed) , come with photos of the work done, and proof of what you can buy the materials for yourself. IF you can do that, and their is a big cost discrepancy, its likely the judge will rule in your favour. So a little time and effort involved there, but worthwhile if you're the type who likes to show businesses you wont be walked over. Been there a few times myself, all good fun if you have the stomach for it. Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 17May 05, 2014 11:23 am cenemelectrical Here are some items that make up a total price for a job that can be overlooked by a client time to source parts materials tradesman insurance apprentice insurance tool insurance tool maintanence unifrom wear and tear tradesman licenses I always laugh when these types of excuses come out. Those are your business running costs mate, spread out over all the jobs you do in a year, ending up in a small % charge per job, not a sizeable charge to one client. Anyone who runs a business has to weigh running costs against projected income, and that has nothing to do with this subject. As for materials, you'd have a % you build into each quote for small stuff like screws, drill bits, consumables, etc which your accountant gives you the annual total cost of each year. As for "time to source parts materials", you'd have a regular wholesaler that most likely opens 6:30am and you have a regular parts run you go on, its not like you spend some unknown quantity of time "hunting" things. cenemelectrical I would also think twice about holding payment as this can lead to court battles, especially if there are no quotes involved... i guarentee the tradesman will come out ontop. Its not surprising that you , as an electrician would say that. But you only have to see the judgement lists published by the State Fair Trading Depts or the State Justice Depts, to see that many tradies/businesses regularly have judgements made against them and its possible this sparkie might too. Triple markup on parts is NOT ON I can guarantee you that. Having said all that, the labour quote of $630 seems unusually low to me as I cant see how he would do all that in one day. Maybe I have misunderstood something. Maybe the sparkie accidentally underquoted you the labour and deliberately over quoted the parts to make up for it? Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 18May 07, 2014 3:10 pm Did you get a written quote? I hope so. We have an Electrical Contracting business and do not do domestic work for just this reason. Some people do compare what they think they can do a job for. On 40 degree days they expect our boys to crawl around filthy, insulation filled stinking hot roof for pittance to install a fan. SO no we don't do domestic. We only do quoted Industrial or Commercial jobs or do and charge for selected customers and our mark up on parts is 15%. I believe some charge 40% but isn't that what builders charge? and some are more project managers, so never actually get their hands dirty or even really have to own any tools? Did someone up there^^ say we don't pay GST on supplies? sorry if I miss read that but I can assure you, I know, as I paid it yesterday! As there are thieves and unscrupulous people in all walks of life (and not saying he is)I would ask for an itemized account and no, don't pay it until you get it but really if you did not ask costs there is not much you can do. Labour is only between $65 and $85 per hour for Electrical Contractors - although industry groups that we are members of tell us we should charge up to $115 p h we would have no jobs if we did this! We even know of guys working for $55 per hour. Even in the more specialized fields the rates are nowhere near this - maybe in the FIFO mining jobs? We do not factor in our running costs to each client or for nuts bolts screws etc and nor does anyone we have working for us or that we work for - maybe we all should? Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 19May 07, 2014 9:27 pm I'm keen to understand, if you did not request a quote in writing before engaging him for the job, how can you be now be thinking of with holding payment because you have a different opinion to him on reasonable costs? Isn't that the nature of ANY purchase we make - we agree/understand the price before we purchase and we then make the reasonable/affordable decision at that point - not after we have consumed...? Re: Electrician's materials costs to you. How much mark-up? 20May 07, 2014 10:10 pm Builders markup 40% you must joking- Maybe the big builders screw their suppliers down,but for the most, what I charge for materials is what I can get them for,to keep my price low so as I might win the job.If I don't the next fellow will beat my price. Unlike plumbers and electricians,Joe Blow the pastry cook can go to bunnings and buy a stick of timber for the same price as me,and the clients aren't dumb, they know how much 300m of merbau decking costs. If I walk into a plumbing or electrical store and try to buy some plumbing fittings,or god forgive a couple of GPO's,not only am I made to feel like a schoolboy who has been caught in the girls change room,but am slugged top dollar for having the gall to enter their domain,and it is just accepted practice that plumbers and electricians can make a cop on their materials,because we the public, can't readily acquire those items. So not only do they buy their materials at a hugely discounted price,they charge retail and then put their margin on top!,and look at you strange if you question their material bill. Always get multiple quotes, no matter how reasonable/cheap you think it is. I remember getting a few quotes for a pool fence, roughly around the same price, thinking the… 5 9873 I have a Nectre Mk2 wood fire recently installed, the flue rises approx 700mm before entering an existing brick chimney via a 45 degree elbow with approx 400mm connection… 0 845 0 1479 |