Calling all Sparks...

Jimbo said:

I don't see how that would take more than three hours or so.

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Oh.

I have repleced hundreds and hundreds of domestic CUs.

The average existing CU would be either a 4 way or 6 way wylex.

It would take me a full 8 hour day to do the CU swap and required testing.

On the masive majority of these jobs the main protective bonding would be either undersized or missing altogether, so that needed to be installed before the job was completed.

It was normal to have an apprentice with me to install the bonding, and carry out any other required remedial work.

Very common faults are open circuit ring final circuits, open circuit CPCs on lighting circuits, neutral to earth insulation resistance faults.

So before we start, you have

16 man hours on site
Consumer unit
MCBs or RCBOs
Meter tails
Main earth
Protective bonding cable
EC14 earth clamps
Fixings
thru crimps
PVC trunking.

I then need to have the following, which needs to be bought and paid for:

A vehicle to get to your house
Fuel for the vehicle
Tax for the vehicle
Insurance for the vehicle
A drive to the wholesalers to get the parts for your job
A drill and drill bits
A circular saw
An extention lead
A 110V transformer
A hand lamp
Gloves, goggles and a dust mask
A whole range of hand tools running into thousands of pounds
Work trousers and overalls
Up to date qualifications
A multi function installation tester
A current calibration certificate for my test kit
The training to safely and competently use my tester
Professional body membership
Annual renewal fees for my professional body membership
Professional indemnity insurance
Public liability insurance
Notification fees to the LABC
Accountant fees
Dust sheets
Vaccuum cleaner
Time to visit your house to see the job
Time sat at home whilst compiling and writing out your quote
Time sat at home whilst completing your certificate
Time sat at home whilst notifing the LABC of your job
Time sat at home whilst writing out your invoice
An envolope and stamp to send your invoice to you.

And at the end of this, I still have to earn a wage and pay my apprentice his wage too.



I expect I've missed some stuff off my list there

RF Lighting said:

I expect I've missed some stuff off my list there

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Batteries for your camera and plenty of green & yellow earth sleeving...

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Don't you have dehydrated water out there yet?

It's much lighter to carry, and you just reconstitute it on-site.

theres also the fact that when you turn up the old unit is an old wylex one
and all the neutrals etc are too short and mixed up
so you try to move it down/up respectively no gain length but then the cables coming in the opposite side are even shorter
I always allow half a day just for the CU

holmslaw said:

davy_owen_88 said:

RF Lighting said:

I expect I've missed some stuff off my list there

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Batteries for your camera and plenty of green & yellow earth sleeving...

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And loads of burn bandages.

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What is this?

Pick on RF Lighting day or something?

holmslaw said:

Jimbo - cost explanation.

1. Spark has to disconnect all appliances in your house, not switch them off, physically disconnect and take out all the lamps - 1 hour.

2. Then he starts to test and finds something is still connected, wastes time looking for it - 30mins.

3. Spark has to take great care not to damage any of you nic nacs etc - allow £50 to compensate you.

4. cu change if straightforward - 1 hour.

5. full test on cu and spot check on all circuits - 1 hour.

6. Reconnect all appliances and replace lamps - 1 hour.

7. Finds rcd has tripped, track down faulty appliance - 1 hour.

8. Trying to convince you that it was your fridge (or whatever) that tripped the rcd, and its got nothing to with him, while your protesting it that it worked before he started, and hes trying to write out the certificate - 30 mins.

Thats 5-6 hours and remember people quote by the hour, or half day or whole day, so 5-6 hours becomes a whole day.

Ok all of the above might not happen, but I will include them in my price.

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And that's worth up to £1000 wow.

I start at £350 for a cu change & that includes bonding (if the bonding route is a pain the price goes up), any inherrant faults that are found are then chargable works.
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Like most other people we do have to make a living you know.

I taken to getting my PAT tester out in the course of a PIR nowadays, a lot of landlords are coming to expect it now too.

Sniffs out the occasional (allbeit, not all) dodgy white goods.

Depending on the number of ways in the DB, a replacement can take from 6 hours upwards, a PIR is recommended by both the NICEIC and NAPIT before the work, (whether this is quoted for or not beforehand). An EIC is required in any case and the PIR is similar in content.

A PIR itself can also take from 6 hrs upwards including the time spent on generating the paperwork. The advantage of carrying out a PIR, is that any departures from the regulations or faults can be determined, such departures or faults may require to be left unconnected on a consumer unit change, if the customer doesn't want to pay.
The other possibility is to obtain a quote for the DB replacement; with the conditions that any discrepancies found during testing and inspection, are charged separately, the amount of these charges in this case are unknown; and liable to disputed by the customer.

A PIR basic cost is around £200 and the minimum cost for a DB change is £350, if done separately. a cowboy or a "friend" could do it cheaper if there was no notification to the LBA.

Regards

Last domestic CU I changed was just before Part P came in and I decided to get out the game and do a degree in electronics, now coming back into the game. Here is what happened:

House was recently decorated, PIR before hand showed nothing that was out of tolerance, noted a few faults, replaced the CU, takes me half a day. I left my self a few hours to do this as it looked straight forward. Ended up with a bag of crimps and a crimper to extend a few cables.

Found two open circuit ring final circuits, open circuit CPCs on three lighting circuits. Went to fix these, had to take up two floors, found a rats nest of junctions boxs. Fixed the faults. Its now 6pm and I get the power back on, RCD trips. Turned out to be a securtity light on a FCU so only happened when they turned it on at night. Stuff like this you overlook on a walk around while quoting.

Spend till 9pm finding the fault. Have to have a second day on site to finish up inspection and testing.

Charged £800, two days work, and a couple of hours at home to do the cert and invoices. 16 Hours work, now we have parts included in that as well and all the stuff I did not quote in I had to use such as crimps, lenghts of cables of drums, a earth block, time waiting for the DNO.

So 3 hours max then? I really wish, most old CU changes end up with fault finding. Then there is the making good of the floor you just ripped up and expaining to the customer why the floor came up when they expected you to just work with the "fuse box"

That's why I got out was fed up.

Adam

toasty said:

Regarding the light socket, yep, been there done that, not as bad as the camera I bought from a jumble sale and then zapped myself on the flash capacitor - still got the scar on my thumb, must be 20 years ago!!!

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That's why they call you toasty!!

Okay, I'm starting to understand where some of the cost is coming now. But that's not necessarily a good thing.

Holmslaw's explanation was very enlightening. An hour to unplug all the appliances and bulbs @ 1 hour. I firmly believe I could do my 4-bed detached house in less than 15 mins.

Point 3 was especially interesting - charging the customer in case the sparky is a clumsy oaf??? Tell you what - ask me to move the thing you're so worried about damaging, I'd rather do that than pay you 50 notes.

I can understand point 8, but that assumes that the customer can't understand simple logic. Fair enough in some cases though I admit.

The final statement about 6 hours being rounded up to a day is a corker! I work a 7.5 hour day and that equates to a 25% surcharge for no reason. I imagine the average sparky works longer days, meaning that rounding up is even more of a p1ss-take!

It's all very well saying that "we do have to make a living you know", but if you charge £500 a day, then at an average of around 220 days per year that adds up to £110k pre-tax. I accept there are plenty of expenses, and that you might not always get £500 each day you work. But even at £300 per day - a 40% drop - you're still clearing well over £45k per year after tax (but before expenses).

RF Lighting - that's a great list. But most of those are either one-off costs or not specific to 'my' job. Presumably you don't got and buy just enough crimp terminals to do a job each time, but rather you buy in bulk so you may go to the wholesalers once a week or so. These items are consumables rather than individual one-off parts costs. And I assume they go on the bill to your customer, marked up. I would guess that the mark-up more than covers your occasional drive to the wholesalers?

It would be interesting to know what your costs add up to on a yearly basis.

Holmslaw's first response to my OP quoted a minimum of £500 - so presumably that would be a straightforward job. And based on Holmslaw's time breakdown, I as the customer end up paying £100 per hour!! So even with all the certs and tools etc., it still seems like a pretty lucrative line of work to me.

I'm really glad I don't actually ever do domestic work.

You will probably find the quote is somewhere in the region of £1000 though.

We put in a big price when we don't like the attitude of a customer, and don't really want the job.