OT How to find a reliable tradesman

You've sort of given the answer. It takes quite a bit of time to visit and give a quote. You want 4 people to do this, but will obviously only use one. So those good ones who have plenty of work through recommendation etc can't be bothered.

It probably also depends on how you ask. If they know you've just picked them out of yellow pages etc, they'll also know you'll be getting more than one quote and likely take the cheapest. A good tradesman won't work for minimum money.

Can you not have a stroll round your area and see if anyone has had this sort of work done recently? And ask them? Most are usually only too willing to recommend a good tradesman.

Spot on. There is no such thing as a "free" estimate. If a customer mentions they are getting 3 or 4 people round, I don't bother - highly likely they will pick the cheapest - which isn't going to be me.

Nail, hit, head.

It's not that they don't want the job, they want jobs that will turn in a decent profit.

On Saturday 13 July 2013 12:10 The Medway Handyman wrote in uk.d-i-y:

Not always. I had 4 estimates for a roof. I picked a middle value, also allowing for my perception of the men.

Granted, that was a lot of money and the job for them was 3 weeks. So it would be stupid of me not to get quotes and silly of them not to factor that into their business model.

In your case, if it's quotes for a day's work, I can see your POV.

Where abouts are you I would suggest you have a look in your nearest Friday Ad

We will not visit the customer's premises to give a free quote, unless we are certain they are not just getting a series of prices. We are never the cheapest because we do the job properly using good quality gear and there are lots of cowboys who just quote what they think the customer will stand then do a s*it job. Also, a lot of them aren't VAT registered. If someone wants a free quote for a domestic job we always tell them they can have one, but if it involves a site visit they'll have to pay £50 + VAT which we will deduct from the bill when they have the job done. That separates the sheep from the goats very effectively. We sometimes get cheeky bastards wanting us to drive a considerable distance then plod around their flats complex (or whatever), check reception on the roof, write them a nice specification for a new TV system, and charge nowt. I've even had my system plans re-issued for competitive tender, with my copyright details tippexed out.

Bill

The real answer is, you don't. You might find one who does a job to your sa tisfaction, but not necessarily somebody else's. We had a recommendation fr om the supplier of our flooring and the guy was brilliant, even let us orde r via his account to have a good discount (yeah, right I fell for that one too). He quoted for two days, took three and had to return for an hour or s o after that and still charged as per the quote. Pleasant, polite, no radio blasting out, and cleaned up completely, each end of day. We passed his de tails on to a friend where he then did a seriously shoddy job, left it in a poor overall finish, took half a day and charged for two full. Another cam e highly recommended to us, took HOURS to do something I once could have do ne in one and left us with such crap fittings we ended changing them later ourselves. Go figure, it really is pot luck.

But equally, why make an appointment and not keep it?

The job they're on over-ran? Between taking the phone call and the appointment another 'firm' job came up? But it would have been polite to phone and cancel.

Indeed. When I was having my garden remodelled, with associated building work, one of the companies that I asked to quote lost the chance of what turned out to be a £12k contract when they tried something like that with me.

Colin Bignell

Good firms don't need to take the chance that they are having their time wasted. There are too many freeloaders about.

The thing about our job is that a lot of jobs are very small: less that £500. It just isn't economical to spend time and money giving free quotes.

I mean, I know it's stupid, but we really do have people wanting us to visit them to give a price for running a cable to a bedroom.

Bill

On Monday 15 July 2013 01:30 Bill Wright wrote in uk.d-i-y:

Presumably you are able to give them a likely price range based on similar jobs? Sometimes, people have no idea what a job will cost.

If they are good, they should have the experience to tell the difference between the serious customers and the time wasters. In the case of the garden remodelling, I supplied a garden designer's drawing and a ten page specification.

Your charging policy would increase the cost of the job by at least 20% if everybody did it and the customers got three quotes. I wonder how much genuine business it loses you.

When I worked for an electricity board, that sort of job had a fixed price that we could give over the phone. Very rarely, the job proved to be more complex than we expected and didn't make any money, but, equally, some were very simple and quick. The fixed price was set to allow for those variations in the long term.

Colin Bignell

I don't (pick the cheapest). I contact as many tradesmen as I can because I know most won't turn up and those that do often will never send an estimate. Out of the ones who do turn up (if any) I listen to them and decide which one is likely to do the best job and pick him/her.

And foolish IMHO. The tradesman has guaranteed they will never get a job with you now.

But how does the potential customer tell (that you will do the job properly)? It is a risk for you, yes - but it's a risk for the customer too.

That's common practice. We don't like it but it's a price we have to pay for doing business.

Decent tradesmen - round here anyway - will be fully employed by repeat work and recommendations from customers. So no need to seek out new untried ones.

What the OP said was he wanted 4 quotes. Which means three are doing it for nothing. Not odds I'd take. Unless desperate for work.

Oh yes of course, we can give them a rough figure. In fact if they give enough detail we can give them a firm price over the phone. I'm on about those who 'insist' we go out to them, name a figure, then go away and wait hopefully by the phone.

I actually suspect some of these people have empty lives and just like having people call round. There's also those who like to show off to their spouse how shrewd they are.

A while back I went out on the basis that the job was booked, only to find the young man firstly attempting to pick my brains then attempting to beat me down on price. "How much do you pay for TV cable then? I bet you get it really cheap..." All this of course with his simpering bride looking on. I went out to the van to 'fetch something' and was never seen again.

Bill

This makes it more difficult for a consumer to find a tradesman though.

But only one turned up. Therefore he is most likely to get the work.