next door pricing

What or how do you guyd price an equipment job next to a current job.No by that I mean like a 1 -2 hour job/

Do you :

1. Just charge your 4 hour min.

2. just charge a nominal fee because your right there and it's not a big job.

3.not do it right then and tell them you will be back and charge them reg. price.

This scenario assumes that the original job will take less than a full day, and therefore there will be time to squeeze that little job in while the equipment is there. I try to still stick to my minimum charge in these cases, but I'll make it sound like I am giving a deal for the job being next door. If you give the little job a real good price & the 2 neighbors happen to discuss their dealings with you, the original customer might get a little upset if he hears about a better deal that his neighbor got. So I try to be fair to the clients & myself in these cases. That said, I have done all 3 of those options in the past lol, so I guess its all a matter of the current mood & desire to do the work also.

I just did one of these last week. A deck was being built next door to where I was working and they needed pier footings dug. I gave him a price under my minimum, the job took 20 minutes and everyone was happy. The original job was 5 days, and the rate I got on the extra work was much higher than that of the original job so there were no hard feelings.

I don't like to take on "extra" work too much because it almost always goes sour and throws my schedule off, but when and easy one comes along and I can get a good rate on it, I'll do it.

I'd recommend making sure the work was performed before the equipment leaves; this can come back to haunt you if your bid is too low.

I can tell how not to charge. One guy I was working for had a finish grade around a house. His D5C and Kubota tractor were on site. Builder across the street from where we were working needed a finish grade done. He asked the guy I was working for if he wanted to do it. The owner slapped together a price that include mobe in, and mobe out, even though we were across the street. Builder rightfully said you just need to track across the street, no mobe costs. At this point I had already laid lumber to cross the street, as the owner told me to do. The owner, and builder got in a shouting match, Pissing away a 4 hour minimum charge for a job that would have taken an hour and a half.

Dude this thread was like 5 years old lol

I got a crew working next door to me to bring a backhoe over and move a very small pile of rock. Maybe 5 tons. Took him about 30 minutes. He charged $100.00 where he usually gets $75.00 per hour. He was happy and I was happy. Anytime I need a small project done, I always look for someone working nearby. I had some lake bank work done by a crew working next door about 2 months ago. They charged their regular rate of $75.00 per hour on each of two machines for a 14 hour project. Did not charge any equipment moving expense or minimun. If they had I would have probably used my regular crew. Bottom line is, by not being greedy they picked up an extra 28 hours of work in a slow economy and did a good job which means I will probably use them again in the future. They will also be recommended when anyone aks me who to use on an excavating job.

Turbo21835 said:

I can tell how not to charge. One guy I was working for had a finish grade around a house. His D5C and Kubota tractor were on site. Builder across the street from where we were working needed a finish grade done. He asked the guy I was working for if he wanted to do it. The owner slapped together a price that include mobe in, and mobe out, even though we were across the street. Builder rightfully said you just need to track across the street, no mobe costs. At this point I had already laid lumber to cross the street, as the owner told me to do. The owner, and builder got in a shouting match, Pissing away a 4 hour minimum charge for a job that would have taken an hour and a half.

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but we don't know your boss's cost of operation. his overhead....i'll load items on an estimate that i think will require more than asked for...and back off on items that in my opinion they won't need as much of....dollars end up being the same...you never leave a job where you made a good margin regretting it

Chris91786 said:

Dude this thread was like 5 years old lol

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True. You can thank the administration of the site for my post -- I had to post 3 to be able to start a new thread..

Ah well.

--c

CJT said:

True. You can thank the administration of the site for my post -- I had to post 3 to be able to start a new thread..

Ah well.

--c

Click to expand...

yeah, we all need to do that, lol
at least the discussion here gave us new ideas..


www.komatpillar.com

I would have to say that this thread is probably as important now as it was when it first started ,with this money crunch going on our customers are looking at both sides of every coin they spend and want the best value they can get .It has happened to me on more than one occasion that we have squeezed in jobs at a reduced rate as we were close to them ,our business is to supply a good service at a reasonable price and for myself I have found that these jobs more often than not, result in repeat work as you appeared accommodating in the start did a good job and gave good service.


Stock

I've done quite a few "next door" jobs. Usually, I'll tell them the regular hourly rate or do it for some cash. In the end, I have some extra money in the pocket, they are happy and I found another person to wave at when driving by. Community relations IMO.

I agree with not wanting to upset your original customer where they think that someone else is getting an excellent deal by piggybacking on to their mobilization costs. I also agree that there are times that you can justify it. I blade this community road once or twice a year. One of the homeowners arranges for the work and pays for it. He then collects from the other homeowners. I have had some of the other homeowners request for other work when I am out there. This would justify piggybacking mobilization. Some of them probably would not have had the work done if there were mobilization (small amount of work).

I often times have many people in the neighborhood of where I am working come by and solicit bids. One way I deal with people expecting 'because I am in the neighborhood deal' is tell them that I do not know what my schedule is on exactly when I will be able to do it but give them a window 'which I could come back and do it' and lump the mobilization in with the rest of my bid and then change the subject by talking about the actual work at hand so they don't think about not getting charged for mobilization. Dealing with homeowners is often times not very pleasant. Usually, when they show me what they want to have done I look it over and convince them that they ought to have it done a different way. I look at drainage differently than they do often times. I don't like to just blade out pot holes. I like doing what it takes to repair their drainage so that they don't have big potholes shortly after you blade it out.

Sometimes I successfully solicit work from previous customers by letting them know that 'I am in the neighborhood'.

There is a balance between making a fair profit, getting jobs, and keeping customers happy. There is a skill in working this balance. I want customers to be glad that they chose to hire me and that I am looking after their interests and that I just do not want to fix the symptoms of their problems but the actual causes of their problems. When you hire me you get knowledge and expertise and not just a warm body on an operator's seat charging by the hour. When there is an engineer that designs the job then you might think about who the low bidder is.

I worked for the guy Turbo is talking about, he is the reason I went into business for myself. He only works for someone only once, he has no business sense. Ted called me in one cold morning to go do a finish grade with the D5, I got there loaded up the machine and he sent me home, all he wanted was someone to load up the machine for him. I would not charge for mobilization, if I was next door, I do try to line up my work to keep down the cost of mobilization. My Linkbelt is 10'- 6" wide which means permits and a mimimum charge on the lowboy. digger