[martinsadie]

Screw the patch system, I don't owe other WCers a living

we all get along fine and make a nice living you wouldnt fit in around here with that bad attitude   

[pingu]

The concept of patches is laughable IMHO...what would give someone a right to a patch..because if you bought a round...thinking you have sole rights to those area's is too funny...and the one that is laughing hardest is the one that sold you the round...think about it...

Dave.

[Wrekin C S]

ask him if he wants to look like a pander then carry on

I like that one! lol   

[PaulTh]

im about to buy a round for 4k and if anyone thinks they will just be able to turn up  thinking the work i buy is fair game is either extremely brave or extremely stupid,my mates got a round in glasgow and this scouse jehovah witness who moved up to be near his gfs family thought the way some do on here and thought he could undercut people needless to say he was sent homewards to think again. 

[davids3511]

im about to buy a round for 4k and if anyone thinks they will just be able to turn up  thinking the work i buy is fair game is either extremely brave or extremely stupid,my mates got a round in glasgow and this scouse jehovah witness who moved up to be near his gfs family thought the way some do on here and thought he could undercut people needless to say he was sent homewards to think again. 

But what are you going to do if he puts you in hospital? There is always someone bigger and better...

[davids3511]

I always thought there was an unwritten rule that you dont step on fellow window cleaners toes by trying to steal their customers and i thought it was a very honourable unwritten rule that worked!but i guess as more and more window cleaners disregard this unwritten rule then more and more window cleaners will see themselves losing their good paying customers to unscrupulous window cleaners who will clean the houses for a 3rd of the price thus driving down prices which is of no benefit to us window cleaners as a whole,i hear window cleaners say "my customers are loyal"well in times of recession if someone is willing to do a £15 house that takes someone 20 mins for £5 im pretty sure you will see loyalty flying out the window.Dont believe me? go to moneysavingexpert forum and look for topics on window cleaning and you will see what people are thinking.

Are you not assuming all guys canvassing an area are unscrupulous? I built a round from nothing to 320 customer in 18 months by being more expensive than all the other cleaners in the area.

Example:Quote:
Originally Posted by MrsE 
My windows are £18 for outside & £45 for inside & out.



I have 9 windows, a set of french doors & a mainly glass front door.

£18?!

We have 8 windows (2 of which are double width), 2 sets of French doors and two doors with glass in and pay £4.50.

another link that questions the myth of loyalty http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=1533363&highlight=window+cleaner

I don't get this last one, are you saying the poster or the window cleaner was wrong?

[Alistair@AWC]

thought he could undercut people needless to say he was sent homewards to think again. 

Paul,

Were not talking about undercutting people here, were talking about people who think they own a street because they clean 40% of it!

I've had people cancel there current window cleaner for my company even though we were charging 3 times the amount - if people are that unhappy with there WCer Im taking them. The only person who has a right to decide who cleans a property is the person who pays £100's/£1000's per month in mortgage or rent payments.

[cozy]

I hope I've understood this properly. If someone buys a round then another WC turns up canvassing, the guy who bought a round in that street is perfectly in his rights to beat him to a pulp?

What have I been doing wrong? I didn't realise some WC who buys a round has the sole rights to that area.

Shall we all put signs at the end of every street we work in to "warn" other WC's off? Why don't we all get tooled up and have "Patch fights"?

Those guys with vans could fit armour plate on the sides and grills over the windscreens. Then we could form gangs and wear colours to identify eachother.

Sounds great to work and think that way. Think I'll move back to UK.

I wonder if other trades have this problem, two gas fitters having a punchup in the street

And some people want a fed and nvq's, and this trade is moving forward

Let's be real guys.

[PaulTh]

david i was saying that noone should be going into established window cleaners streets and undercutting them as they are probably not paying their taxes and thats how they can afford to do so like someone charging £4.50 in comparison to someone charging £18.50 for roughly the same house.I put the links up from a forum to show that the general public dont really care if your insured,licensed,paying taxes etc all they care about is getting a good job done at the cheapest price.And up here you need a license in most areas and when applying for the license you have to state which streets you do so if i have 95% of a streets customers and ive paid good coin for the round and got my license,pay my taxes then im not going to sit around waiting on the council,police doing their job if someone else comes in trying to take my business away from me,for one they almost certainly wont have the streets they are canvassing on their license.

i was stopped one time by a couple of police officers who asked to see my badge,after id shown them it one of them asked how much i charge as he thought his window cleaner was ripping him off charging £7 for a 3 bedroom semi.oh and another good one i know of a few guys and they did the head of the fraud squad for the dss house(none of them paid their taxes)i was told he had asked them their companies name and nxt time they went round he said he couldnt find it registered only to be told off by his wife to stop bothering the laddies as they were only out to try and make a few bob,they charged £1.50 for a 3 bed semi.

[s.w.c]

Shall we all put signs at the end of every street we work in to "warn" other WC's off? Why don't we all get tooled up and have "Patch fights"?






i could do with some exercise an stress relief.

[PaulTh]

you guys have got me thinking,your totally right everywhere is fair game and so i wont be buying a round ill just spend 4k on leaflets and canvass every house in Edinburgh,ill not bother with the license,heck just to make sure i get the customers ill cut my overheads by not bothering with insurance and to hell with paying taxes,there thats me sorted im sure ill have a few thousand customers in no time.

[martinsadie]

you guys have got me thinking,your totally right everywhere is fair game and so i wont be buying a round ill just spend 4k on leaflets and canvass every house in Edinburgh,ill not bother with the license,heck just to make sure i get the customers ill cut my overheads by not bothering with insurance and to hell with paying taxes,there thats me sorted im sure ill have a few thousand customers in no time.

id stick with buying the round. i have never canvassed why waste time 

[cozy]

Hi Paul, I pay tax and even VAT on my prices, I'm insured and a registerd business. I don't cut any of those corners. I built up my rounds alongside other WC's. I'm by far the most expensive from all of us working in the areas I work. (Apart from 1 guy that charges about 20% more than me and loses his custies for other reasons, not turning up / charging twice after only 1 clean etc).

I think I would be pretty upset if a cowboy came into an area I was working, but it doesn't give me the right to knock him about. This business is always going to have cowboys.

If buying a round was the only way to get work, who builds the round in the first place?

I still don't get it mate, if you bought the round and it's a good one, why are you reacting like this? A stable round can't be "nicked" by anyone, or why would it be worth buying?

[PaulTh]

hi cozy,i havent bought the round as yet,im just saying if i thought about the window cleaning business like some do on here then i wouldnt bother forking out for work if any tom,dick or harry could just nick it from me,my gf told me few weeks ago that her mother and her neighbours arent happy with their window cleaner and i could go do theirs but i dont think that way i guess im old fashioned.Every window cleaner i know and i know loads through the west coast and they all the think the same way,keeping to your own areas,not stepping on others toes basically do to others as youd have done to yourselves,karma has its way of biting you in the ass,its different if an old boy gives up the ghost or someone has an accident in which case we normally help the guy out with his work till he decides hes ready to come back,infact the only wcer i met with a different attitude is the jehovah guy.

[martinsadie]

hi cozy,i havent bought the round as yet,im just saying if i thought about the window cleaning business like some do on here then i wouldnt bother forking out for work if any tom,dick or harry could just nick it from me,my gf told me few weeks ago that her mother and her neighbours arent happy with their window cleaner and i could go do theirs but i dont think that way i guess im old fashioned.Every window cleaner i know and i know loads through the west coast and they all the think the same way,keeping to your own areas,not stepping on others toes basically do to others as youd have done to yourselves,karma has its way of biting you in the ass,its different if an old boy gives up the ghost or someone has an accident in which case we normally help the guy out with his work till he decides hes ready to come back,infact the only wcer i met with a different attitude is the jehovah guy.

thats the way it is around here

[R W C]

hi cozy,i havent bought the round as yet,im just saying if i thought about the window cleaning business like some do on here then i wouldnt bother forking out for work if any tom,dick or harry could just nick it from me,my gf told me few weeks ago that her mother and her neighbours arent happy with their window cleaner and i could go do theirs but i dont think that way i guess im old fashioned.Every window cleaner i know and i know loads through the west coast and they all the think the same way,keeping to your own areas,not stepping on others toes basically do to others as youd have done to yourselves,karma has its way of biting you in the ass,its different if an old boy gives up the ghost or someone has an accident in which case we normally help the guy out with his work till he decides hes ready to come back,infact the only wcer i met with a different attitude is the jehovah guy.

There is absolutly no such thing as patches, Ive got quite a few custys moving at the min and theyve asked me to carry on at there new property or does this now mean i have to tell them that the person that currently cleans that area has to do it weather you like it or not, and that the people moving into your old house will have to have me, so im not going to make sure that every clean is brilliant as they dont get a choice , its me or know one, When i canvass i only take work where they havent got a cleaner, if they say there not happy with there cleaner i suggest that they sort it with there cleaner and see if he can sort out the problems they have with him, if this is a know go I give them my card and they can ring me in the future, ive never asked anyone what they currently pay and most of the time im more expensive, Im a big beliver in karma and this has been proven to me.I would never knowingly take work off other cleaners, Ive handed quite a bit to others and some of them are on this forum, but if someone delibratly takes work off me id have no hesitation doing the same.

Chris

[cozy]

Good point lads, if that's the only way to get a decent start then I can see your point. It's still a mystery to me though why there is an attitude of patches.

I remember as a kid in the 60's, WC's having a punchup over town center shop work but I didn't realize it was like that in UK now.

Not stepping on other guys toes is noble but how would a business develope?

Oh well, there but for the grace of god............

Looks like I'm living in a totaly different world over here. I'll get my coat shall i?

[R W C]

Cozy I think youll find this only happens in very few areas,

[martinsadie]

Not stepping on other guys toes is noble but how would a business develope?

you buy a round for starters and if you need more work you buy of a cleaner whos downsizing or finishing,only new cleaners round here are the ones who buy work  

[Johnny B]

It seems to me that it's all down to the customers' choice.
I have been told on many occasions by my customers when they have been approached by a window cleaner or somebody canvassing. I always smile at this, because it usually means that I will pick up more work. I cannot ever remember losing a customer because of somebody else looking for window cleaning work, even if the price is lower than mine. Hence my earlier comment that customers are usually very loyal. At least mine are anyway. I always reply to my customers that I hope they get enough work to make it work for them, as they need to make a living just as we all do, and there is enough work to go round, but that I appreciate their continued custom.

I still fail to understand why some window cleaners feel they have a right to their 'patch' as they call it. Even if the work has been bought, surely the person who has bought the work would look after their customers so well that they would make themselves indispensible to them, so anyone trying to acquire their customers would be unsuccessful, whether anyone was trying to undercut them or not.

John