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Hi Nick We went for AAAC in march last year following a lot of hard work and quite a lot of money invested in the business. We are also a fairly young company (6 years on our own) and we had 6 full time staff at the time, we now have 9 plus 2 part timers. Now it can't all be put down to AAAC as we also acheived ISO 9001 in september last year but the running of the company has become far easier and more effecient as a result. We've grown in (turnover and staff numbers) by around 20% each year since we started but last year we grew 40% in size and doubled our profitablity. Like I said this cannot but put soley to AAAC but it certainly helps in the day to day running of the buisness. The fact that a client (or potential client) can see that you have QA systems in place makes you a little more appealing, but like Mr Arbocop has said it hasn't meant the phone has rang any more or we are given any preferential treatment over non AAAC by any of our clients. The investment in management time is by far the biggest cost but the fact that your conformity with law and best practice is measured by two auditors who see a range of similar companies gives you a bit of peace of mind if nothing else.

Around 1.3 tonne

Don't know if anyones already seen this one but I thought they were worthy of calling themselves 'Real Tree Surgeons' [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSaVPC0N2lE[/ame]

We've used one of those in the yard a few months back, a recycling centre down the road from us use one and do contracting work. It took 3 hours to produce 150 tonne of good quality chip from pretty contaminated logs, rootballs stems etc. Thats twice a fast as it usually takes the tub grinder and then end product was far better quality. The chip quality is as good as what you'd get from a Jenz chipper or any other chipper for that matter.

Skyhuck, does your groundie operate the crane when your on a dismanlting job or do you climb with the remote control round your waist. Also what would you do if you were to need rescuing or have you given your groundie some basic aerial rescue training? i.e. a mobile phone with 999 in the memory.

Lots of local authorities and some larger organisations are now using the 'Constructionline' or 'CHAS' scheme as a databse of pre-qualified suppliers or any trade. They can then view your latest H&S stuff online as you need to update your details annually and these are then scanned in for all to see. Some do ask for AAAC or ISO but its not the norm, and even if you don't have it you can usually argue that you have an equivalent system but its not accredited. I do believe in Quality Assurance systems as they give you an independant assessment of your firms stregths and weaknessesd and where its at legally. As for bringing in more or better work I'm still not sure.

Done it, looks very worthwhile

Done an elctric cable, luckily just to an outhouse, hit a gas pipe into a house and had a few car wheels wrapped aroud the drum of a mulcher head on a skidsteer. My mate however whilst working at night driving an excavator mounted mulcher hit the ground and blasted railway balast accross an entire street putting out just about every window and totalling around £25k in damage. ouch.