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rubbing you hands together

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Ken Wainwright:
What a wonderful thread. No particular answer but lots of different questions, opinions and approaches.

For what it's worth, for me, a call to rescue a disaster, if new and fresh, is always treated as urgent , even if it means an early evening call out. But payment? Sometimes it's a £40 min. charge. Sometimes it's for a bottle with something red inside and sometimes its a freebie, occasionally even for someone I've never met before. There's no rhyme or reason to my approach, I think it must depend on my hormones on the day ???  On the surface, all of this may seem unprofessional, but look a little deeper. Similar to John, my advertising budget is almost nil (£125 for NCCA Y/P listing, Parish mag and school fete is the total). So by seen to not take advantage of peoples misfortune, I find is an excellent marketing tool. For example, if I do a freebie, when madam is gobsmacked at the "bill" I make a point of exlaining that I was in the area, my out of pocket costs are virtually nil, and that my marketing exercise will hopefully bear fruits in the future. I invariably obtain work from this approach. Obviously if I'd travelled out of my way, then a charge would be made.

Safe and happy cleaning:)
Ken

PS Thinking about it, there is logic behnd my charging strategy, each case is taken on it's own merits, especially if madam answers the door wearing nothing but a smile with a promise  of egg, bacon, sausage and beans :D

des:
I got a call once to clean a care home and a few weeks later they phoned to say they had  an accident on the carpet could i come today and clean the area again .I had just finished my jobs for the day so i went around and cleaned the carpet for them. She asked me how much was the bill and i told her it was free but could i park my van in there car park while i went to the bank to pay in some money .Yes she said and any time you are in town please feelm free to park there. So i had a free parking space since then and then the lady got the top job looking after all the homes in a 50 mile area .Not only do i get all the new homes to do but she tells them the price and its very good price and they have cash every time. So give a little it pays  des ::)

lee_gundry:
i did a flood restoration service for a  old woman who was not insured,i did the full works for free.


Lee G

Nigel_W:
The most memorable one I had was a call out for a red wine stain. It was the daughter of an existing long term client. I fitted it in at lunchtime and made no charge because of the connection with Mum and Dad.  I had a call the next day  - it turned out that the daughter runs a property management business with 40 luxury company flats in my area. I am still cleaning them 6 years later 8)

Nigel

Dave_Lee:
Dave,
So you found the board. With regards yo your comments. The question is - How many and How much.
Dont make the mistakes I made - whilst not advertising for many years but fully booked all the time - Reason: I had all the work coming in without advertising after an initial 7 years. I was also broke, doing the job properly but not charging enough. Happy to say those days are well behind me now and I'll never fall into that trap again. In my opinion you if you are making your money with large volume of jobs - you dont have the time or even the incentive to do the job properly and shortcuts are inevitable. As I said, been there done that, and hated it -happier now doing jobs at the right price (Right for me, that is). You must know Dave, even if you have only been in this business a short time, that £75 for a full house of carpets is not just low priced its suicidal and for someone with an impressive set up like yours gives the public a low perception of professional carpet cleaning, that others in your area have worked hard for years to improve. No offence intended Dave, this is just how, I for see it.
Dave.

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