Clean It Up
UK Floor Cleaning Forum => Carpet Cleaning Forum => Topic started by: mark_roberts on May 27, 2008, 08:47:23 pm
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Came across a cleaner today who charges £20 an hour. Big van, lots of directory advertising (so its costing him to run his business) and Im lead to believe he may have a truckmount.
How does he do it.
Mark
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He doesn't but he is yet to find this out. Give hime sometime then he will realise he was better off stacking shelves in asda and getting holiday pay as well
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how do you know he charges £20/hr?
perhaps he works 12hrs a day so gets £240 a day, but he'd need some marketing to bring in that amount of enquiries to give him work for 10hr days
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I did a job last week for a hotel took me 7 hours £ 180 not ideal work but I,m struggling £180 is better than sitting at home watching Jerermy Kyle
John
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I would rather be out earning £200.00 5 days a week than earning £250.00 3 days a week. Charge a little less get more work which leads to more referralls and repeat work. Choose how ever you look at it at the end of the day we are only cleaners if i can work 30 hours a week for £1000 then thats fine by me.
Mark
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Karl, don't be daft, you would get £6.50 or there abouts for stacking shelves and a driving instructor gets around £20 an hour, which apparently, is more than many tradesmen !
There always were and probably always will be, people who seem to work, just for works sake. They're a pain, but have to be endured.
If they're on your doorstep, your only problem would be if they did a good job at low prices, but even then, you can widen your work area, or specialise ( quick drying / allergy treatment / protection / FREE spot remover ) or whatever.
The £20 per hour is probably just notional anyway, with much of his work taking double and treble that rate.
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Jesus i am circa £100 on most of my jobs would rather do 3 £500 plus jobs a week ,and have time off
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probably £20.00 ph before bait n switch.
will
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I agree with Mark, you soon get other people ringing up for cheap deals, although I can understand that when you start, needs must.
S
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Hi Guys
The most important thing to remember is that we earn gross per hour.
If true expenses are taken off, then you would be lucky to get half that figure.
Cheers
Doug
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My accountant always says "It's not what you earn that matters, its what you keep", so if you are earning £20 an hour and keeping 19 of it then I guess it is good money... better than earning £50 an hour and keeping 10!!!
Its all about perspective.
Andy
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I am lucky really ,a lot of my work comes from a letting agy ,who i do a discount for as they pass on so much work , and they also add a bit on for their time sorting out payments ect.They also recomend me to their clients who can book me directly ,the clients tend to use me as they know they are not going to get any probs when the final inspection day comes :) .The £650 job i did on sat was a commercial one and the last time i cleaned there was in Jan so i knocked off £57. i know i will be back there come end of this year so it`s a banker so to speak.It just depends on how much work i have coming in as to what i charge people though,there are people around this way that charge peanuts i wont compete with them ,don`t see the point getting stressed about it ,as it comes accross in my voice on the phone when i am getting desperate to work.
I need time off to work on my scirocco and countless other bit`s and bobs i do,Selling books on Amazon,selling records on Discogs,and growing my own veggies :) and spending too much time surfing on the net
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We've done £20 an hour and taken £1000 a day, i dont think life is that simple
that you can dictate £100 an hour all day every day, which is what we aim for.
I would still do the £20 an hour if thats all that was on offer and we had nothing
else to do, but thats just our choice, i 'd rather be working than watching telly ;)
steve
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I wory about the £20 customer and the £100 customer meeting :)
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carpet guy
The asda guy works 48 weeks a year so the true £6.50 is higher, he is guarantee the weekly wage, were as the 20 quid guy worked 48 hrs the 20 quid goes down, add accountany, fuel costs, business expenses etc the 20 quid drops even further, ok the asda guy will never make more than the 20 quid guy, but the asda guy has no haslles at all, the 20 quid guy has all the hassles of running a business.
i was trying to make a point, 20 is not enough to justify the hard work of running your own business.
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i wolud not start the engine up for£20.00 Per hour
by the time you get there and do the job, you'll be losing money hand over fist
someone said to me once, don't be a busy fool!
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Obviously it depends whether you really,really need the money NOW.
The time would be far better spent marketing your services or dreaming up new ideas to find and attract quality Clients.
However another way to look at it is doing certain work for NOTHING as a means to getting more business could equally be valid.
It's the difference between firefighting and thinking long term.
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The same arguments always rage when hourly rates / charges are discussed and the same claims are made, opinions expressed
From LOW COST cleaning, over a 20 year period, a business owner who posts on here, has accumulated a property portfolio with 20 properties, which effectively makes the owner a Millionaire.
I don't know the actual value, but in this area the rental income from that ownership would amount to around £15 k per month, plus the increasing value of the property, which always increases, even in quiet times and there is still the value of the properties, if sold.
Is that a Business Model to emulate, are they busy fools, or are they damned shrewd business people ?
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lets assume you have a van parked on the drive full of all the equipment you need to clean carpet & upholstery ( which I would think most of us have) we have paid our liability insurance, van tax & insurance and everything else we need to pay to be in business.
these cost are fixed & paid, if we never do a job or work 12hrs a day they stay the same.
to say now that i would never work for £20 an hour is tricky, I could stand by my principles and sit in front of the tv all day or i could go out to clean carpets for 5hrs and make £100. Apart from a little bit of fuel & chemicals my cost are the same
So in truth my principles will make me lose money.
some are lucky and work full time on high paying jobs, but some don't, perhaps they need £20 an hour.
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Carpet Guy,
We know who you are talking about and dont they have other business interests. I mean its not as though their property portfolio was built up on carpet cleaning (Cheap at that ) alone, which is what it looks like you are suggesting.
Dave.
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Original question:
Would you work for £20 an hour? Er NO. Not for running a business. After business expenses and running costs there is no real point. Its not really a business and wont last for long IMO.
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Dave
If you consider three, or it might be four vans, working full time throughout the year, there is a lot of cash generation taking place.
I was part of a similar operation some 12 - 15 years ago with 6 operators throughout a 200 mile radius plus the two principles creaming off the higher value work.
This generated approx' £8k per week, from the 6 self employed operators with advertising costs of only around £240 per week. The operators got 40% leaving a healthy 60% of the gross going to the principles, who already earned around £900 per week each.
This operation ran for 10 years and allowed the two gentlemen concerned to aquire a number of properties and close down the operation having achieved their objectives.
The work was all low priced, but usually averaged around £40
This is just another way of generating cash, cash the lifeblood of any business !
There is no perfect cash cow, but there are ways of making money from relatively low charges, bearing in mind, when charges are low, it's very common to have clients request additional work and you are already there.
Not advocating £20 an hour and would NEVER price c/c on a time basis.
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Rob
Although I understand where you are coming from
I say hats off to the Guys who generated that much work? and then reinvested the money
My property Guru reconds £15000 in cash will convert to 100k in 5 years time I think he is in a dream world but he is a Millionare and I am not. He was illustrating why its best to build up cash to invest
But £40 12years ago
Was £20 an hour 12 years ago
Did the self employed people pay for own equipment and transport
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It depends on whether you are talking gross or net. I think the majority of us would be happy with making £20 per hour once all our expenses were paid. If this was the case we would be clearing £800 for a 40 hour week, which is pretty good. If you are talking gross then £20 per hour is not enough to maintain a decent income and re-invest enough money back into our business for it to survive and progress.
Phil
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You couldnt work 40 hours cleaning carpets. Your actual working day would then be 12 hours with all the travelling, on the phone etc.
I used to work for a low price company. Averaged out at £30-£40 per hour 8 yeas ago. No real standards of workmanship, no training, no insurance, worked from the car, low par portable machinery, no secondary machinery ie. agitation machine or vacuum cleaner. Big drive to sell extras which where not needed. Customer care or satisfaction wasent thought about. So very quickly there was no motivation among the cleaners to work in those circumstances. Many left to start on their own as I did. Many failed because they though they could undercut by a few pound and get the work but they failed to understand the quanity principle.
Needless to say the company is no longer trading. Yes the owners did make money but made many enemies along the way. This model of business is not recommended.
Mark
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While I agree with your sentiments and morality, there is a level above the one you you quote, where there is money to be earned.
There is no point being idealistic about, " not working for a penny less than £ ????????????? " and not working, just as kidding yourself that every job MUST be fully vacuumed / presprays are timed to the second / wanding is done, as it was taught, even in areas of virtually no soiling and so on.
In every business there are rules and guidelines, pedantic fools follow the book to the letter and get paranoid when presented with a challenge which their book does'nt cover.
Practical, confident individuals just " get on with it "and collect the money, which allows the realist to manage their time more effectively and even while working on a lower rate, will, because they are more efficient, earn more money.
They would be foolish to work for £20 an hour, when working efficiently, they will earn £50 to £70 per hour, by being good at managing.
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Is this a discussion about working for £20.00 a hour, or employing guys having 5 or 6 vans and those guys working for £20.00 an hour and you getting the profit,
big difference.
And the person with the property is quitting cleaning cos it don't pay, and is not worth the hassles.
One man band working for £20 is not enough money
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Always the same these threads - as the majority of our business is general cleaning we work for much less than £20 an hour. Carpet cleaning is generally more than £20 an hour, but not always.
And I always take offence to people assuming that I run a mickey mouse company just because we are not charging the big bucks.
Obviously a nice car, house, 2 holidays a year, savings and a pension scheme is under selling myself. Note to self, must try harder...!!
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I just worked 6 hours for £120 and im happy ( i had planned on it being 2 hours though)
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I just worked 6 hours for £120 and im happy ( i had planned on it being 2 hours though)
That what i was thinking beter to aim high and if there a problem you stll cover costs, had a problem on a job where there was unexplained browning, took 3 hours to put right but costs still worked out covered. "which was nice"
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Always the same these threads - as the majority of our business is general cleaning we work for much less than £20 an hour. Carpet cleaning is generally more than £20 an hour, but not always.
And I always take offence to people assuming that I run a mickey mouse company just because we are not charging the big bucks.
Obviously a nice car, house, 2 holidays a year, savings and a pension scheme is under selling myself. Note to self, must try harder...!!
Paul the idea is that it GEES us all up
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Always the same these threads - as the majority of our business is general cleaning we work for much less than £20 an hour. Carpet cleaning is generally more than £20 an hour, but not always.
And I always take offence to people assuming that I run a mickey mouse company just because we are not charging the big bucks.
Obviously a nice car, house, 2 holidays a year, savings and a pension scheme is under selling myself. Note to self, must try harder...!!
My words exactly Paul well said !!
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Gentlemen you are the genuine people who the public will happily give their hard earned cash to, feeling it's been EARNED and pass your name to friends and relatives.