Clean It Up
UK Window Cleaning Forum => Window Cleaning Forum => Topic started by: david mark on May 02, 2016, 10:33:34 am
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This past 5 years ive payed staff a set wage which incudes Holiday pay and days off sick they still get payed when rained off but the
agreement is they come in on Saturday to complete there round ,however this system does not work all the time they don't always finish there work so spills over to next weeks work due to problems with there personal lives wind rain ect its coming to the point where im concedering paying a % ie 50/50 split. I have 3 employees and run 1 man to each van. This way may be fair to both of us
Has any small window cleaning companies moved over to % from paying a set wage and how did you find the transition was it a better system to both parties
Any replies would be appreciated
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we run the same as you , we did try going to go the % thing but found all they did was rush round , causeing poor workmen ship and beating the vans to death so we went back to the old way
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Thanks for your reply. It does concern me that the quality of the work will become poor and possible cancellations due to rushing to complete there round using a % basis.
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Maybe if they're told if enough work is lost due to complaints/ cancellations one of them will be down the road and that it'll also affect the likelihood of any pay rise.
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thing is I find its easyer to keep a customer then find a new one , and once the workman ship starts going down hill it goes fast
you never just lose one here or there its loads at once and can last for a while , as most customers wont sack you until they find someone else once they have it in there head you find someone else they will doesn't matter if you send someone else and the work goes back up to late damage is done
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It's a good idea to build into there a contract with you
a completeion of work to a reasonable and satisfactory standard and within a reasonable time frame protects you and them
Ie that you should not expect them to do to much but they need to understand and realise there income depends upon them working To a satisfactory standard and copleting the schedules
I sometime feel we need to find a good balance with what we can earn from employing people
I think someone on here spoke about holidays and length of them slightly different subject but similar principle and said happy staff work well
It's the same with standard of work completion of work, pay well create an ethos in them of quality with reasonable speed and efficiency
I always think if they had the same drive as we have for business they would be running there own
I firmly believe in a fair wage for a fair days work,which may mean I earn less of each employee but there happier in the long run
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thing is I find its easyer to keep a customer then find a new one , and once the workman ship starts going down hill it goes fast
you never just lose one here or there its loads at once and can last for a while , as most customers wont sack you until they find someone else once they have it in there head you find someone else they will doesn't matter if you send someone else and the work goes back up to late damage is done
You make some good points here Susan. I hadn't thought of the 'delayed' response to loosing customers, but it makes sense.
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So this fifty fifty split do they pay for equipment, fuel and van repairs if not they are better off than you are at the end off the day
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That's a good point I pay an average of £75.00 per day and they complete between £150 to £160 per day But some days in the week are harder than others or owners don't open locked gates so only charge for the front that can loose alot of money over a year.
Had guys work for me in the past that would do £180 to £200 per day but not consistent would reach burn out point and get more cancellations possibly for cleaning windows to quick leaving streaks ect . I feel what I pay now is a good wage for what they do each day but profits are way down but its still a profit.
Its trying to get that balance. Of paying a wage to keep your guys happy and make a profit plus what the market we are all in are willing to pay.
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Where are you based?
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I'm I reading this right ? you have one man per van who completes £160 worth of work per day, from that you pay out
£75 in wages leaving you £85 a day for everything else including holiday and sick pay.
Surely it cant be worth your while financially to employ never mind the extra hassle.
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+1 to what Sean says
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Based in Blackpool yes I agree starting to think of selling up fed up with the hassle of empoying just keep and just. keep a round for myself. I tryed putting up prices most not willing to pay increase of 50p average price of semi £8.50 round this erea some windys still charge £6 for semis
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there on good wages if you live there ! they would be on min wage if I was there boss when your getting such low money for cleaning windows they having you over
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I'm I reading this right ? you have one man per van who completes £160 worth of work per day, from that you pay out
£75 in wages leaving you £85 a day for everything else including holiday and sick pay.
Surely it cant be worth your while financially to employ never mind the extra hassle.
You are either paying too much, your prices are too low or they aren't working hard enough. Which ever it is, I can't see it's worth it.
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I feel having 1 person per van on paper works but in reality its not the case ive tryed 2 in one van it only worked when the work was compact but some days the addresses are in different streets and not many together if I give them say £180 a day its seems ok till it rains they can't catch back up but if I lower the amount to £160 its more achievable thats if they come in on Saturday after a bad week with weather or sickness
If I pay minimum wage no one would be interested to work for that in this game round this area I had 2 staff quit in the last 4 months and found better paying jobs .
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I feel having 1 person per van on paper works but in reality its not the case ive tryed 2 in one van it only worked when the work was compact but some days the addresses are in different streets and not many together if I give them say £180 a day its seems ok till it rains they can't catch back up but if I lower the amount to £160 its more achievable thats if they come in on Saturday after a bad week with weather or sickness
If I pay minimum wage no one would be interested to work for that in this game round this area I had 2 staff quit in the last 4 months and found better paying jobs .
How many jobs on average are they expected to do?
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Around 18
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Susan question if I may
What do you pay? What do you expect, turnover or number properties
or is there a balance you expect a staff to achieve in profit margin
As David pays well but turn over is low so profit is hard to achieve I imagine that's location in country and prices that can be charged
I would aim at 85-100 a day per staff depantdant on age experience and time in employment which would included statuary benefits and upcoming statuary pension scheme
But a turnover between 285-300 which down south can be moderate amount of houses, between 8-12 at a top end of 15 on compact estates
Hopefully not creating burnout in staff
Just interested
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Around 18
One guy does 18 jobs and it totals about £160? I'd say 18 jobs is a good full day, but your prices are too low on what you're paying. You either need to be paying £50-£55 a day or up your prices so that they are achieving £225 a day.
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Firstly your guys are not doing enough in a day a single man on his own needs to be knocking out a minimum of £250 a day your labour cost really needs to be at 30% max of your hourly rate ( including your PAYE contributions - holiday pay allowance etc.. )
How can you have people on paye when it's % only wage ?? I think you could offer a basic then extra bonuses for work completed ( no bonus if complaints are received )
We run flex hours over six days so if rained off in the week and they are still behind by end of play Friday they are required to work Saturday (unless booked as holiday) we don't pay for rained off days midweek)
Darran
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Thanks for the replies I put my prices up on 2 off the 3 rounds in Feb 2016 by 50 p some a £1. 4 year's since the last increase I lost a few but around 20% Refused to pay the increase so had to leave it at the original price or they would cancel and get someone else The reason that Round 3 did not get price increase was a previous employee started out on his own and took around 15% of my customers by under cutting my prices tought him the trade and thats the thanks you get cheers (Nick)
How do you get on with not paying them if they turn up for work and it starts raining say 11am do you pay them by the hour
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Thanks for the replies I put my prices up on 2 off the 3 rounds in Feb 2016 by 50 p some a £1. 4 year's since the last increase I lost a few but around 20% Refused to pay the increase so had to leave it at the original price or they would cancel and get someone else The reason that Round 3 did not get price increase was a previous employee started out on his own and took around 15% of my customers by under cutting my prices tought him the trade and thats the thanks you get cheers (Nick)
How do you get on with not paying them if they turn up for work and it starts raining say 11am do you pay them by the hour
Mine work in the rain.
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We battle through with the rain but customers that are in turn us away
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We battle through with the rain but customers that are in turn us away
So you've got customers that tell you how much they'll pay and when you can work? And they're underpriced!
In my opinion you need to look closely at your business. I think you just need to whack up the prices and accept the losses and get canvassing/leafleting as your business isn't sustainable.
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Susan question if I may
What do you pay? What do you expect, turnover or number properties
or is there a balance you expect a staff to achieve in profit margin
As David pays well but turn over is low so profit is hard to achieve I imagine that's location in country and prices that can be charged
I would aim at 85-100 a day per staff depantdant on age experience and time in employment which would included statuary benefits and upcoming statuary pension scheme
But a turnover between 285-300 which down south can be moderate amount of houses, between 8-12 at a top end of 15 on compact estates
Hopefully not creating burnout in staff
Just interested
your bang on the money we say 15 jobs aday is about right . sometime 20 if there all close to each other
this can go down to 10 if theres a lot of travel to and from jobs but we charge more for these so it in turn earns the same as the stuff that's next door to each other
we like our guys to do 200/270 aday average again this can go down to 120 if they get bogged down on a job or go up to 500 aday if there on one of our big one day jobs
they get paid from 80/100 aday depending on hours worked ect ect but again were in the south east so its alittle easyer to make the daily number
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How about paying minimum wage (not sure what that is a day now) and then make the rest up on 'bonus'? That way when you have to pay their holiday pay you only have to pay them the minimum wage.
Maybe you should look at another way of doing it because you're not making much profit at all on having 3 vans out. It can't be worth the aggro and expense surely?
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Thanks Susan
It's Good to know that sometimes your heading in the right direction
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If rained off they get paid for hours worked - we only call off if rain is heavy and forecast for the day.
Our work ranges from flats with just 4 windows to very large estate houses, ( residential ) and shop fronts to hospitals (commercial) no matter what we are cleaning there is a set average hourly turnover to hit.
On your pricing of £8.50 a semi I'd expect to get done 4 p/h minimum X that by six hours = 24 cleans.
Darran
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That's a good point I pay an average of £75.00 per day and they complete between £150 to £160 per day But some days in the week are harder than others or owners don't open locked gates so only charge for the front that can loose alot of money over a year.
Had guys work for me in the past that would do £180 to £200 per day but not consistent would reach burn out point and get more cancellations possibly for cleaning windows to quick leaving streaks ect . I feel what I pay now is a good wage for what they do each day but profits are way down but its still a profit.
Its trying to get that balance. Of paying a wage to keep your guys happy and make a profit plus what the market we are all in are willing to pay.
On these figures your business simply isn't making enough turnover to support 3 employees and 3 vans. If you have work that an employee in a van can't achieve in excess of £30 per hour it's probably not worth the hassle of employing.
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When i employed one of my now franchisees, i was paying him 40% of turnover. I always guaranteed £1250 worth of work each week, so he did very well from it. When i first took someone on it was on a 60/40 split in their favour which was ridiculous.
I wouldn't pay anyone more than 30%, knowing what can be achieved in a day.
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you need to make some changes..
1. start working in the rain and whatever the weather. only stop working when it is dangerous to work. offer a rain guarantee to your customers.
2. start working your staff harder. my guys work 8 hour days and are expected to clean 32 x 3 bed semis(or the equivalent) each in this time.
3. you'll probably need new staff to make these changes as getting them to work harder for the same amount of money will be extremely hard.
good luck!
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What about only stop working if it's not going to be conducive with their health or doesn't that count Richard?
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you need to make some changes..
1. start working in the rain and whatever the weather. only stop working when it is dangerous to work. offer a rain guarantee to your customers.
2. start working your staff harder. my guys work 8 hour days and are expected to clean 32 x 3 bed semis(or the equivalent) each in this time.
3. you'll probably need new staff to make these changes as getting them to work harder for the same amount of money will be extremely hard.
good luck!
One person cleans 32? Wow! There's a guy on Facebook cleans that sort of number, but he's around a fiver a house.
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32 full houses a day Or 32 fronts? If it's the first option, I'd say you push your workers too hard
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I used to have a round in Blackpool aswell , people kicked off when I put the prices up from £4.50 to £5 for a semi , terrible prices . Very difficult to canvass aswell because there are so many con artists and gypsies
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you need to make some changes..
1. start working in the rain and whatever the weather. only stop working when it is dangerous to work. offer a rain guarantee to your customers.
2. start working your staff harder. my guys work 8 hour days and are expected to clean 32 x 3 bed semis(or the equivalent) each in this time.
3. you'll probably need new staff to make these changes as getting them to work harder for the same amount of money will be extremely hard.
good luck!
One person cleans 32? Wow! There's a guy on Facebook cleans that sort of number, but he's around a fiver a house.
Exactly there's one in my area as well, when your going through that many properties a day your quality isn't going to
be worth much more.
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Has anyone thought of paying an hourly rate and just giving the employee X amount of £s work to do in the day.
I.e. In 6 hours I expect you to clean this amount of houses for £8 an hour. If you don't, (without good reason - as specified in contract) the difference will be minused from your wage.
I think that's fair.
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Has anyone thought of paying an hourly rate and just giving the employee X amount of £s work to do in the day.
I.e. In 6 hours I expect you to clean this amount of houses for £8 an hour. If you don't, (without good reason - as specified in contract) the difference will be minused from your wage.
I think that's fair.
For a start you cant pay them less than the minimum hourly wage no matter what they achieve, but what you have described
is just another bonus scheme and therefore will have all the problems that come with bonuses.
For example lets say the employee has a target of 20 properties but gets off to a bad start so wont reach the required amount,
not much incentive left other than to faff about for the rest of the day and get the minimum amount anyway, or worse forget
about quality and take shortcuts to pull the amount back hoping the customers wont notice or complain.
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I don't know much about employing but from the sound of your prices £150 a day would be good going on your own ans qouls leave me knackered. So I don't see how an employee is going to flog himself to death to hit targets. Sounds like you would be better off on your own, shove all your prices up by a fair wack and do it on your own or with 1 employee.
Or tell them all you're thinking of putting prices up those that say no.say ok and sell them all to another windy and keep the ones that will.
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you need to make some changes..
1. start working in the rain and whatever the weather. only stop working when it is dangerous to work. offer a rain guarantee to your customers.
2. start working your staff harder. my guys work 8 hour days and are expected to clean 32 x 3 bed semis(or the equivalent) each in this time.
3. you'll probably need new staff to make these changes as getting them to work harder for the same amount of money will be extremely hard.
good luck!
One person cleans 32? Wow! There's a guy on Facebook cleans that sort of number, but he's around a fiver a house.
Exactly there's one in my area as well, when your going through that many properties a day your quality isn't going to
be worth much more.
the quality is fine thanks and our price is at the high end of average for our area.
we have been cleaning for 6 years to this standard and have a lot of long standing customers.
you get this fast by having the right staff, having the right efficient setup, and training the staff properly.
in the first year i didn't hit these levels but once i got on the tools myself, found out the speed you can work at, and then got new staff who I trained myself and we've been doing it ever since
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Has anyone thought of paying an hourly rate and just giving the employee X amount of £s work to do in the day.
I.e. In 6 hours I expect you to clean this amount of houses for £8 an hour. If you don't, (without good reason - as specified in contract) the difference will be minused from your wage.
I think that's fair.
For a start you cant pay them less than the minimum hourly wage no matter what they achieve, but what you have described
is just another bonus scheme and therefore will have all the problems that come with bonuses.
For example lets say the employee has a target of 20 properties but gets off to a bad start so wont reach the required amount,
not much incentive left other than to faff about for the rest of the day and get the minimum amount anyway, or worse forget
about quality and take shortcuts to pull the amount back hoping the customers wont notice or complain.
What's a "bad start"? If it's legitimate, then they have nothing to worry about. If it's a hangover, then they'll keep working till they've hit their target, even if they don't get paid for it.
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When i employed one of my now franchisees, i was paying him 40% of turnover. I always guaranteed £1250 worth of work each week, so he did very well from it. When i first took someone on it was on a 60/40 split in their favour which was ridiculous.
I wouldn't pay anyone more than 30%, knowing what can be achieved in a day.
Is 30% with you supplying van,fuel,equipment,water and paying there tax,ni and insurance or do you sub it out at 30% with them supplying.
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As with Richard 32 semi's is not unattainable, we work on turnover per hour as our rounds are very varied but if we had a day of semi's £8 each all my guys would do this in a day
Darran
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As with Richard 32 semi's is not unattainable, we work on turnover per hour as our rounds are very varied but if we had a day of semi's £8 each all my guys would do this in a day
Darran
There's no such thing as an £8 semi here.
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So what do you have then??
Darran
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So what do you have then??
Darran
Nothing as keenly priced as that. A flat's £15. I guess I or any one could knock out 6 2 bed semis (6 windows) on a modern estate an hour, but on anything else I can't see it.
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My parents should have named me Thomas as there are certain things I would need to see with my own eyes before I
would believe them, 32 three bed semis all cleaned to a decent standard by one person in a working day would be one of them.
Plus as I was nearly crucified on here for daring to suggest that an employee should be able to do the same as the business owner
what target would they be hitting 40 a day.
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My parents should have named me Thomas as there are certain things I would need to see with my own eyes before I
would believe them, 32 three bed semis all cleaned to a decent standard by one person in a working day would be one of them.
Plus as I was nearly crucified on here for daring to suggest that an employee should be able to do the same as the business owner
what target would they be hitting 40 a day.
I agree, once up to speed they should be able to do the same in a day. I'm off now until next Tuesday, just done the work lists for my colleague and he's doing exactly what I know I can achieve each day.
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8 wky, if you have nothing that keenly priced then your turnover per day should be well above mine - fair play to you 👍
I don't have a day of 32 semi's our top qty day is 29 - around 24 are semi's and 5 others that are 4 and 5 bed detached finishing off with a period Manor House - all other days are mixed but turnover exceeds that of the £8 semi day example.
All my employees can clean more than I can in a day ;D
To doubt ? Well that's upto you, it's a sad world, or is it person that can not accept anything because they can't do it themselves.
As always I am happy to offer my opinion, that is exactly what it is, just based on what I have done/do. But you say it can't be done therefore I bow to your all encompassing knowledge
Darran
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My parents should have named me Thomas as there are certain things I would need to see with my own eyes before I
would believe them, 32 three bed semis all cleaned to a decent standard by one person in a working day would be one of them.
Plus as I was nearly crucified on here for daring to suggest that an employee should be able to do the same as the business owner
what target would they be hitting 40 a day.
Sean, your welcome to pop up and come out for a day, in Scotland with my lads (sons).
We don't scrimp on quality, we do all windows, doors, frames and sills using Trad.
My lads are capable of doing 30 houses a day each day in day out, this can take them anywhere from 5 hours to 8 hours a day to complete, depending on their mood for the day and the compactness of the round, oh and we are talking £5 houses here.
Their daily target is £150 each of which we go 50/50 and they meet their own running cost, which are minimal as we ditched the van a year ago and now walk round, it is amazing how much time is saved due to not having to load/unload van several times a day.
And if you do come you can compare my standards of work against the local big boy, who expects his crew to do a minimum of 50 houses at £4/£4.50 using wfp each a day (KS Cleaning May know who I am referring to here), the standard of their work is so poor that the trad lads in the area have taken well over 1000 jobs of this team, simply because they are under pressure to perform and reach targets so corners and whole windows get cut.
Am I happy with my £75 a day I get from my lads ? Yes
Are they happy earning £75 a day? Yes
These figures will son be £90 a day as I am in process of upping prices to £6
OR they can drop their daily target to 25 jobs to get same money.
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Hi guys
I Just wouldn't want to do that many semis in a day, don't have a need and the more I read on here of the prices there are around the country I really take my hat of too how hard some guys work to earn a living
Down here 3 bed semi range from £15-20 on average my price is £20 on a six weekly £25 12 weekly
if I did 15 every day down here I'd be pleasantly content and earn a really good living of three staff
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Bear in mind like most things there are 3 bed semi's like my mums 1930's house, big windows, landing windows, pantry window etc... Then you have the 3 bed semi of the modern era, typically 3 and a door at the front, possibly ( quite rarely ) 3 and a door at the rear and all those in between.
Just like parts of the country, prices have a range, a chap near me charges £3 for a semi - ask him and he would say that's the best price you could get in this area, ( another doubting Thomas )
I always tried not to knock anyone for what charge, people need to be comfortable about what they charge, and be happy with that. - I just get irritated by the dogmatic ones who think things can't be done because they can't/won't try it.
Darran
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Just like parts of the country, prices have a range, a chap near me charges £3 for a semi - ask him and he would say that's the best price you could get in this area, ( another doubting Thomas )
Darran
i had a new client last month, quoted her £15:50 over the phone for her house, she was surprised as her previous window cleaner only charged £5. i explained a little bit about window cleaners and pricing, and then about our service and she gave me her bank details to set up a DD there and then. paid double for her first clean too.
some people are happy to pay £5, but would be fine about paying more modern prices. people who choose to be our customers don't mind paying a modern price.
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I always payed 25 percent of what was done with staff which worked realy well.
Now i sub work out and take a 25 percent cut which again works realy well.
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20-30 houses a day is no where needed down these neck of the woods,you can quote £25-30 for a 3 bed semi every day of the week and get them,these discussions on here regarding prices and money earned are not comparable it's a lot easier to run it as a profitable business down south as the number of jobs you need to hit in a day are a fraction of the amount you'll need in other areas of the country. In a lot of cases although you would never do it you could send a worker out to do 6-7 houses a day and earn over and above what you'd need to cover your costs,this job is all about quality not quantity in my book I would dread looking in my book thinking I've got to knock out 25-30 houses today to do my money. This was my point when stating some people take on any job with glass in it,the fact is a lot of employers need the turnover of jobs per day-week so they will clean a £30 job for £15 because it's purely a numbers game for them they need the work. IMO it's not newbies driving the price down its people employing or franchising work out going in at silly low prices because at the end of the day they arnt on the tools cleaning it.
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My parents should have named me Thomas as there are certain things I would need to see with my own eyes before I
would believe them, 32 three bed semis all cleaned to a decent standard by one person in a working day would be one of them.
Plus as I was nearly crucified on here for daring to suggest that an employee should be able to do the same as the business owner
what target would they be hitting 40 a day.
Sean, your welcome to pop up and come out for a day, in Scotland with my lads (sons).
We don't scrimp on quality, we do all windows, doors, frames and sills using Trad.
My lads are capable of doing 30 houses a day each day in day out, this can take them anywhere from 5 hours to 8 hours a day to complete, depending on their mood for the day and the compactness of the round, oh and we are talking £5 houses here.
Their daily target is £150 each of which we go 50/50 and they meet their own running cost, which are minimal as we ditched the van a year ago and now walk round, it is amazing how much time is saved due to not having to load/unload van several times a day.
And if you do come you can compare my standards of work against the local big boy, who expects his crew to do a minimum of 50 houses at £4/£4.50 using wfp each a day (KS Cleaning May know who I am referring to here), the standard of their work is so poor that the trad lads in the area have taken well over 1000 jobs of this team, simply because they are under pressure to perform and reach targets so corners and whole windows get cut.
Am I happy with my £75 a day I get from my lads ? Yes
Are they happy earning £75 a day? Yes
These figures will son be £90 a day as I am in process of upping prices to £6
OR they can drop their daily target to 25 jobs to get same money.
Yes I know who you are referring to ;D
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Is 30% with you supplying van,fuel,equipment,water and paying there tax,ni and insurance or do you sub it out at 30% with them supplying.
That would be full time employment, so supplying everything and paying out 30% wages. I don't employ though.
There are so many reasonable ways to pay staff and hit large profits. Performance bonuses etc.
I think I'd probably go the minimum wage route, with added bonuses if I were to employ. If you pay a set wage regardless, you need one hell of a grafter
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The best way IMO is no complaints bonus and a hitting the target bonus,it's obvious that you need to put in place a no complaints bonus otherwise if they are on minimum wage or just above it by only giving them a work done bonus they will be running losing more work than there doing.