Greedy tradesmen (or women!)

[LolalovesLondon]

Is it just me or are some people taking the piss at the moment? Everyone I contact is booked up for weeks so it’s not lack of work I don’t think...
Had a quote last week to get a gas oven installed - straight swop, no new pipes or alterations, cooker is the same as we have now just a newer model.
£195 installation only.
Is that normal nowadays? 🤔

If you have contacted a number of tradespeople and they are all charging roughly the same figure, then that is clearly the going rate. Why do you think that they should do it below market rates? And if they are busy, others are clearly willing to pay it. Maybe your expectations are too low, rather than theirs too high?

Where do you get the idea that I got numerous similar quotes?

I got two quotes. One for £195 and one for £69.

The issue I have with it all is that the price is no guarantee of a quality job. In fact I've learned now that whatever you pay, it will always be a bit of a bodge up. I had some decorating done 'professionally' as part of an insurance claim. All the woodwork has brush lines and paint runs in it, and the cutting in is shocking. I could do a better job and I'm shit at painting!

We had some works done in our garden during the summer. I'd had 3 quotes for it last year for £2500-3500, however for various reasons I didn't get the work done. The cheapest co had gone out of business this year, so I started the process again.

Got 5 more quotes. They ranged from 3500-5500. All said it was 'a weeks work for their team'.

Ended up finding someone to do the job for £2300. He and his mate completed it in 2 days. Was it a 'bob-on' job? Not really. There are some bits that are a bit rough, but would I have got anything much better if I'd paid 1-3k more? I highly doubt it! I think the difference was the guy I used is a jobbing builder living in a cottage driving a battered old open backed truck. Whereas the other guys live in the 700k houses round here, with a load of signwritten vans etc. In the higher quotes I'm paying at least in part for their massive overheads...

I love the phrase information asymmetry!

It would be good to know what things cost. As a going rate I assume minimum £150 a day for trades (or say £100 for half day) plus parts. I'm in the outskirts of London. Whereas friends in the Northwest can find excellent tradespeople for £50-60 a day. One had their whole 3 bed house redecorated beautifully for £500 plus paint. Round here you'd be lucky to get 1 room done for that!

NoIdont
I’ve hit a nerve by starting this thread.
I know the first bloke was chancing it with his £195 quote.
I suppose those who work in a trade or have DPs that do don’t want to admit that there are chancers in their line of work. Some of the replies on here are overly defensive.
Can’t think why...

gren
Definitely at least £150-200 p/d labour here. One person.

Which is reasonable I think!

There is a sue called price your job which gives a rough estimate for most trade jobs. It is not 100% as it doesn’t allow for regional differences but it does give you a starting point.
From a straight swap fitting a gas cooker it gives a price guide of £75-£100 with a time estimate of 1 to 2 hours
www.priceyourjob.co.uk/install-gas-cooker-cost/
So the second guy is probably a bit on the low side but the first one is more than a bit on the high side. You got lucky as the second one had a free afternoon and was happy with a quick job which was local for him. The first was chancing his arm a bit but probably was just giving you his half day rate regardless of the amount of work he had to do.

@LolalovesLondon

Tappering Just to add, if materials were included in the £400 ‘day rate’ as you seem to think - how do you think that works? One customer wants a composite worktop and another wants marble... The day rate is labour only.

@LolalovesLondon I know that thanks. But that day rate has to cover all insurance, tax, tools and sub-contracting costs. It's not £400 straight profit.

Tappering

If you ‘know that’ already why was most of your post about the price and availability of materials?

Clearly materials, insurance, additional labourers, accountants fees, tax costs etc., are all free. Raw materials cost money and they fluctuate. During lockdown there was a real shortage of fencing, gravel boards and posts because so many people were having garden work done - the price went up. According to the FMB, the price of a brick went up 9% between 2017-2018. But yes a £400 day rate is clearly all cash straight in your pocket!!

Re-iterating what other people have said really - but my OH is a tradesman and we have a ‘cost of business’ analysis which factors all aspects of running the business, annualises those costs, then brings that back down to a daily cost (insurance/registrations/accountancy/utilities etc .. that’s not an exhaustive list, and doesn’t include materials) and it costs him £50 a day just to be in business. So using the cost you were quoted, if that person was a similarly controlled tradesperson with all the necessary registrations and insurances in place (bearing in mind they need the qualifications and skills necessary as they are installing something that could kill you if not installed safely) - do you really think a skilled professional person should earn less than £150 a day? I am speaking from the perspective of the South East here, which I know may be more expensive than other parts of the country. The reality is that just because it may take less than a day to do - that is a ‘day’ of their work as in most cases they won’t have another job to do that day once you factor in travel time to get to another job. You’re paying for a day of their time.
As other people have said - you do have to pay for something you can’t do yourself!

Also why shouldn’t tradespeople earn enough to have a ‘big house’. A bit classist to suggest that as its perceived they’re not ‘educated’ in the same way as white collar professionals that their hard work should be less deserving of financial reward! Good for them!

@SchrodingersImmigrant I don’t want to see the state of your wiring if your lawyer did it!

That’s really interesting Whiskey and explains costs clearly.
I agree that £140/50 is an acceptable day rate for a skilled tradesman.
It also explains why smaller jobs are unpopular unless you are very local.

Fortunately I managed to get someone yesterday who was willing to charge for a short job and who lived round the corner.
Also fortunately, there are tradesmen willing to tag such jobs into the end of a day or squeeze them in amongst bigger jobs.

Personally I couldn't care less what size house someone lives in, unless they're jacking up the price of a job in order to fund that big house, liveried van and all the latest tools etc, in which case I'll go with a more realistic quote.

@LolalovesLondon

That’s really interesting Whiskey and explains costs clearly. I agree that £140/50 is an acceptable day rate for a skilled tradesman. It also explains why smaller jobs are unpopular unless you are very local.

Fortunately I managed to get someone yesterday who was willing to charge for a short job and who lived round the corner.
Also fortunately, there are tradesmen willing to tag such jobs into the end of a day or squeeze them in amongst bigger jobs.

150 quid a day is a shit day rate, may as well be employed and not have the hassle.

@R1R2 ... I agree! Particularly when you factor in the lack of sick pay, holiday pay, pension and raft of other benefits employed people take for granted!
And why shouldn’t a tradesperson have a liveried van - it’s the most effective way of advertising. And tools are used day in and day out and wear out and need to be replaced and calibrated to ensure they’re effective (and in the case of electrical tools, safe).
@LolalovesLondon - that worked out perfectly, and most tradespeople would happily do that if by chance they can easily fit it into their day, they’re passing, it’s very local etc - but certainly should be considered as a financially viable BAU operating model.
If a hairdresser charges £25 (and that’s cheap in SE) per haircut and manages 6-7 cuts a day - why is a skilled tradesperson charging slightly more than this for a days work surprising to people?

And by the way the regulatory role I work in, I can assure you my OH does NOT do cash work, and not do a lot of trades.

That sounds about right to me. You are paying for experience and expertise. I was once quoted £100 to spur a switch which would have been ok had the sparky been experienced but he was not

Arguably those who are the most competitive don't need to advertise :)

As you seem to have a bee in your bonnet about anyone querying the cost of works Whiskey, how would you justify the example I gave? Where a reasonable job was done (in 2 days) for under £2,500, yet all other quotes I got were between £1-3,000 more? To clarify, the higher quotes were doing exactly the same job, no fancy extras, etc.

Without knowing the details of the work you had done (I can’t remember if you specified in your message earlier and will take me ages to scroll back) I would say that either (a) given ALL the other quotes were so much more you were very fortunate to get the price you did, or (b) none of the others actually wanted to do the work!
I’m not saying that prices can never be queried and that no tradesperson ever comes back with an unreasonable price ... just that the example given of £195, given the costs involved that I explained, was not unreasonable

And yes, I would say that the majority of work dies cone through recommendation and word of mouth, but the vast majority of reputable businesses still establish a market presence through visibility, and without a physical ‘shop front’ - a sign written vehicle is probably the most effective way of doing that

@LolalovesLondon

Tappering

If you ‘know that’ already why was most of your post about the price and availability of materials?

Clearly materials, insurance, additional labourers, accountants fees, tax costs etc., are all free. Raw materials cost money and they fluctuate. During lockdown there was a real shortage of fencing, gravel boards and posts because so many people were having garden work done - the price went up. According to the FMB, the price of a brick went up 9% between 2017-2018. But yes a £400 day rate is clearly all cash straight in your pocket!!

Because I was responding to a previous poster in the same paragraph who seemed to think that every penny of what a trades person invoices, is pure profit.

Anyway, I'll leave you to it. Best of luck finding someone reasonably priced to do the work you want. If you haven't already tried and are a member of a local town/village/community Facebook page, then that tends to be a good place for recommendations.

Fair enough - I don't think I specified the work, but it was replacing a large area of decking, including materials.

There may have been some variation in cost of materials but realistically I think that only accounts for about £500 of the difference.

Possibly it was that they didn't want the job - or maybe thought it was going to take longer than it did so built some fat in, or a combination of all of that.

Some years ago we got builders in to quote for an extension (our neighbour had the same work done several years previously and paid £60k, so we were anticipating quotes of £70-80k).

We got one of £30k, and 2 others of £180k and £200k (for comparison, more than we'd paid for our house ). We took the view the £30k guy probably hadn't read the plans, and the other 2 definitely didn't want the work.

Tappering

RTFT. The oven has been connected.

I know loads of trades people, they are in very short supply and can pick an choose the jobs they do, based on how much profit they can make.

Many also claimed £10k for business premises ie storage units, but carried on trading through lockdown as they were allowed too.

They tell me that one reason they are in such short supply is that many EU trades have gone home after the Brexit vote, probably why so many voted for it!

I’m not sure what area you are in but it’s about £70 in Lancashire to do that.