[Ian Lancaster]

i have a minimum charhe of £10 ...i don't do council estates...but i still go for condensed

Is that just a personal dislike? We do several council estates, the houses don't come much more condensed than that, and the people seem to fall into two categories: those who would always try to avoid paying, and those who can't bear the thought of owing money.  If you have an area of the latter type, and you stick to your £10 minimum, you won't get any better work than that

[tolzy82]

Where was this customer?

[Rob.Hall]

I was asked to quote for a basic job last week.

Gave a price of £8. She replied that the other wc charged £10.

My immediate thought was that I had screwed myself there.

This Lady gave me a real pull up because She said, 'I know there is not much difference in price but everything has become so expensive and we are looking to cut back.

My feeling now is that people will be looking to see where they can save.

[Moderator David@stives]

Theres over 30 million properties in this country, there not all looking to cut back.

[simon knight]

Although having condensed work is ideal, in reality I don't mind packing away and driving for 15 mins to the next job...gives the feet and legs a break.

[williamx]

Although condensed work is more economical, I personally like the break of driving from one job to the other.

At the end of the day it doesnt feel like I have done a shift in a grotty factory.

Another good point of pricing high and delivering a high standard of work is that I don't have to work to many hours.

I can now spend more of my time relaxing and enjoying my life.

[alanwilson]

what a load of ball locks.  well done squeeky, you're the one with the customer, not the other guy -  £14 for 7 windows??  £9 is more than fair.

all these guys on here blowing their trumpet that they charge £25 for this that and the other, making £60 an hr blah blah, what do they drive?  why are they working??!! 

It seems funny to me that the ones making all the 'money' are the same ones who don't drive a new van, who don't employ, and who seem to post threads such as ' where's the cheapest place to buy .....'

Its really isn't hard to see who's talking bull around here.

[tolzy82]

where is this house by the way?

[Paul Coleman]

what a load of ball locks.  well done squeeky, you're the one with the customer, not the other guy -  £14 for 7 windows??  £9 is more than fair.

all these guys on here blowing their trumpet that they charge £25 for this that and the other, making £60 an hr blah blah, what do they drive?  why are they working??!! 

It seems funny to me that the ones making all the 'money' are the same ones who don't drive a new van, who don't employ, and who seem to post threads such as ' where's the cheapest place to buy .....'

Its really isn't hard to see who's talking bull around here.

Not sure what you are on about Alan.  You slag off £60 an hour yet praise Squeaky for getting a £9 job that takes him "under ten minutes" (which breaks down to about £60 an hour).  So it's OK if Squeaky does it but not OK if anyone else does it?
It's got me wondering precisely who is talking "ball locks".

[Tosh]

Can I just make a few point here about pricing:

There are many variables when it comes to pricing a job.

For example, the ones I do that Squeaky dropped, I charge each of them £12.00 where-as he used to charge them £6.00; so I effectively doubled the price.

I've been doing them for at least a year, and although I do believe these customers moaned about the 'doubling of their price', they're all very nice to my face - top customers - I'm normally paid straight away, since they're retired types.

Anyway, how did I get away with doubling their price and retaining these customers?

No other window cleaner would want to go there:

     Parking is almost non-existant; definately not suitable for a van-mount (pefect for a backpack).

     There's plenty of awkward windows for ladders, especially when they park their cars right in front of
     their house.

     I dominate the area; I clean every house that wants a window cleaner; no other window cleaner  
    (that I know of) goes in this part of the street (and not many go into the area either; the whole place, pretty   
    much has awkward parking, and is difficult to do with ladders).

So, given that I know that there's a lack of supply of window cleaners to fill the demand of wanting on, I know I could charge good prices for all the houses in that small place.

It's one of our top residential areas, with all my prices ranging from £27 to £12; most of which I've been doing for quite a few years now.

I also think that once Squeaky has more work than he can handle (he's only been window cleaning for about 12 years now and still hasn't got a full round!!!???), he'll get braver and charge better prices and won't be struggling to pay his tax bill, like he has in recent years.

[williamx]

what a load of ball locks.  well done squeeky, you're the one with the customer, not the other guy -  £14 for 7 windows??  £9 is more than fair.

all these guys on here blowing their trumpet that they charge £25 for this that and the other, making £60 an hr blah blah, what do they drive?  why are they working??!! 

It seems funny to me that the ones making all the 'money' are the same ones who don't drive a new van, who don't employ, and who seem to post threads such as ' where's the cheapest place to buy .....'

Its really isn't hard to see who's talking bull around here.

Alan
What do you think is an acceptable amount that a window cleaner should earn per hour?

As for those who shop around for the cheapest price, when they are buying anything, isn't that sensible, or should they only buy the most expensive.

For example I need to buy a carpet cleaning wand, every supplier in the UK are charging £275 plus delivery and vat for one.

All of these suppliers get this wand from a company in the USA, this company are willing to sell me one direct for £97 plus £55 delivery and custom charges of £12.54, who do you think I should buy one from?

[Tosh]

For example I need to buy a carpet cleaning wand, every supplier in the UK are charging £275 plus delivery and vat for one.

All of these suppliers get this wand from a company in the USA, this company are willing to sell me one direct for £97 plus £55 delivery and custom charges of £12.54, who do you think I should buy one from?

But that's not always a good analogy when you compare it to window cleaning.

For example, Squeaky doesn't advertise; you won't find him in any of the books (Yellow Pages, Local Pages, etc); which is similar to many many other window cleaners.  So while he maybe cheaper than other window cleaners, how can potential customers find him?

Then, he's limited to finite number of houses he can clean.

For many potential residential customers - not all I know - they're severley limited to who they can 'choose' to clean their windows.  Or at least they may peceive themselves to be restricted.

Customers - I guess - at least the brighter ones, normally resign themselves to the 'Devil they know', and would prefer to pay a bit extra, to retain a proven good service, or at least one that doesn't burgle them, or let them down.

The nature of our business differs from many others; what I'm saying is customers can't usually 'pick and choose' by price; you won't find window cleaning on any web price comparison site!

Don't undercharge, overprice if anything, and that way you can guarantee a good service to your customers.

[macmac]

what a load of ball locks.  well done squeeky, you're the one with the customer, not the other guy -  £14 for 7 windows??  £9 is more than fair.

all these guys on here blowing their trumpet that they charge £25 for this that and the other, making £60 an hr blah blah, what do they drive?  why are they working??!! 

It seems funny to me that the ones making all the 'money' are the same ones who don't drive a new van, who don't employ, and who seem to post threads such as ' where's the cheapest place to buy .....'

Its really isn't hard to see who's talking bull around here.

Here, here, you're right Alan, it's not very hard at all, they're usually the ones to give the worst advise too

Tony

[dai]

To be honest, I charge what I believe I can get, and the customers pay the least they can for a good job.
Money is something we could all do with more of, including most of our customers.

With me, people get the service they pay for, if it's a five pound job, I'm not going to hang around for ages waiting for all the drips to fall. If they are terrace houses with long back gardens, the bottoms get done when I finish the tops.
If it's a well priced job I'll wait until the drips finish, and do all of the frames including the tops.
We charge what we can but still have to compete.

When I was a lad chimney sweeps were 10 a penny, not any more, now they are hard to come by.
The prices they charge reflects this, in my area they charge upwards of £30 a pot and they won't even come for one job. Last time my chimney was done was with 4 of my neighbour's, he had done the four of us in an hour and a half, he had earned £1.33 for every one of those 90 minutes.

Competition is what keeps prices down, and that's why I try and guide every window cleaner I see to this site. It's the one positive thing that comes out of the earnings threads, they get to read what others say they are earning.
The negative thing about this forum is, many of us were perfectly happy with our lot until the high earning posters told us what they were earning. Of course this has a negative affect on the self esteem of many cleaners who charge what they believe to be reasonable prices, this is the source of many arguments.
The" I do a better job than the other guys and charge accordingly" posts are irritating to say the least,
We all have to clean windows to a standard that will keep our customers happy.
I would have to wheel meknackers round in a barrow to ask for £20 for a council house. Dai

[Paul Coleman]

The negative thing about this forum is, many of us were perfectly happy with our lot until the high earning posters told us what they were earning.

Too true Dai.
Until I found this forum, I regarded £15 an hour as just about acceptable, £20 an hour as reasonably OK, and £25 an hour as a good top whack - and I'm in southeast England which would normally be regarded as a fairly well off part of the UK.  This was working off a ladder BTW.  OK, so the hourly rate had to rise a fair bit when I went for WFP to offset the higher outgoings but this hourly rate rose because I could work faster rather than by increasing prices.  This forum has raised my income and my expectations.  It hasn't actually raised my standard of living because it just means that I am repaying my debts a bit more quickly.  I still do have patches of work where I turn over in the low 20s per hour but I now regard this work as ripe for a big increase or ripe for passing on once I've replaced it.  I realise that it's not practical in some parts of the country but I do not regard a £10 minimum as excessive.  I think it's a pity that some on here seem to get the hump about it and for that reason, I think it's better not to say too much on earnings threads.

[alanwilson]

ok

shiner - squeeky never lets on that he's making £60 an hour, no, in fact common sense would tell you that overall squeeky earns much less than that.

Is it ok to earn £60 an hour?  I think its fine to earn £600 an hour but when people on here break their earnings down to base it on what they earn while they are working then it never gives a true account of what they earn - for example I did a job on my own last week, took me 4mins to do and its £8 - am I making £120 an hour then?  No chance.

Try and look at the issue in a logical fashion in future please.

williamx - as for looking around, thats fine - I'm scottish after all!! however when its something so puny as a 17ft xtel or some fittings or something then its not worth considering.  I made a point on another thread to Dave St Ives about resin use - he uses loads of it and I suggested going for an ro to save money, but it was as much about consistantly producing high quality water.  Dave's response about not really caring about the cost so much (even though I didn't necessarily agree 100% with it) really just proved a point about how the bigger outfits (and I believe Dave is not a one man band) just get what they need and get on with it.  After all, we're all earning £40/hr - £1600 week so what point is there in trying to save a fiver?

Shiner - wfp debts?  did you buy an off the shelf system?  How much did you spend?

Dai - I couldn't agree more, I hate people posting and saying they wouldn't do a 15min job for less than x amount - I just think it demoralises those with less established businesses.

macmac - ta pal.

[Paul Coleman]

ok

shiner - squeeky never lets on that he's making £60 an hour, no, in fact common sense would tell you that overall squeeky earns much less than that.

Is it ok to earn £60 an hour?  I think its fine to earn £600 an hour but when people on here break their earnings down to base it on what they earn while they are working then it never gives a true account of what they earn - for example I did a job on my own last week, took me 4mins to do and its £8 - am I making £120 an hour then?  No chance.

Try and look at the issue in a logical fashion in future please.

williamx - as for looking around, thats fine - I'm scottish after all!! however when its something so puny as a 17ft xtel or some fittings or something then its not worth considering.  I made a point on another thread to Dave St Ives about resin use - he uses loads of it and I suggested going for an ro to save money, but it was as much about consistantly producing high quality water.  Dave's response about not really caring about the cost so much (even though I didn't necessarily agree 100% with it) really just proved a point about how the bigger outfits (and I believe Dave is not a one man band) just get what they need and get on with it.  After all, we're all earning £40/hr - £1600 week so what point is there in trying to save a fiver?

Shiner - wfp debts?  did you buy an off the shelf system?  How much did you spend?

Dai - I couldn't agree more, I hate people posting and saying they wouldn't do a 15min job for less than x amount - I just think it demoralises those with less established businesses.

macmac - ta pal.

I'll respond to the bits you've posted to myself.

I'm sure Squeaky does make less than £60 an hour.  I do too.  Not sure what your point is.  I have some jobs that would project to maybe £80 or even £90 an hour if they were to take an hour.  I also have work that would project to low £20s per hour.  I'm OK with logic.  Not sure why you would question that.
As for debts, I had some big personal debts that built up before WFP.  I made a few mistakes - mainly around a relationship that didn't work out and then I had a major illness that made working very difficult for a while.  It became pretty clear that I was struggling to repay the debts while working from a ladder.  I saw how fast WFP could be once I got used to it so I took a calculated gamble - and believe me, it was calculated too (because I used logic).  I worked out how much per month the loan would cost, how much extra I could expect to profit, and how long it would take to reach that point.  I got it about right but it took me a bit longer to get to that point than I allowed for.  To get me started, I borrowed about £14,000 which meant higher outgoings of about £300 a month PLUS using a larger van than I previously had means higher running costs on that.  Also, it needs to be factored in that I got £1,675 for the van that I previously used for trad cleaning.
I suppose that my outgoings are around an extra £370 a month with everything but my extra turnover far exceeds that amount.
I realise it can be bad form to borrow more money when already struggling with debt but occasionally, there are situations where it is the best option.  One such situatuion is when you borrow money in order to vastly increase your income.
Not much problem with logic there I suppose.
Of course it could all go pear shaped if I get sick or injured but there has been no trace of the hepatitis since '04 and, apparently, my liver has been functioning normally for quite a while (marvellous things livers as they regenerate themselves.)

[alanwilson]

shiner

sorry about the illness - really sucks.

the big personal debt is bad though, having ran up debts when I was younger (like most of us) it can be hard to repay, my debts reached £42000 in 1987!

I don't know if I would have taken the route you have taken regards borrowing so much from the bank but clearly you did the numbers and that was the best option for you.

[Sir Squeaky]

Glad you've all had a nice chat about me.

I'll catch up later...can't be arsed now.

[tolzy82]

Hes Exactly what he calls himself! 'SQUEEKY'