Consultants and tree tags - why

[Philip Anderson]

Of course tagging trees costs more, both in time and the materials...£65 per hour sounds alot though!

 

Is £65 an hour a lot compared to an accountant , solicitor or liquidator ,we have been informed by the liquidators of a company that owed us money that an administrator will be charged out at£327 per hour and a senior partner at £600 ,so£65 including travel, professional indemnity insurance which you must have is not out of the way really.

Personally I tag trees on development sites but for roadside safety inspections I get the spray can out !

[DN22 Gardening]

We did a local school recently.

 

When they rang us for a quote there were 40 /50 trees.

The school were to provide tags made by the students so i told them to do 60 or so to be sure they had plenty.

 

They couldn't understand why i was asking for extra money when the total number of trees topped the 100 mark.

there were also a couple of areas we'd designated as 'area of young *******' whatever species they happened to be.

 

We're also starting a large ish (for us) job on monday where a large, established tree company has surveyed the site (approx 80 trees) and not tagged. The location map of the site is on a sheet of A4 and you'd need an Electron Microscope to read it.

The Surveying tree Co. are happy to provide us with a larger scale plan, and its only going to cost us £250 +vat !!!! Very generous of them.

[Parker]

I always tag and where appropriate underscore the tags with orange paint so that they can be seen. Can't understand why you would do a survey and not tag the trees.....seems pointless!

[Goaty]

We did a local school recently.

 

When they rang us for a quote there were 40 /50 trees.

The school were to provide tags made by the students so i told them to do 60 or so to be sure they had plenty.

 

They couldn't understand why i was asking for extra money when the total number of trees topped the 100 mark.

there were also a couple of areas we'd designated as 'area of young *******' whatever species they happened to be.

 

We're also starting a large ish (for us) job on monday where a large, established tree company has surveyed the site (approx 80 trees) and not tagged. The location map of the site is on a sheet of A4 and you'd need an Electron Microscope to read it.

The Surveying tree Co. are happy to provide us with a larger scale plan, and its only going to cost us £250 +vat !!!! Very generous of them.

 

 

Greedy robbing scumbags. That is low IMO:thumbdown: This sort of non proffessionalism needs stamping out.

[treebloke]

I have no interest in how much they charge that is down to them, we are going to site tomorrow in Brum to price a job with approx 100 trees, some are to be felled and some need remedial work and some need nothing, none of the trees have been tagged and the report was done by a company in Southampton.

 

I called and spoke with them today as some of the trees are not even numbered on the drawing supplied, the guy who did the report is on holiday, our client is chasing the quote. This is the third time this year we have been in a similar situation, how do they get away with it.

[treebloke]

Greedy robbing scumbags. That is low IMO:thumbdown: This sort of non proffessionalism needs stamping out.

 

We have been in this situation also, if you can get it on a memory stick or card you may be able to take it to Prontaprint or similar, we have had them printed for around £5, per sheet A1.

[Amelanchier]

...how do they get away with it.

 

They get away with it because no-one goes back to the client and tells them that the survey is flawed. If that happened every time then clients would take action - the product they paid for is not what they thought.

 

Unfortunately, IME contractors generally muddle through and clients are none the wiser.

[PhilBeech]

Exactly Tony. There is plenty of frustration through the whole process.

 

The survey the contractors are acting on May never have been intended as a schedule of works. Many clients won't pay to be hand held through the process either.

[sloth]

That's ludicrous! What use is a tree survey to identify hazardous trees without a means to identify them and work recommendations to lower the risk? Report not fit for purpose, surely? I think I'd be telling the person who paid for the survey to complain.

Not going to comment on prices of others, but if a customer or contractor couldn't use a map I'd provided I'd be sending a larger/clearer map free of charge. It doesn't take a lot!

 

Some tags I see obviously have put on by someone with no history of working! I always avoid/clear a patch of ivy so the tag is visible for a year at least. Don't fix to cut branches that will occlude and pop of the tag after a couple of years. Don't attach to a part of the tree that you recommend for removal. Dont drive the nail home, leave some growing room. It's just common sense!

[Arborist]

Im surveying at the moment.

 

Im not tagging the trees but I mark on a map with a dot and number that has been printed off of auto cad then record the relevant tree info onto a hand held computer.

 

When I go back to the office the dots and numbers are transferred over to the maps on auto cad, I try and be as accurate as possible.

 

Any trees to be felled are marked up with spray paint.

 

I asked about tagging the trees but its not in the contract.