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« **Reply #1 on:** November 27, 2006, 05:46:57 pm »

Thomas,

I bought a second hand Fiat Scudo for £2k, the built my own WFP with all
parts required for £1k.

In the short term I lost money compared to trad because of the first cleans etc..
but after 3 mnths you start seeing the benefits. My output has increased by
20% and I recovered all costs within 7 mnths.

A friend of mine who I introduced to WFP has gone the same route but he
is now leasing a van. His work was cut down from 5 wks to 3 wks and is now
looking for more work.

Once you have WFP you then need to structure your work around it and take
on houses that are compatible to WFP.

Being in Scotland you only need a DI system, all our work is domestic.

Hope this helps

Doug

« **Reply #2 on:** November 27, 2006, 05:58:26 pm »

Absolutety better off without a doubt !
I was not the quickest trad man , i used to earn about £60 ~ £70 a day .

I got my pole system using a zero % credit card {interest free loan } !

Now i am earning in the region of £150~£200 a day

Not always that much obviously but 75% of time .

Thats domestic , a day at commercial brings in more again .

So yes , wfp has done it for me

Rich P @ F

« **Reply #3 on:** November 27, 2006, 06:01:40 pm »

Quote from: thomas james on November 27, 2006, 05:29:56 pm

this is basically aimed at the domestic lads with maybe a few commercials

do you think after the costs of wfp equipment, a larger van with larger fuel costs insurance etc, that you are better of than if you had not bothered investing

I know it is safer but spreading this cost over say 5 years compared to not investing at all, financially do you think you are better off

just wondered if anyone had looked at it from this angle

The big difference for me is that my 6 weekly work cycle now takes 4 weeks - sometimes less. My hourly rate is much higher now on most jobs so long as I stick to good access and keep away from too much work wqith flat roofs. My year runs October to October. Now that I've got rid of most of my dross work, my income should escalate substantially this year. Of course the running costs are higher but thew extra turnover will far more than offset this. Year one with WFP has been my learning curve with very big outlays and quite a few mistakes. Year two is when I start to reap the rewards more. Year three (starting October next year) should be a blinder.

« **Reply #4 on:** November 27, 2006, 06:09:25 pm »

Yes definitly better with WFP. But don't just think that you are going to hit the ground running. There is a lot to learn about how to deploy your hoses and all sorts of little things before you really get fast. But when you do its a lot better.

« **Reply #5 on:** November 27, 2006, 06:15:24 pm »

Oh Vince , you make it sound like a science

You are of course right , many a broken planter lies in my wake

Rich P @ F

« **Reply #6 on:** November 27, 2006, 07:16:30 pm »

In genweral people who have 'splashed' out on WFP method are better off than window cleaners doing it the traditional way. We are all moaning about the lousy weatehr (heavy rain, strong winds) BUT we are still working when and where possible. Imagine how the 'Traditional guys are feeling. They must be on the verge of 'Jacking it all in' soon. My message to them is don't despair, the sun will show its face soon, hopefully!!!!!!!!!!! or change to WFP!!!!!!!!!!!

« **Reply #7 on:** November 27, 2006, 07:18:54 pm »

my expert (2.0hdi) does 55 to the gallon so did the kangoo(1.5dci)

only difference is more water say 750 expert 500 max on kangoo

even though i never used 500 in day 450 the other day when two working 6 hours solid

i am better off, i can grow older with a bit more grace and time to do whats important in life rather than just work

yes my turnover has trippled. only 10 days a month i do 3days 2 days 3days 2 days work completed rain or shine

« **Reply #8 on:** November 27, 2006, 07:21:09 pm »

i will answer your question but will keep it simple

YES

« **Reply #9 on:** November 27, 2006, 07:31:52 pm »

I have been WFP now for 8 months. I can honestly say it has revolutionised my business. I am now turning over 30% more work than last year. It is the first November I have completed my round! Ever! in 19years!! AND 30% more!!

Thats the good news!!!!

It has cost me, not only in finance, but in stress too!!

Finacialy it has cost me around 2K. Buying the Equipment and refurbishing my trailer.
At first it was hard work. I made mistakes and had a few problems. I lost a few customers and occasionally seriously considered dumping the lot!!!

BUT I PERSIVERED...............WELL probably because I am a stubbourn B*****D
and was NOT goimg back to Ladders!! Or, have the wife say " Told you it was a waste of monery!!"
Instead, a month ago my wife said "I'm proud of you! You have stuck to your guns and made that pole stuff work!"

David

« **Reply #10 on:** November 27, 2006, 07:36:41 pm »

The bigger vans all have suspension designed for greater loads, and a bigger van does not mean bigger insurance costs either.
I've been WFP for over 2 and a half years and I'm still using the same poles I had to begin with.
For me it now means I worry about the size of my tax bill whereas before I never did.

I have a handful of commercial offices that are the cream of my round, but WFP has meant that domestic acounts now make up about 50% of my work, and the domestic stuff is also the most profitable (those offices notwithstanding).
2 and a half years ago I only had 2 domestic accounts (about £100's worth, and yes, they are good accounts)...I must have a count up...I really don't know how many I now have, but it is now a substantial number.

Of course the setup and running costs are greater, and there really is a big learning curve, but for me the difference is enormous, I'm not prepared to say what my best week has been, but never in a million years could I have acheived it were I still 100% trad.

Ian

And Dave....well done mate

« **Reply #11 on:** November 27, 2006, 08:23:20 pm »

Quote from: thomas james on November 27, 2006, 08:11:20 pm

guys if you have been doing window cleaning for a few years and you have a maximum work load traditional, can the time saved by wfp be justified against the costs, when you are in a position were you dont want any more work

I know it is safer but if you have a maximum work load then you have found a way around sorting out the dangerous windows I put this view forward as I have spoke to a guy who brings his £5000 ionics system out for 4 commercial contracts a month and totally refuses to use it on domestic as he finds it too much hassle and not happy witht he results .Now he also spent £10000 on a new van to support the system
now this is £15000 to do the job a little bit easier, not more work than what he had before,his running cost went up £1500 on fuel.Now you will probably think this guy is inexperienced but he has had his system 4 years and probably is well knowledgeable about wfp,As he said= if I did not have it someone else would come along with it.He recons he saves time over traditional, but not enough to justify the extra cost

if your going to spend 15 K on a new van and system, then it will take time to pay for itself

if you use a small van or car, build your own system, use 25 L barrels in a car OR fit a small tank in a small van

loads of options when you build your own, you build it to suit what you need (if you have a car, then use the 25 L'r barrels)

<--------------- have a look at the DIY forum, e.mail me for a link, e.mail on the side

« **Reply #12 on:** November 27, 2006, 08:33:40 pm »

  Jim,

  I'm going to stick my neck out on this one, my opinion is Ionics is designed
  for Commercial work and not domestic due to the cumbersome hoses they have, micro bore is far better for domestics.

  WFP works better on big houses and I would say a no, no on council houses.

  Training is another big issue, its taken me some time but due to all the good
  info off this site as well as being taught I think I have got to know how WFP
  reacts to each type of window. Like flow rate I feel is a big issue in the
  quality of work, its all these tips you learn off this forum.

  He has probably been shown by Ionics and no one else, so that is another
  problem. There are things I still find a problem but still trying out new
  things to increase my work rate.

  Like there are 2 folk up my way who have gone into WFP with a back pack,
  and what I am hearing they are not too impressed. That is not their fault
  but they have been given the sales pitch in do this and this and that's it.
  As we all know it does not work that way, you need to be taught.

  Just my veiws James as we have discussed this before.

  Hope this helps.

  Cheers

Doug

« **Reply #13 on:** November 27, 2006, 09:07:34 pm »

As said , you dont have to spend 15k on your set up , i spent £1440 on system , ground floor pole , 18 foot pole , 24 foot pole 39 foot pole , IBC tank , all you need to get going , this was all running from an astra van .

I then took the choice to spend 5k on a transporter so as to carry more water and have a bit more room .

It could be done cheaper by a long way , it just depends on how much of a vision you have for the future , and it depends on your cash situation of course .

But like i said , a zero % credit card got me up and running , and the initial £1440 was all paid back within the 12 month offer on the card , therefore costing me nothing to set up due to the rise in daily takings , but remember , you have to have the extra work there to get the extra cashflow .

Rich P @ F

« **Reply #14 on:** November 27, 2006, 09:29:27 pm »

Not a chance mate , not in my area anyway , it could be different in your area , what you have to remember is that there are far more windows out there than there are w/c's , only you can decide if its worth the jump or not .

Personally , i fell from a ladder and split my knee cartlidge , oh and it rotated 180 degrees too , this is why i changed over really , 5 weeks off work , but strange as it may seem , im actually glad i fell in a way , no lasting damage hopefully , but i wont be falling again !

Rich P @ F

« **Reply #15 on:** November 27, 2006, 10:27:43 pm »

Well, if you look at it this way ........ Slip off your ladder and see how much you earn then. Also if you finally do get back to work how fast r u gonna be!

I suffer with sports injuries occassionally (or is it the Mrs battering me?), when trad using ladders sometimes i struggled, with wfp i dont.

Also dont really fancy being off work for too long, so even if i was only earning same as trad daily, which im not, think in the long run wfp def would pay for itself, plus picks me up better prices on houses, charging more for plasics, panels ets

« **Reply #16 on:** November 27, 2006, 10:37:33 pm »

Quote from: thomas james on November 27, 2006, 08:47:44 pm

your correct doug wfp for commercial and large houses

now the guys who have been at it a while probably have attacked this type of work,I am just wondering if the new guys getting into it find it more difficult trying to find the larger houses available, and trying to make it work on council and small private houses, as new estates go up the houses are getting smaller and smaller and prices drop to the £5-£8 bracket, the newer houses are getting easier to do compared to older houses allowing for ladders to be used most times in a safe manner,with just the odd window needing a pole.I know you target the bigger houses doug, but taking a semi being the average house in the country, is the large houses not just limited and it has been a case of first in reaps the rewards

Yes the time saving with WFP is not as good on the smaller properties usually. Generally, the larger the property the greater the time saving. In fact, on a few of my jobs there is no time saving at all.
Having said that I have timed myself on certain jobs. Excluding the first clean I have a job that used to take me a bit over an hour. That one is no 35 minutes. Another was two and a quarter hours which is now 1 hour 45 minutes. Another one which was just about two hours (and not a very safe feeling either) is now done in about 1 hour 10 minutes.
Unlike my first few times around with WFP, I don't think I now have any jobs that actually take me longer with it. Some are the same. As stated, the trick is to hunt for larger jobs with good access.

« **Reply #17 on:** November 27, 2006, 11:13:25 pm »

A great many of my domestic accounts are semi's, and a standard 3 bed semi, takes no more than 10 minutes to clean.

And this is NOT rushing, done trad in that time most certainly would be.

The time saving on a small account isn't much, but for me it is certainly quicker and less effort is involved.

If you can't make WFP work on domestic then you ain't doin' it right!

Bigger jobs, georgian or leaded work and the time differential is truly enormous.

If your round is domestic and you are full to the gills with work then you may well wonder what is the point of spending a lot of wonga to do what you are already doing.
But within a month or 2 you will find that you need new work.

You will finds that instead of shying away from Georgian work you'll be gobbling it up, work you could not do before is suddenly work that you can now do.
You will now be in a position to take on work that you would previously avoided.

None of us have all 3 bed semi's, we have a selection, and on some of it you will be massively faster.

You have to be organised, it isn't the same as trad, your approach has to change, every job you have will need to be re-learned.

You may well be better off sticking with ladders, some people just don't seem to learn how to use WFP, their results are poor, they just don't seem able to adapt.

My new van costs me £250 a month for 5 years and I spent about another £1200 or so upgrading from working out of the back of my hatchback to the full van mount, plus £250 to get my van signwritten (it's paid for itself over and over....the signwriting that is!)

My initial setup cost around the £1500 mark to be fully up and running, and that paid for itself in a few months.
Once I had picked up well over £250 a month of new domestic, and I was consistantly turning that extra work over, I then invested in the van, comortable in the knowledge that I wasn't going to have a problem paying for the van.

So for me at least, before I took each step, I was also sure I had that cost covered, and every step of the way I have exceeded those targets and I'm continuing to take on more well paying work, the vast majority of which is domestic.

I use trad every day still, but that is used almost entirely on the commercial work, the only time I use trad on my domestics is when I have to clean inside work.
For external work on domestic it is 100% WFP, whether its a one bed flat or a mansion.

Ian

« **Reply #18 on:** November 27, 2006, 11:21:01 pm »

i dont make much more ,if any .but apart from the achey back & neck ,still in one piece.after previously falling from a ladder and having 6 months off ,and being very lucky i didnt kill myself (shudder)

« **Reply #19 on:** November 28, 2006, 06:33:05 am »

Well there is only so much you can do to cover your ass!

If my van was totalled I'd have two options.

1. go back to the car and work out the back of it as I did before.

2. (the route I'd most likely take) My van is fully comp and in the event of an accident my insurance supplies me with a hire van, so I'd simply use that to work out of.
Lost income due to the accident would be claimed for off the insurance, the other persons insurance if the accident wasn't my fault.

Actually my car has a tow bar, so I'd also have the option of getting a trailer and working out of that.
I'd only lose a day or 2 of work regardless of what option I used.

Ian

« **Reply #20 on:** November 28, 2006, 07:42:24 am »

Quote from: thomas james on November 28, 2006, 07:31:25 am

good on you Ian for thinking it thru but I am not getting at you

but bringing to attention the fact that you would get a hire van, but then you would need to get a tank etc as I dont believe they would have this stuff fitted
in the hire van

If I was in such a situation for a while, I would fill containers and work from a trolley. Not pleasant since I am used to a van mount but certainly doable. My insurance doesn't cover hire van but it would probably be cheaper to buy an old one for a few weeks than to hire one (unless it was from the other parties insurance of course). Bear in mind that quite a few people work from a trolley as their main system and they seem to manage OK.

« **Reply #21 on:** November 28, 2006, 08:38:25 am »

Were I to work from a hire van that is exactly what I would do, go back to the trolley...no...come to think of it I would do as I did with my van before I fitted the tank in the back.
I'd fill up my water containers and work from the back as before.
Even when I was using the car, the trolley was virtually redundant.

Ian

« **Reply #22 on:** November 28, 2006, 09:07:55 am »

this is the point

get a trolley system , try it out, if you dont get on with it (for some strange reason) then if you have built it yourself, you have wasted 500 - 600 quid, not a major issue

than if you need a bigger system in a van, buy a tank and away you go, you wil stil use the same pump, poles, brushs, hoses etc etc, just change the 25 L barrels for a tank

« **Reply #23 on:** November 28, 2006, 09:09:35 am »

Nicely put Matt

Ian

« **Reply #24 on:** November 28, 2006, 04:50:15 pm »

hi I would definately say i was better off though the outlay at first is a lot you can gain extra work to cover costs i have increased my income since going wfp coming up now 18mths well worth the investment just won a large contract in nottingham have put in more quotes for other work I would not have even entertained before using poles.

« **Reply #25 on:** November 28, 2006, 07:51:26 pm »

Quote from: thomas james on November 28, 2006, 06:12:06 pm

guys i compliment you all fighting your corner well, especially ian giles good replies

you know when you have a good system when you can defend it from all angles

so i decline fighting the corner for the traditional guys, how ever I thought I would have got backup from the odd traditional window cleaner or wfp who has had a bad experience

so you are all doing better wfp - good on you, however no one did a comparison between cost of traditional compared to wfp, oh well cant get all the answers

co,mparing costs is a little haqrd though

my ladders and trad setup cost me about 250 quid

my DIY WFP system cost me about 600 quid

ongoing costs of WFP, my RO system is now 3 years old, i spend about 10 quid a year on resin

BUT you do buy the odd connection that breaks, or the hose gets a hole in it (about 6 quid for 10M's)

i stil do trad downstairs and i buy GG3 and rubbers and scrims (which cost me more than 10 quid a year)

BUT the WFP system earns me more, not because of the speed i work, because im not so tired

« **Reply #26 on:** November 28, 2006, 08:05:45 pm »

More work carried out per person per hour/day

As a business if you spend little on expenses (trad) then little comes off your tax bill at end of year. if you spend a lot of expenses (wfp) then you get a smaller tax bill atend of year. So the expenditure question is not a question here.
Output of actual work is.

« **Reply #27 on:** November 29, 2006, 08:09:29 pm »

YES and Yes again.

I spent 15k setting up last winter between October and December.

I have used wfp from January this year or 48 weeks.

I bought a brand new van,had a van tank system installed by Facelift.Bought 7 poles and a Static RO system in my garage with a 40 40 RO. Loads of stress setting up as I was very unsure weather it was a wate of money. 11 months on and its all rosey in the garden.

I thought it would take me three years to get back what I outlayed thats £15,000.00. In week 46 I had recovered the full ammount of my setup costs. What I mean by that is I have compared my best ever year as a trad w/c with this year cleaning wfp, I have earned todate an extra k16 above my best trad w/c earnings for the same time period.

I have a domestic round, I have more customers now as I clean windows a lot faster but do not work any longer.

Its not just about costs setting up, look at it from the other side, you have something that will make you money faster for less effort and less health risks. Plus the bonus of owning something that gives you a feeling of pride and satisfaction.

This year I have paid of my set up costs from now on its all extra profit.

Nel.

« **Reply #28 on:** November 29, 2006, 08:26:50 pm »

I do make more money since i changed to WFP than i did traditional.
But on some jobs there is not much difference on time compared to trad.
But others i do in less than half the time.

Today for instance i earn't twice as much as i could do traditional and i was not slow traditional either.

Its not like that everyday though i wish it was but the worst day i would at least earn the same as traditional.

Paul

« **Reply #29 on:** November 29, 2006, 11:49:36 pm »

Most definitely, at least £100 a week, probably more. All that & the extra incentive that I will never fall off my ladders again, it's a no brainer.

« **Reply #30 on:** November 30, 2006, 06:50:15 am »

Yes and I'm not very organised either.

« **Reply #31 on:** November 30, 2006, 09:25:00 am »

Oh YES The best money spent ........sorry about the ladder boy though

« **Reply #32 on:** November 30, 2006, 12:53:44 pm »

short answer .....YES.
It has been worth all the cost and "teething problems. No matter what the profit margins etc, just imgaine the cost of all equipment going up next spring when the HSE really start clamping down on the window cleaning industry.

For those of us that have organised ourselves and are used to it we will have no bothers and issues with HSE if and when we get investigated for our methods used! That is worth a million by itself