How much would you charge?

Join Date
May 2010
Location
London
Posts
689
I have seen so many varied salaries for basically the same job to make me realise there is no standard.
So out of interest, I would like to give you a real world scenario that actually happened and for you to give a genuine honest price.
Lets see how it varies.

The back story; A machine had broken down in a huge scrapyard.
It chopped steel girders into tiny pieces.
They have their own maintenance staff including an electrician but none could make it run.
Things were getting desperate - when my name was mentioned.

I'd never been or even heard of the place but turned up at 08:30 (40 mile round trip)
The boss, a surly man in a greasy suit walked me to the machine telling me it would be a cash job so expected a 'bit knocked off the bill'
The maintenance staff then told me all they had done and what they thought the problem might be. (this took up to 09:00 without even starting)

We were starting from scratch here - no luxury of drawings or anything helpful.

Inside the panel was a Siemens S200 plc.
I have the software for these and plugged in.
I went online and pressed the start and stop to try find the starting sequence in the logic.
There is it was and 1 input was missing.
I physically traced the input wire from the plc to it's source.
It was a N/C aux contact on a contactor with common 24Vdc on the other end.

It had failed but there was a working spare right next to it.
I swapped the wires over and as if by magic it started. :)
Time 09:30

I go see the boss and tell him how much.
He blows up on me saying 'how much' and 'you have only been here half an hour' etc
I gave an honest price - not inflated in any way. He had no clue what I had done to repair it but there it was chopping girders up again.

How much would you honestly charge?
 
Remind me to never call you in :ROFLMAO:.
Over here the better ones charge around €25 per started quarter plus transportation, which can go up to about €1 per km round trip. So this would have been a €170 job in cash and about €250 billed (because of the administrative fees).
 
One thing that may have helped would be to make sure they know what you charge up front. The complexity of there problem shouldn't change those rates. He was POed at his staff for not finding it on there own. Next question is, Do you want the work the next time its down?
 
Well, the job took you 1 hour and the driving approximate 1 hour?

So 2 hours and some for the car expense??
 
£350 + km (~£50]. Maybe less if it's a returning customer. Guess I'm not doing any jobs in belgium either..
 
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One aspect of pricing is also what kind of job you have? The rate for the job is diffrent if you are an regular electrician with some PLC knowledge or an specialized PLC guru. If the job was two hours and you charge like some answers 750 or 400 pound, well that is overpriced in my world. Or do you charge based on how important the job is to the customer?.. Remember that greed is a cardinal sin...
 
When my business was open I also had a 4-hour minimum for any job. The customer always knew that before I went in. In the case of new customers who had heard about me through a referral from someone else, I didn't head out to their site without first advising them of my policies and getting a purchase order.
I had a standard response to those who thought my rate was too high. You're not just paying for an hour of my time. You're also paying for the fact the I could get the job done in an hour.
 
A service technician would have been $150.00 for the job. 2 hours.
We have a 1 hour minimum charge per visit and the 1st hour is $10.00 more to cover administrative. Mileage is not charged if within a 60 mile radius. Clock starts ticking when the person leaves, and stops when they return.

We have some new software with phone apps that streamlines the time tracking and billing. Everyone is electronically tracked now. They know exactly where everyone is, how fast they are going, accelerating, hitting the brakes...

My insurance company wanted me to put one of these devices in my Challenger for 90 days to lower my bill. I think the opposite would happen. :whistle:
 
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I had a standard response to those who thought my rate was too high. You're not just paying for an hour of my time. You're also paying for the fact the I could get the job done in an hour.

It's important to remember that if you sell yourself based on your cost, you'll always get compared to someone cheaper than you. If you sell based on value to the customer, you'll be much more likely to be seen positively.

Steve's quote is a great example of the right way to do it.
 

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