Commercial PIR on a LARGE site.

[Festerfly]

Right, i've been asked to organise a commercial PIR on a Large site which i do a lot of Maintenance electrical work. I haven had to deal with this side of things on such a large scale before and although easy enough to break down into smaller sections for testing & recording purposes my main concern is with the pricing side of things? I have read as much as i can about how others have been pricing their PIR's both Commercial and Domestic but at present i can not be sure of exactly how many circuits there are on site. There has been no previous PIR and there have been around 15-20 different sparkys on site over the years doing various works here and there mostly unrecorded but remembered by different members of staff etc. I have a list of the number of DB's on the site and their locations which was compiled around 4-5 years ago but it does no more then just list their locations and QTY. The boards are a mix of 50's examples right through to a couple of more recent Hager and Crabtree units. Imagine that 70-80% of the Circuits are un-labeled and a mix of office/workshop/kitchen/storage/external etc.

All in a fairly major job which would have to be completed in stages as the majority of the site can not be shut down Mon - Sat due to the nature of the business.

There are two of us attending the PIR itself with the possibility of an extra 'apprentice' style person for general running around, dogsbody kind of stuff as and when required due to the layout and size of the site.

Sorry for the vagueness of the question overall, but im still trying to get my head around where to start on something of this scale...

Thanks

 

[johnboy6083]

if its very large and complicated, then a fair dayrate? or is it worth taking a hit on the PIR, in order to gain future works from it? i would definately work in pairs, as when ive worked with the senior sparks doing initial verifications on larger sites, its so much easier to have two of you, and it avoids a lot of confusion.

 

[Sintra]

My advice would be attend the site and carry out a survey. Look in every db and cu and count the circuits. This way you can put in a price per circuit and you won't be far off. The other option is to give a price per circuit to the client and count them up at the end from the pir.

 

[Mr Mark Sparks]

i agree you really need to do the survey then factor the survey time into the price and hope you get the work
this sounds like the sort of thing that will need 1/2hour 2 men per circ therefor 1man hour per circ

sounds like the remedial work could be a gold mine

 

[IQ Electrical]

Right, i've been asked to organise a commercial PIR on a Large site which i do a lot of Maintenance electrical work. I haven had to deal with this side of things on such a large scale before and although easy enough to break down into smaller sections for testing & recording purposes my main concern is with the pricing side of things? I have read as much as i can about how others have been pricing their PIR's both Commercial and Domestic but at present i can not be sure of exactly how many circuits there are on site. There has been no previous PIR and there have been around 15-20 different sparkys on site over the years doing various works here and there mostly unrecorded but remembered by different members of staff etc. I have a list of the number of DB's on the site and their locations which was compiled around 4-5 years ago but it does no more then just list their locations and QTY. The boards are a mix of 50's examples right through to a couple of more recent Hager and Crabtree units. Imagine that 70-80% of the Circuits are un-labeled and a mix of office/workshop/kitchen/storage/external etc.

All in a fairly major job which would have to be completed in stages as the majority of the site can not be shut down Mon - Sat due to the nature of the business.

There are two of us attending the PIR itself with the possibility of an extra 'apprentice' style person for general running around, dogsbody kind of stuff as and when required due to the layout and size of the site.

Sorry for the vagueness of the question overall, but im still trying to get my head around where to start on something of this scale...

Thanks

Is there any chance of doing the job on night shift? Makes things so much easier, especially when dealing with distribution boards that aren't labelled!

If you quote a day rate, you won't get the job, the client wants as close as he can get to a firm, fixed price.

As has already been said, glean as much information as possible, this can help you be more competitive and stop you from taking a hit on unforseens!

Check on access to any high level works, scissor lift costs etc.

check your insurances, PI and PL, you NEED to have PI in place to cover yourself on this type of job!

 

[Festerfly]

Thanks for all the advice. I'm in there for some other works this week any way so will take my list of DB locations and count the circuits. I know my way around the site pretty well so shouldent be an issue gaining access. My thoughts
Are leaning towards the do the available works daytime and the unavailable works at night. Just got to work out the right rate for this etc.

The remedials will all come to me anyway. But agreed, I can already think of one or two urgent ones off the top of my head.

 

[mogga]

count the number of circuits then add around 50% to allow for unlocated ones

 

[accordfire]

Right, i've been asked to organise a commercial PIR on a Large site which i do a lot of Maintenance electrical work. I haven had to deal with this side of things on such a large scale before and although easy enough to break down into smaller sections for testing & recording purposes my main concern is with the pricing side of things? I have read as much as i can about how others have been pricing their PIR's both Commercial and Domestic but at present i can not be sure of exactly how many circuits there are on site. There has been no previous PIR and there have been around 15-20 different sparkys on site over the years doing various works here and there mostly unrecorded but remembered by different members of staff etc. I have a list of the number of DB's on the site and their locations which was compiled around 4-5 years ago but it does no more then just list their locations and QTY. The boards are a mix of 50's examples right through to a couple of more recent Hager and Crabtree units. Imagine that 70-80% of the Circuits are un-labeled and a mix of office/workshop/kitchen/storage/external etc.

All in a fairly major job which would have to be completed in stages as the majority of the site can not be shut down Mon - Sat due to the nature of the business.

There are two of us attending the PIR itself with the possibility of an extra 'apprentice' style person for general running around, dogsbody kind of stuff as and when required due to the layout and size of the site.

Sorry for the vagueness of the question overall, but im still trying to get my head around where to start on something of this scale...

Thanks

As with the consensus - do a site survey first if you can - get as much info as you possibly can.

Night time testing is an option too, if you can get in, as it is less likely to matter if you inadvertently switch something off without realising (likely if you don't know what is on a circuit). Having to do all the testing on a Sunday otherwise will affect your costs too I guess.

There's been hot discussion of this lately in another thread..........as to cost generally.

So, this time, what I will say is arrive at a cost per circuit, and multiply by the number of circuits (plus, as another says, a margin for "missed" circuits). Either that or count boards, and arrive at a "day" or "night" rate allowing say a shift per board up to twelve ways or so. That should give you a ballpark for now, given you say you have a list of locations and quantities.

Don't forget to factor in a cost for documenting the circuit, board legends, and so forth, and any admin around the job too.

 

[Festerfly]

***UPDATE***

Okay, i found the DB list i was passed a year or so ago. This was compiled by a local firm back in Summer 2008. i know i said it was a large site, but honestly, i was shocked when i looked over it again just now......

As of AUG 2008


105 Boards (mix of SP & TP. Mostly TP)

Approx 836 Circuits to be tested!!!!!!!


GULP!

Any wise words??? lol


still speechless to be honest.. major works!

 

[IQ Electrical]

That's a small High School to us, daunting when you do your first of that size though!

Think of it as small installations, be sure to find out the origin of each board you test, this can save you absolute nightmares at the end and assist greatly should a distribution schematic be required.

If you use certification software, get a laptop on site and key in the data as you test, otherwise, you've got literally hours of data input time when the testing's complete.

Keep a list of DB's with you and 'highlight' them off as they're completed so you have an accurate idea of where you are and what you have left.

Stock up on labels (next inspection, rcd test, 2-colours etc) we always include for applying rcd and 2-colour labels as we test.