Day rate advice

[Yanni]

Just because he's charging you twice as much doesn't mean to say that it's split equally between the two.
Thee electrician might be getting £300 and the apprentice £100

I think that explains it all for me...

I would expect a day rate to be around £300-350 (plus VAT if applicable) for an Electrician.

Sure it all depends where about in the country you live, London is certainly much more expensive than here up north. The £200 per day is not unreasonable for a self employed electrician. I had further chats with other companies here up North they confirm they pay their men £22 per hour. My electrician charges me now £240 per day plus VAT and he is employing others to do the work, he is not involved with tools. If at £240 per day makes a profit then If you do the work yourself the £200 is reasonable. VAT is not a problem as we claim it back as a business.

I'm not an electrician, but I wonder if, rather than this being a 'customer' point of view, could it be a projection of your own views onto the tradespeople?
Is this more a reflection of your own business philosophy?

If a business philosophy is being a good steward of your expenses, pay only what is due and constantly looking after value for money I believe everyone should be looking at this model. The government that has plenty of free money to give for furlough can always top up the rest.

As a final thought will I go with the £400 a day electrician? Not necessarily, In fact I had a quote with another company and expect to receive a higher price for this quote for the same job. But the person who spoke to me and visited the factory gave me much more confidence in having experience in similar industrial settings and also advised me on further electrical work that would save me hundreds of pounds in the future.

Yoohoo Yanni where are you?

Right here!

 

[flameport]

I had further chats with other companies here up North they confirm they pay their men £22 per hour.

At 40 hours per week (8 hours x 5 days) at £22 per hour, the cost to that business including employers NI for 1 person is £985 per week or £197 per day.

There is absolutely no way they could charge £200+VAT per day per person as that only leaves a ridiculous £3 per day to cover all other costs, and that also assumes their employees work 100% of the time available and therefore have no holidays, sick days or anything else.

 

[markyd1]

£ 22 per hour...get them to do the job.......and then get someone for £400 per day to put it right

 

[chivers67]

The last guy i worked for had two apprentices and paid them £5 an hour, this is in Surrey, South East (was 5 years ago) - they also went to college studying which they got paid to do too. Effectively they were learning the trade as teenagers.

 

[ChloeRadshaw1]

I do enjoy these threads where people talk about tradesmen needing tools and van and expenses. What about breakfast and lunch.

£240 a day is cheap - You should pay them 900 a day

Seriously when people go to university for three years study hard and then come out on 25K a year (and have to pay for suits, travel and everything themselves) being an electrician at 16 years old is the ticket to a fortune

 

[Deleted member 174758]

Do I detect just a smidgeon of jealousy there, Chloe? I'm not a sparky (I'm a carpenter and joiner), and so I'm not on a a sparkies rate, either, but are you saying that in a market economy, where there is a massive shortage of people willing to enter the trades, and where this country has deliberately cut itself off from a major source of trade labour, that people shouldn't be paid the market rate, as dictated by supply and demand? I am old enough to have lived through several depressions where building trades jobs were all but impossible to find and rates ridiculously low (would you have worked for the sub-£9/hour rate on offer if and when you could find work, as many tradesmen did back in 2008 to 2010?). And tell me why a computer programmer is worth £35k to £75k after only a 3 (padded out from 2) year degree? This is more than my site manager earns, for a helluva lot less responsibility (never heard of a programmer going to prison for manaughter yet). And why does a solicitor cost so much? (The last one I used cost over £100/hr) BTW I can't recall a single apprenticevin recent years being 16 years old - most are 17 or even 18. And since when does a degree mean that you are actually worth anything to a company? Graduates in most disciplines arrive with zero work experience, zero work ethic and in many cases zero relevant experience for the role they are to undertake (e.g. the classics graduate who landed a job as a reporter - know who I mealn? - and we all know how that career progressed)

 

[Taylortwocities]

The topic is nearly a year old, and inflation has been rampant since then. Add 50% to all rates. (LOL)