kentjames

Every time i see crews doing council work i wonder how the hell did they get the contract looking like that. Ive seen some with hardly any PPE, one was waving a saw around constantly one handed out of a MEWP slashing some holly back. It should be tested on your quality of work, capabilities and testimonials rather than a H&S scheme you have signed up to by paying money and submitting paperwork.

Blue sky in Kent today, well till lunch time. Better weather finally but now lots of jobs are being cancelled as the clients gardens are too wet and they dont want a messed up lawn!

Yeah i saw that, he had that top out ok though so got some skills, just none in Ninja warrior!

Well he tried eh Mark

A properly worded website with correct seo will still come in just below the advertised sites, on some searches we rank higher than the paid ones

Our facebook page has generated 8 jobs since we have had it. From garden clearance, maintenance and tree surgery. We get recommended by people in our local area pages and I do post on these threads also, if I see them, and we have had 3 jobs from those too. I have considered the adverts especially with the localisation options but haven't needed to at the moment as we have enough work without spending any money on advertising past a good website. Seo is key to a website, good description is key to a page and also keeping it updated with new content, after all its what social media is all about!

Same here with the wet boggy gardens, it creates such a mess the client would rather wait. Today's job has been put on hold as the garden is underwater in places. On the plus side, our admin is all bang up to date

Since a post on a random facebook thread the other day I have had these pruners bookmarked with a view to asking this post. Does anyone own / use one of these ARS Swinghead telescopic pruners? They look ideal on spec for some of our 'light trimming' jobs for domestic clients and I can see them being useful for several applications but wonder if anyone has invested in them? Here is a link to one - 180ZR-3.0-5

Last year I used Google Calendar for the first time and it revolutionised our business. It helps massively with planning, dragging and dropping various jobs around - useful when the weather causes delays. I invited my workforce to view the calendar on their phones and therefore they can see the schedule but cannot alter anything. I always back this up with a paper diary after we have done a day or weeks work just in case. Mainly as this records who paid what and when and what people earnt that day etc.

Looks great, well done to all involved and merry Christmas to you Paul

Having been there myself with the loss of a lot of equipment I know exactly what you are going through at the moment. Its amazing how useless the police are when there is little chance of catching the crims. Unless they are on site still they rarely turn out of their office and even then only if accompanied by a dog or tazer unit. After the event it took three phone calls to get them to come out and take the statement on the same day and wasnt until that afternoon did the soco come out and check for fingerprints, which was pointless it turned out as they wore gloves. The insurance team at Trust were, and continue to be, fantastic and took care of the claim very quickly. It took longer for me to find the invoices for the equipment than it did to fill out the forms, with a pen and many cups of coffee! I guess if you wanted to read the rest then see the thread here: http://arbtalk.co.uk/forum/members-only/76717-picking-up-pieces.html Lessons learned, better security, cameras (for recording evidence if the deterrent fails), keep copies of the invoices for all equipment in a sh*t hits the fan folder for ease of access and above all praise those nice chaps at Trust insurance for being there and continuing to be.

I'm in and purchased mine, well done for organising as always Steve.

I remember it vividly as I was only 6 at the time. I slept through it for the most part but my sister who at the time as in the box bedroom went into my parents room to say the walls were moving. My dad said don't be silly and sent her back to bed. It was only some years later that it was discovered there was lateral cracks around the house and indeed it was apparent that the roof had lifted and sat back down again! I remember the extensive work there after to add lots of ties into it! Anyway, at the time my father was just starting out in his gardening firm and already had an established client base. He got phone calls from one hotel up across the other side of the village who rang in a state saying they had trees down everywhere and could he come and clear them. Well my dad took two days to get there in the end due to the amount of trees down across the roads in that short 3 mile section of road network. Once he eventually got there he found some around 10 trees down, the two worst ones being one across the top of the breakfast room which caused structural damage and the other which had completely destroyed 3 or 4 cars in the car park. The hotel owner was very apologetic to the cars owners but they didn't care as it meant they didn't have to go home from their very nice hotel stay! It's a shame we do not have any pictures from these days in our family but cameras were a luxury which they could not afford. at the time. Across Kent there was huge amounts of damage and many companies set up during this time. Some are still going today, one of whom of course is Kingswood tree surgeons (Richard Olley who now runs Kingswood training) Of course PPE was pretty scarce in those days and so it is unsurprising how many injuries there were. Thankfully my dad had been taught by a woodman who showed him basic cuts and this together with common sense kept him safe. Thanks to this thread these memories can be shared.

I haven't used them yet but I've had quotes from Amber Langis Home | Amber Langis

All very nice machinery but you wouldnt get them any where near most of our clients trees or indeed in the middle of most of your parks i would have thought David?

Sorry but you are seriously under valuing your experience, knowledge and services at that rate

Second vote for Trust, they settled our claim within 48 hours and tools are covered anywhere anywhen.

Very nice work there, well done. Sleepers look a great option for those routes with heavier traffic too

Excellent, thank you kindly

Thats the one my friend hired in on a site clearance job, seemed to do the job no problem. Pricey though but i suppose that depends on its output / area cleared per day?

Coppard plant hire at Godstone had one for hire a year ago.

Barrie, what's the coverage like on those cans of paint? Will one do a full respray do you reckon? Cheers

At last, some proper Sunday night television! Our 13 year old very much enjoyed the programme and as family we have followed XH558 at local airshows etc for some years. Recently we saw her on the Southern route on her tour as she flew over Manston. Very emotional day and such an iconic aircraft. It's a real shame to see her grounded but I'd rather see that than her crash into the ground in years to come through fatigue or failure of her many basic computer systems.

This mower I'm renovating was purchased 2nd hand 4 years ago and is still going strong! The engine is perfect, just getting a bit tatty now paint wise. It gets washed and dried once a week unless its been used on wet grass then it gets hosed out daily.

Gardening is a broad term yes, it includes essentially anything which is not tree surgery. Fruit tree pruning is a grey area still but usually if its one tree it gets done within the contracted maintenance. We do commercial landscape management too and on one 27 acre site it is mostly grass, hedges, trees (epi and raising only), weed spraying, leaf clearance, strimming banks etc but thats an annual contract price to include everything possible (apart from the exceptions which are all stated in the contract! #extras)