Browse Forums General Discussion Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 21Aug 26, 2009 9:58 pm Lesson learned, ask for price first..... Life's too short too drink bad wine Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 22Aug 26, 2009 10:53 pm Daryl Been around for a while and a fair and reasonable charge for a plumber is $90 call fee which covers labour for 1 hour. Parts on top of this of course. For emergencies i have no idea but i would imagine $135 call and this covers 1 hour would be fair. That guy who said 3 hours charge for a call out has to be joking or is bankrupt lol. Daryl. No not joking or bankrupt, in fact quite the opposite, company is growing at a rate of about 200% every year over the last 6 years. I was simply putting forward a possible explanation, based on my experience in managing 20 odd tradies and the costs that are involved in doing so. I should have mentioned that i am in commercial signage and building maintenance and things are quite different to domestic plumbing. Majority of our work is project work and we are set up to cater for interstate clients so the paperwork involved in scheduling works, raising jobs, invoicing etc is quite a bit more extensive than a diary entry and a carbon copy handed over at the end of a job in exchange for cash. Still, i dont think i would find it outrageous that a qualified tradesman who came to my house within the hour and fixed something, charged me $200 odd bucks. But, in the same breath, i guess thats why i do it all myself. Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 23Aug 27, 2009 2:33 am Carmel Yep, I have learned my lesson about asking about prices upfront. I should have known better. It seems so obvious in hindsight. I can still feel uncomfortable when asking what someone's fee will be - it is almost as if I am saying that the person might otherwise charge too much - but I've learned that it has to be done or we are allowing the person working for us to charge what they like. But this might just be my anglosaxon background, as I can be uncomfortable telling someone what my own fee is. (Except when I don't want to do some work on offer and purposely set the fee high enough so that they ask someone else to do it, or I resent the work less if they continue with asking me to do the work. I'm much more relaxed when trying to price myself out of a job than when I'm trying to be reasonable. Human nature is funny.) In a former area of work, biomedical research, one of my colleagues, a scientist with a much longer background in working with medical staff than I had, said that before he would undergo a surgical procedure, he would have no hesitation in asking the surgeon how many times that they had performed the procedure and what success rate they enjoyed. How many of us would even think to ask this, let alone be prepared to do so? I sometimes have to explain to people that I have to drive for close to two hours in order to spend fifteen minutes with them, and that I have to charge for this time as I would otherwise be doing productive work instead of driving. Under these circumstances, a charge for a three hour call is only slightly unreasonable. Pfiff Finally making progress again, with a clothesline (yippee) and some much needed little things being attended to over the holidays. 40 C on New Year's eve? We love our a/c! Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 24Aug 27, 2009 9:28 am wake_me I see this as pretty standard rates for a call out job for a one off client. We charge $60 / hr for our qualified tradies ($65 for sparkies) and we have a 3 hour minimum. 3 x $60 = $180 1 x $25 part + 15% mark up = $28.75 Total $208.75 + GST ($229.60 incl GST) I have heard of plumbers charging $75 an hour so it could have been a lot worse. To put your mind at ease ring a few more companies and enquire about their rates. I think its ridiculous to insist on a 3 hour minimum. Most jobs would not take anywhere near 3 hours. I'll definitely be double checking this before I call anyone out. Edit: Read you said you did mainly PROJECT work but realise this is not the type of work the OP was mentioning. For a project yes 3 hours seems reasonable but for the type of work the OP mentions it is not. Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 25Aug 27, 2009 11:00 am wake_me Daryl Been around for a while and a fair and reasonable charge for a plumber is $90 call fee which covers labour for 1 hour. Parts on top of this of course. For emergencies i have no idea but i would imagine $135 call and this covers 1 hour would be fair. That guy who said 3 hours charge for a call out has to be joking or is bankrupt lol. Daryl. No not joking or bankrupt, in fact quite the opposite, company is growing at a rate of about 200% every year over the last 6 years. I was simply putting forward a possible explanation, based on my experience in managing 20 odd tradies and the costs that are involved in doing so. I should have mentioned that i am in commercial signage and building maintenance and things are quite different to domestic plumbing. Majority of our work is project work and we are set up to cater for interstate clients so the paperwork involved in scheduling works, raising jobs, invoicing etc is quite a bit more extensive than a diary entry and a carbon copy handed over at the end of a job in exchange for cash. Still, i dont think i would find it outrageous that a qualified tradesman who came to my house within the hour and fixed something, charged me $200 odd bucks. But, in the same breath, i guess thats why i do it all myself. Sorry if i pushed a few buttons there and i'm glad to here someone is doing well. I still say that a callout costs around $100 and covers around an hour labour. This is my exp so this is all i can post. I think you have long out grown the house hold side of plumbing. She did say it was a "non emergency" One thing doesn't sound right tho and that is everytime i have phoned for ANY trade i have been given costs over the phone before agreeing to go ahead, i haven't had to ask for the price, it is a standard practice (i thought) Daryl Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 26Aug 28, 2009 3:44 pm i dunno if this helps or not. This was a while ago so my memory is a bit **. i paid about $200ish for the plumber to replace a tap. It was broken and keep gushing out water in the wee hour of morning (try 5AM). I turned off the water to the house but it didn't stop the water from pouring like mad... by 7-8AM the plumber came by... on a SUNDAY. It took him maybe about half an hour or so to fix... didnt stay for too long. i sure as hell don't know how to change a broken kitchen sink tap... men you might think this is easy but since there were only clueless women at home at that time, we have no idea whatsoever. i wouldn't say i wish i could have been charged cheaper but i guess i was expecting that much in fees... Emergency repair = will always be expensive Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 27Aug 29, 2009 10:23 pm I think that electricians skills and experience are a little undervalued in this case. Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 29Aug 30, 2009 11:28 pm Vascariz I think its ridiculous to insist on a 3 hour minimum. Most jobs would not take anywhere near 3 hours. I'll definitely be double checking this before I call anyone out. The job doesn't take three hours, but do you expect the tradesperson to pay for the transport to and from the job themselves? If $60 per hour needs to be charged to ensure a reasonable income, why would you bother going to a 15 minute job (= $15)? If it takes half-an-hour to travel there, so an hour travel time all up, plus the cost of petrol, wear and tear on the car etc, you would actually be losing money. There has to be some way of charging for shorter jobs to cover these costs, whilst not pricing yourself too highly for longer jobs. Charging a minimum call is quite common in life - studio musicians work with a minimum three hour call, for example. Even if you are only needed for a few bars of music in a recording, the pay has to make the trip in and the waiting around worthwhile. Pfiff Finally making progress again, with a clothesline (yippee) and some much needed little things being attended to over the holidays. 40 C on New Year's eve? We love our a/c! Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 30Aug 31, 2009 10:44 am I smell a defamation lawsuit coming! Post pics of invoice or it never happened Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 31Aug 31, 2009 7:11 pm We all have been through the situation of paying for something, or someone, that has cost us more than we anticipated. I have paid $200 for a plumber before for a bloke to come out on a Sunday morning to unclog a sewer pipe which took all of 10 mins (including a chat). No I wasn't really impressed with paying it, but thats the price you pay for attending a job on a Sunday, and as having my own business myself personal time is very valuable. A lot of businesses have a minmum fee- it covers the travel/setting up time etc over staying at another job all day where more work can be accomplished. If they charged the normal rate or the time they were there for they would go broke pretty fast. Bobcat's usually have a 4hr minimum at around $75-85/hr, concrete pumps have a 3hr, with the rising costs of running a business they need to cover these Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 32Aug 31, 2009 8:40 pm Not to go off the topic, but when I saw the title of the thread : Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME I thought I had better do my Mod duty and check it out as I thought it might be of the PINUP type, male nice to look at type, (for the girls of course). bugger. What a dissapointment. www.themaxbuild.blogspot.com forum.homeone.com.au/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=20717&start=300 www.leahspaperpassion.blogspot.com Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 33Aug 31, 2009 8:44 pm themax Not to go off the topic, but when I saw the title of the thread : Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME I thought I had better do my Mod duty and check it out as I thought it might be of the PINUP type, male nice to look at type, (for the girls of course). bugger. What a dissapointment. Also off topic : Our plumber is 84 ( I kid you not!!) Got a bit of a shock when I went downstairs to check him out on the first day !!! Great plumber so far though!! MagicJ I finally have my own reno thread: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=28335 The reason a dog has so many friends is that he wags his tail instead of his tongue! Re: Check Out My Plumber, He's AWESOME 36Aug 31, 2009 9:29 pm Wow!!! Is THAT guy your plumber ? - maybe you would not mind being charged $200, if so!!! MagicJ I finally have my own reno thread: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=28335 The reason a dog has so many friends is that he wags his tail instead of his tongue! Re: Check Out My Plumber **Photo for you THEMAX!** 40Sep 01, 2009 12:42 am So this plumber looked like... Ask yourself if the insurance company will be aware of the Reno. 4 7355 i would suggest nothing is unreasonable for PCI. we did all sorts, including checking the hot water, checking all the GPO's had power, testing that the showers were… 9 98621 4 14255 |