[wazzastud]

This is an appoligy to all the happy people out there who are happy with 60 quid a week cleaning windows
I didnt mean to offend any of you....Honest i didnt, i just thought that by letting you know there was a how to manual out there that might be able to assist you with your  busines and i just thought you may be interested in it, sorry for the bad judgement on our part folks......what more can i say?...........lmfao

Anyway........enough of that dammed manual.......its sold out now anyway.......whilst out canvessing last night 16/9/03 i knocked at a door of a nice house and asked the young chap who answered weather his mum or dad was there and he looked a bit cross with me and said he owned the house so i just made light of it and said well you cant get a better compliment than that mate...lol...i offered my services and he asked how much so i told him £12.50 B/F and that we come round on a monthly basis, and then i asked did he have a conservitory to which he replied he did, i said well we charge £2.50 for that so £15 he laughed and said you had better come in and have a look so we whent through this bloody fantastic house to the kitchen and attached to the kitchen was this 40 foot by 20 foot conservitory with a heated indoor swimming pool,i nearly fell through the floor......i said i see what you mean so anyway we agreed to do it all in for £30, but thats not all he then said he would like me to price his offices up because he had been let down by no less than 4 window cleaners he runs his own chartered accountants office, but i aint got a clue what to charge, i have had a look and there is approx 36 sq Meters of glass one side and 39 sq Meters on the other side its above shops and there is a wide concrete ledge to work from so no ladder work and round the back is a flat ashphelt roof to work from also no ladder work...........how should i price it ........ per meter or by the time it takes to do?............how do you experienced guys price these jobs up?

[wazzastud]

P.S I guess the 4 window cleaners who previously let Mr Mcewen Down got fed up with 60 quid a week or went bancrupt......just a thought........perhaps Mr Speedy,turbo,Sqeegee ma thingy can tell me how he prices his commercial jobs up, when he gets time off from his PR work...........would be nice to hear from a real pro.

[Majestic]

Does your book not cover how to price jobs? (Joke )
The way that I do it is per window that way you can get a better price  

[Rob_B]

How I price up commercial jobs is I see how long a job is roughly going to take me, then charge my hourly rate for that length of time.

[wazzastud]

And there was little old me thinking that no one on this forum had a sence of humour and then majestic goes and cracks a joke...lol
thanks for the advice majestic and Rob_B
its Much appreciated,  

An Update with ref: the offices for those that are interested if any........lol

we submitted our Writen Quote Today for £120 whilst we were on site at the guys house cleaning his windows and pool housing for £30 he has accepted the quote and members of our team will be carrying out the work tommorrow morning at his business premises.
That makes £150 + the other work canvessed in that  hour £54 worth To a total of £204  A new record for our company all from one person door canvessing residential properties. who was it who said it couldnt be done and that they didnt believe me? I guess the old saying is true the harder you work the luckier you get.

( just for the record: the unmentionable item that our publishing company has produced and that was being joked about was advertised for the residential market in variouse European and US trade publications via press release and not commercial work as this is a new field to us, we are also thinking at this stage of taking a vary seriouse look at the contract cleaning arena ie retail outlets and offices etc )

will have to reaserch that field first though

[Majestic]

Are you a sole trader or do you have people working for you  

[wazzastud]

I have just recruited a few fellers, i was a sole trader up until recently

[STEVE71163]

Do you find that you get three times the work done with three of you because we have never seemed to achieve that?

Steve Lowe

[gibbouk]

i just canvessed a job for £1800 pound so i guess my average for the week is higher than yours.

[Service_Champion]

I've just got a contract worth £3000 to clean 6 pubs in Hampshire, twice a month inside and out.
It is my first commercial contract, lets hope there is more like it.

Regards.

Stewart.
Service Champions -Total Cleaning Solutions

[wazzastud]

Yes we are getting more work done, with teams of two guys, we are getting twice the work done, as long as the work keeps comming we will go for growth every time.

Well done you guys, £1800 and £3000 is good going, yes i should think there is plenty more where that come from, the more contracts you get the better it looks to other commercial outlets, build a portfolio to show new and potential clients.

[The_Fed_Man]

Steve, everytime you add a person you will find the total manhours on the job will go up, the law of diminishing returns.  For example, two never do twice as much as one, three never do three times as much as one and so on, also your staff also will not work as hard as you do, so allow for that in any calculations (well not normally, although I know of a guy who said he would beat them up if they didn't!).

[STEVE71163]

Never tried that , Thats a good idea! Thats what we have found that the more people working together the less productive it seems. I think its better in twos really.

Steve Lowe