Patio quotes

[electrogear]

I’m having a bit of trouble getting an idea of patio labour costs. I’ve done all the ground work for our patio including digging out and compacting 200mm of hardcore and I’m buying the 900x600 porcelain slabs next week. The total area is about 80 square metres and there’s a path approx 10 square metres which is curved but other than that it’s fairly straight forward - no drains to fit or anything.

I had a friend’s brother come in December to have a look and he quoted £45 per square metre for laying the slabs and supplying sand, cement and grout. I thought this was reasonable but he’s now said he’s putting his prices up and wants to come and give an overall quote instead because materials have gone up in the last few months and I can just sense that I’m being messed about a bit here. I’ve been in touch with 2 other fitters but they both want to charge me to quote and they’re saying there’s currently a waiting time of over a year!

I’m starting to lean towards doing this myself but if anyone has any examples of pricing for labour only it would be helpful.

 

[Notch7]

£45 a sq metre sounds pretty fair to me.

And he is right everything is going up - literally by the week. The fuel prices, esp diesel has a big impact on heavy side materials - think how much those builders lorries guzzle.

and the tradesman doing it - his diesel has gone up too.

I used to say around £100 a metre for a patio for say Indian sandstone, base, supply and lay slaves etc.

 

[Charlie George]

£45 a sq metre sounds pretty fair to me.

And he is right everything is going up - literally by the week. The fuel prices, esp diesel has a big impact on heavy side materials - think how much those builders lorries guzzle.

and the tradesman doing it - his diesel has gone up too.

I used to say around £100 a metre for a patio for say Indian sandstone, base, supply and lay slaves etc.

Is that allowed?

 

[Notch7]

Is that allowed?

 

[electrogear]

£45 a sq metre sounds pretty fair to me.

And he is right everything is going up - literally by the week. The fuel prices, esp diesel has a big impact on heavy side materials - think how much those builders lorries guzzle.

and the tradesman doing it - his diesel has gone up too.

I used to say around £100 a metre for a patio for say Indian sandstone, base, supply and lay slaves etc.

Thanks for the reply. I’ve been populating my spreadsheet…

Costs for a 4:1 mix of sharp sand/cement, primer slurry and brush in grout total around £20/sqM (delivered) and that’s taking the first online price I can find so I’ll be able to get that down to about £15/sqM I reckon, so by my reckoning he’s charging roughly £30 per square metre for laying the slabs as the ground work is already done. If he averages 15 square metres per day (conservative estimate?) that’s a day rate of £450, and he lives the next village over.

I don’t want to be “one of those” customers but it does seem a lot of money and if this is the going rate these days then I’m in the wrong trade because builders, joiners and electrician rates are in the £150-£200/day range where I live!

 

[John D v2.0]

You can ask for a day rate or you can ask for a square metre price. If it's a square metre price you know what you're paying and the contractor takes the risk on anything unforeseen by them.
If you prefer to pay a day rate and book them for 3 days, then the sand doesn't turn up or the mixer breaks down then that's a couple of hundred. Then are you going to supervise the work, what happens if the grout cracks is that another day or two to fix it.
I think you've answered your own question though, this builder is happy to do it but you think is expensive, however you can't even get other quotes at the moment, suggesting the quote is fair enough.
Personally i agree that you should do it yourself. There's no point trying to guess whether he's trying to take the Mickey or not.. Good luck!

 

[mikeey84]

Additionally some builders may be reluctant if they haven't laid the base themselves.

If the patio starts moving, and you get them back, they could easily point to the base being the problem, and then your stuck having to fix the issue yourself

 

[lowster]

It depends on where you are in the country as to whether £45 is a good price - I'd bite their arm off! I had quotes (East mids) for levelling and laying 70 sq meters of indian sandstone paving and the quotes were well over £20k! Well out of my affordability, so have had to have a go myself.