Are we all rubbish?

[Matthew Storrs]

But in the same sense so often several small jobs in a day can turn out to be far more profitable then 1 day job.

[jnoon]

Edit.. This is a response to post 30. Things have moved on as I write.

 

 

Thats my point, you don't get £500 per day every day..

 

 

You get 350 one day and 750 another, forget about a day rate, learn to know when you can charge the good money and when to go cheap.

When its "your job" here's how to price it:

Look at the job carefully taking into account the timber and chip and how much of it there is, more than one load?, assuming there isn't look at the hours that it will take you to do the job, not rushing like a headless chicken but working at an easy friday kind of pace, you need to think of your £500 daily target and divide by 8, so you want £60 per hour, then you need a minimum call out of 2 hours... £120...

Now, £120 for the first hour + 7 hours at £60 makes you £560 for the day, too much perhaps? so charge £120 for the first hour and £50 per hour thereafter.

 

I suspect you have got into the bad habit of just slapping your 360 day rate on most jobs, some will be easy and you will feel that you have done well some will be hard and you will really earn it. With my system you will earn less on some jobs but way more on others, and its a fairer system of pricing for the client too. You will get days where you can string 3 little £250 jobs together and these will be your £750 days.

 

Try the above system and stick with it for a month at least, let us know if it works.

 

So how do you give the customer a price if you have it on the clock if you get what I mean, mines just a day rate, some days we fit more in but it's priced mainly so I price it fairly and we work steady,

That way everyone knows were they stand including the customer

[Scott Walker]

We only charge day rate when we have too eg working for large estates on rd side work etc. Most of our work is prised and you make far more money this way I think, take mondays job reduce row of conifer trees £350 and we was on to the nxt job by half 11. im not a fan of working day rate.

[Ty Korrigan]

Hmmmn,

£360 inc vat is 420euros ttc.

One climber and a 16 year old work experience boy turned that over today for 2 pops whilst the other team of one man and a grinder did much the same on 9 stumps.

 

You guys are on short rations all right.

[jnoon]

But in the same sense so often several small jobs in a day can turn out to be far more profitable then 1 day job.

 

My point exactly , espicially if you can get a load or two of logs in a week,

Take last Friday for example,

We finished early,

£360

Had a £40 job to do on wAy home

Two loads if logs £220

My only expense was ground and fuel say £100

So I make around £500 that day that's how it goes I suppose I must be doing something right to own the kit I've got outright

[Wood wasp]

Where did the the £130 figure for self employed Sparkies come from? I left school 22 years ago and the 714s as they were then were on £100 a day. A self employed sparky will now be looking for £300 per day minimum and as someone said - all parts to complete job are sold with markup.

[Matthew Storrs]

My point exactly , espicially if you can get a load or two of logs in a week,

Take last Friday for example,

We finished early,

£360

Had a £40 job to do on wAy home

Two loads if logs £220

My only expense was ground and fuel say £100

So I make around £500 that day that's how it goes I suppose I must be doing something right to own the kit I've got outright

 

I used to think the same, must be doing something right, I have 50k worth of machinery BUT as mark Bolam said, its dividing between personal and business expenses, in my case a lot of my machinery was paid for by me , not by my business. I know that makes no sense at all to the more business savvy amongst you!

[Mark Bolam]

My mates who are sparks have bigger houses than me, but I have a better body.

[jnoon]

I used to think the same, must be doing something right, I have 50k worth of machinery BUT as mark Bolam said, its dividing between personal and business expenses, in my case a lot of my machinery was paid for by me , not by my business. I know that makes no sense at all to the more business savvy amongst you!

 

I've worked hard saved even harder and bought my truck, chipper, splitter , quad , trailers , kit etc etc all outright without borrowing a penny,

I guess it's the way I've been brought up

Doing it my way if I do get or have a slack month in not tied into owing people money for kit I don't own, chipper or truck finances etc

[kevinjohnsonmbe]

It always seems from posts on Arbtalk, Devon and Cornwall = crap money!

 

Not really the case.... Pick the job, pick the customer, walk away if you need to. I know it won't work for everyone, but I'd rather crack on with some work at home than go out and compete for a job that's not worth doing. I'd rather leave the downward competition on price to those that need to fight for it. I've quoted for a job and lost out to a company that had to travel >100 miles daily to the site, didn't have the benefit of local disposal of chip / timber etc. I can't understand how they broke even, they were well under what I'd take as bottom line and had considerably higher overheads... Crack on, I'll walk the dogs while the sun shines!