Did I pay too much to get my fascia boards repainted?

[lljkk]

They were flaking badly, looked awful. Lots of faschia boards and part of the porch.
One man clamboured up and down on ladders in this heat, scrapped and sanded down, primed the bare wood and glossed over. They look nice now.

Only took him 10 hours of work, though, and I paid him £385 for the privilege.
£38.50 an hour gross... is that excessive?
He wanted most of it in cash, too which I don't feel comfortable about if he's dodging the tax man (but I didn't want to start a dispute about it, either).

I think that's ok - off the top of my head I would have expected to pay up to £500 for a full house. don't worry about the cash thing now - yes he probably is dodging tax but he would doubtless have charged you more if you'd insisted on a cheque!

Sounds ok - I paid £180 for front only.

Well it sounds a lot to me on the basis that it took 10 hours, we have just had our front door and wooden door to the garage painted and quite a lot of woodwork around the door and gutterings also painted for less than that amount - took 2 days, although the decorator did it as 1 full day and 2 half days because of drying times. Did you agree a price beforehand? However, I suppose the main thing is that it's done and presumably looks great!

Thing is 38.50 an hour les tax, NI, transport, wear and tear on equipment etc etc isn't all that much really - the guy does need to live off it after all. However what we don't know is whether tax etc will be coming off that or not

Sounds cheap to me, I have just had an estimate for £2000 and £4000 if I want to replace them!! told him to get lost and that was all I had to live on for the rest of the year!

Doesn't it work out as about 34k/annum after costs but before NI/tax/pension? Quite a good salary, methinks, so far out of London / home Counties!

We were led to expect quotes in excess of £1k, so it seemed pretty fair price. He was quite professional about it.

sounds v reasonable to me. Presume that included materials?

Yeah, included the lot. I have no head for heights and DH hates painting, so we had to get someone in.