FIND AN ELECTRICIAN SITES: Who do they benefit?

[sparkticus]

MyHammer, ServiceMagic, RatedPeople, MyBuilder even B&Q/ScrewFix have a site. I was approached this week by a small start-up wanting me to pay £300 to be listed on an "Electric Booking" site allowing estate agents and local authorities to find "reputable" service providers!!

Typically they want around £35/month subscription fee, then take a percentage of the jobs that you bid for/win in the range of 6% to 10%.

Most of them offer some form of customer feedback and tradesman feedback. For technical trades such as gas, electrics & electronics that feedback is usually
- "Polite, tidied up afterwards"
- "Very professional job completed on time"
- "Arrived on time, did a good job, cleaned up afterwards"
- "Excellent job would recommend to friends and family"

Clearly you never see anything like "arrived on time but failed to fully comply with BS7671 running cables outside of prescribed zones"

Now they are obviously for all trades/services but do they benefit electricians or clients looking for electricians in any way? Are they worth the money? If so how many do you join?

 

[seco services]

Clearly you never see anything like "arrived on time but failed to fully comply with BS7671 running cables outside of prescribed zones"

Thats cause these posts are removed
Anyone can post comments on their own advert.

Now they are obviously for all trades/services but do they benefit electricians or clients looking for electricians in any way? Are they worth the money? If so how many do you join?

No descent tradesman would entertain these rip off merchants.
Take a look at what the bids go in for, i wouldn't start the van for them prices.

 

[sparkticus]

Take a look at what the bids go in for, i wouldn't start the van for them prices.

I tend to agree with you but these sites are capturing a huge amount of domestic electrical work. At what point do you say "if I can't beat then I'll join them" ?

We have lost several domestic PIRs to such sites. One of them where the job was awarded by the client at £45!!! (a full PIR on a 3 bed semi)


Shunning them is one approach but another approach is to join and raise the standards? Or is it?

 

[EFLImpudence]

I tend to agree with you but these sites are capturing a huge amount of domestic electrical work... ...One of them where the job was awarded by the client at £45

If that is the case then you'd probably be better off starting another site than actually doing any work

 

[flameport]

We have lost several domestic PIRs to such sites. One of them where the job was awarded by the client at £45!!! (a full PIR on a 3 bed semi)

There will always be people like that - they are the ones who get 15 quotes for a tiny little job, and then still complain about the price.

They are also the ones who:
- are never satisfied with anything
- want a top quality job doing for less than nothing
- want the impossible such as a rewire with no mess or damage to walls
- will stand right behind you while the work is done
- agree a time for the quote/work yet are not in when you arrive
- complain bitterly if you are 1 minute late
- expect you to rush out to their property at any time of the day or night because a light has broken
- attempt the work themselves, get it wrong and then claim 'it was always like that' and 'it worked before you got here'
- want to supply all the parts themselves (including consumer units and similar) because they think it will save them money
- rewire their whole house and expect you to turn up for 5 minutes to just do 'the final connection' and issue a certificate.

Do you really want to attract that sort of customer?

 

[sparkticus]

I tend to agree with you but these sites are capturing a huge amount of domestic electrical work... ...One of them where the job was awarded by the client at £45

If that is the case then you'd probably be better off starting another site than actually doing any work

Now personally I like what I am doing now and do not want to make my living from what could be confused for a scam. But your comment is relevant because so many people do appear to be starting such sites. The big ones spend money on advertising and even back the likes of programs such as cowboy builders but where is all this going? Won't these sites dilute themselves by there simply being too many of them? I mean how many variations of the yellow pages do we need?

 

[kevindgas]

firstly your list at the beginning is slightly misleading as B&Q don't charge anything for there trade directory (which we are on)

the likes of my hammer / checkatrade etc. are just leeches preying on the unsuspecting, pay up and your in (even with your cowboy hat and boots)

sadly the fools out there hang on everything they see on the TV! so the likes of C.A.T grow bigger by the day forcing yet more of us to join or get no business!! f****g pain in the aris the lot of them. its hard enough for us to pay for the governments stealth taxes like CPS and reassessments every 5 years without giving this scum our hard earned as well!

CAT makes my blood boil setting themselves up as judge and jury of traders with nothing but fear put in the minds of the masses!

 

[Stoday]

You can judge these sites by how easily a customer can find them.

Try Google with "electrician mytown" and see if one of these comes up. If it's not on the first two pages, it's useless.

 

[sparkticus]

firstly your list at the beginning is slightly misleading as B&Q don't charge anything for there trade directory (which we are on)

B&Q are related to "problemsolved" and charge £10/month.

the likes of my hammer / checkatrade etc. are just leeches preying on the unsuspecting, pay up and your in (even with your cowboy hat and boots)

It's easy to make such comments but what about pro's as well as contructive cons?

sadly the fools out there hang on everything they see on the TV! so the likes of C.A.T grow bigger by the day forcing yet more of us to join or get no business!! f****g pain in the aris the lot of them. its hard enough for us to pay for the governments stealth taxes like CPS and reassessments every 5 years without giving this scum our hard earned as well!

What fools are you referring to? Do you mean your potential client base?
I don't disagree with all of your comments (at least to some degree) but ranting has never fixed anything.

CAT makes my blood boil setting themselves up as judge and jury of traders with nothing but fear put in the minds of the masses!

"fear in the mind of the masses" that's is quite fearful in itself! Do you really think it is that bad? Are we seeing the rise of a new superpower?

What is C.A.T?

 

[JohnW2]

You can judge these sites by how easily a customer can find them. Try Google with "electrician mytown" and see if one of these comes up. If it's not on the first two pages, it's useless.

If I do that for my nearest town, 'ratedpeople' and 'mybuilder' are both in the first half of the first page. Is that good or bad?

Kind Regards, John.