Scrub Puller
Senior Member
From reading these pages over the past few years it seems to me that most dirt jobs in the US...even small ones are done against a quote. Times may well be changing and it could be the same here in the cities but, around here in the sticks it’s still generally hourly rate work as it was back in the ‘sixty’s.
The problem is there are some slack ass “contractors” who have no idea of how to run a business. I have hired a couple of excavators and dozers during the past few years and none of them have been satisfactory when it comes to time keeping and invoicing...I query everything unless I receive an itemised account.
One bloke reckoned he worked on engine hour meter hours...and on the first day the twenty five ton Hitachi started in the morning and ran until half past five that night. I asked him for the hours and he read it from the meter...and at $130 an hour you’d think he’d mention tenths. He got a little agro when I pointed out that on half a dozen occasions he’d been wandering around the paddock with his ear stuck to a phone...plus a short lunch break and smoko with an idling machine. I gave him a cheque and told him he was finished and he’d better phone in for the float.
With a one man operation it is a pain in the butt to be taking time out estimating...far better if you can just hook into it and get the bugger done. The thing is any job takes what it takes...if you have good machinery suited to the job, a competent operator and a fair hourly rate there is no way to do it better. In most cases the client is the “winner” because if I’m quoting I’ll add a contingency factor.
For instance I would fly over a block of scrub (or ride it) with the client and would maybe estimate that it should cost around two dollars fifty an acre... but would point out that I would quote three bucks if he wanted it pulled “contract”. I should add that in those days D9G’s hired at fifty to sixty bucks an hour and we threw the chain in free.
To work this way you have to know your costs and work at the high end of the rate scale...this allows some “wriggle room” if things go a little pear shaped. You need to be impeccable with your record keeping and bookwork. All our machines had a specially printed log book. The operators were obliged to have a decent watch. If we were pulling (with two or three tractors) start times and stop times for each run were recorded with notations with the reason for stopping such as “broken chain”, “broken blade rope”, “smoko” or what all...the client was charged by the minute for the actual hours that the machines worked.
For a while we also ran we also ran Kienzle clockwork vibration card recorders but they were unable to cope with the dust and vibration. At the finish of the job the often grimy dog eared originals from the logbooks (and the recorder cards if available) were supplied to the client with the invoice showing a breakdown of the individual jobs, the machine number, the hourly rate and hours and minutes worked.
With this strategy we were able to build up a reputation as honest brokers in a huge area of Queensland and apart from Government work we were rarely asked to quote.
On the smaller scale it realy bugs me to see folks getting duded by blokes quoting exorbitant prices for straight forward painting, house yard fencing and roofing jobs...and then hear them skiting later that they’d “killed it” putting up a fence for some little old lady...I suppose it’s lack of competition, probably a condition that doesn’t apply so much in the US?
Any comments?
The problem is there are some slack ass “contractors” who have no idea of how to run a business. I have hired a couple of excavators and dozers during the past few years and none of them have been satisfactory when it comes to time keeping and invoicing...I query everything unless I receive an itemised account.
One bloke reckoned he worked on engine hour meter hours...and on the first day the twenty five ton Hitachi started in the morning and ran until half past five that night. I asked him for the hours and he read it from the meter...and at $130 an hour you’d think he’d mention tenths. He got a little agro when I pointed out that on half a dozen occasions he’d been wandering around the paddock with his ear stuck to a phone...plus a short lunch break and smoko with an idling machine. I gave him a cheque and told him he was finished and he’d better phone in for the float.
With a one man operation it is a pain in the butt to be taking time out estimating...far better if you can just hook into it and get the bugger done. The thing is any job takes what it takes...if you have good machinery suited to the job, a competent operator and a fair hourly rate there is no way to do it better. In most cases the client is the “winner” because if I’m quoting I’ll add a contingency factor.
For instance I would fly over a block of scrub (or ride it) with the client and would maybe estimate that it should cost around two dollars fifty an acre... but would point out that I would quote three bucks if he wanted it pulled “contract”. I should add that in those days D9G’s hired at fifty to sixty bucks an hour and we threw the chain in free.
To work this way you have to know your costs and work at the high end of the rate scale...this allows some “wriggle room” if things go a little pear shaped. You need to be impeccable with your record keeping and bookwork. All our machines had a specially printed log book. The operators were obliged to have a decent watch. If we were pulling (with two or three tractors) start times and stop times for each run were recorded with notations with the reason for stopping such as “broken chain”, “broken blade rope”, “smoko” or what all...the client was charged by the minute for the actual hours that the machines worked.
For a while we also ran we also ran Kienzle clockwork vibration card recorders but they were unable to cope with the dust and vibration. At the finish of the job the often grimy dog eared originals from the logbooks (and the recorder cards if available) were supplied to the client with the invoice showing a breakdown of the individual jobs, the machine number, the hourly rate and hours and minutes worked.
With this strategy we were able to build up a reputation as honest brokers in a huge area of Queensland and apart from Government work we were rarely asked to quote.
On the smaller scale it realy bugs me to see folks getting duded by blokes quoting exorbitant prices for straight forward painting, house yard fencing and roofing jobs...and then hear them skiting later that they’d “killed it” putting up a fence for some little old lady...I suppose it’s lack of competition, probably a condition that doesn’t apply so much in the US?
Any comments?
