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BlueToBits

You get a call out to fix kitchen sockets that are not working.
It's only a couple of miles out of your way home so you leave the job you are on an hour early and call in.
You charge say, £47 including VAT for a up to 1 hour and £35 per hour after that.
It's a sweet elderly lady living on her own, and you suspect on just the basic state pension.
You notice the RCD has tripped. It resets first time without any problem. She says she had jammed a slice of bread in the toaster and the power went off when she pulled it out. How much do you charge?

Do you:
  1. Charge her the full call.
  2. Say "It's OK, no charge today" and hope you will earn it back on a recommendation or two.
  3. Say "Call it a tenner to cover fuel "and consider not declaring it to the tax man
  4. Charge £10 and certainly declare it to the tax man.
  5. Charge £20 and declare it to IR and VAT
  6. Waste time time "checking things out, testing this and that" and charge the full call after a 'respectable' 30 minutes.
  7. Charge the full call but say you are happy to do anything else she would like for the next 59 minutes, change a few light bulbs, re-adjust the sticking kitchen cupboard doors, nail up a damaged fence panel, put some junk boxes in the spare bedroom, or even just sit down and chat over a cup of tea for an hour as you suspect this is the thing she would be most grateful for.

What would you do?
I always agree the cost before we turn up and always charge the full amount, but I usually stay for the hour, do an IR test to check it is not likely to trip again, show her how to reset it if it did, fix one or two things I can with the tools I have in my bag, but still spend most of the time drinking tea and chatting.
Is this morally wrong?
What would you tell your employee electrician to do if you sent him out on the call?
 
The tea and biscuits would be my charge for the old girl.
 
It's a FREEBEE as far as I'm concerned - Tell her it's for Christmas.

It will more than likely that she'll press you to take something for your trouble and to buy yourself a drink. Just take it and thank her for it.
 
You explain you will forget the charge this time, you leave her with a few cards and she tells all her family and friends what you did for her and you customer base increases... the opposite happens if you sting her... its not her fault how far away you live either that's just part of business some jobs are on the door step others not if you go too far out then you can't compete to say a more local sparks so this limits your catchment area.
 
I wouldn't charge an elderley woman anything under the circumstances you have described. I would just wish her a merry christmas after resetting the RCD and let her know what happened and be on my way.
 
How about this one Women phones me at work she tell me that her shower wood not turn of so she turns it to cold and leaves it running the bath can i pop around on my way home from work when i arrived i parked behind a porch outside the block of flats went in a cup of tea tuned the water of at the mains it happened she had an old shower in a box in the cupboard the same make so i stripped out the old valve fitted it to the shower its a goodern told her she will need a new shower soon she said how much i told her when she needs a new shower give me a call got outside to my van GOT A £60 parking fine what can i say
 
if it's a private company fine, like in residents parking only,then contest it. rare that they take you to court in spite of all the threatening letters.also, check the ticket with a fine tooth comb. i has one once where the muppet had got 1 letter wrong on the reg. he put a W instead of a M. when this was pointed out, the crafty sods sent a supposed copy of the ticket, but it was 1 that they'd rewritten with the reg. correct. told them to shove it and heard no more.
 
This was some time ago now a council ticket just thought i would share my experience good turn with ya selves

- - - Updated - - -

And it was at 8 pm lol
 
One of the best customers I have I gained as a result of a similar situation. Little old dear who's RCD had tripped and wouldn't reset, I popped by on my way home after agreeing a price over the phone, the first thing I checked was the cordless kettle and there was water in the contacts. I unplugged it, told her to leave it to dry out, showed her what to do if it happened again and if it did I advised that she bought a new kettle. Problem solved.

She tried to pay me and I said not to worry, that the tea and hobnobs were payment enough for 2 mins work. The next week one of my guys was changing a CU for her daughter who had said how grateful she was for what I'd done for her mum. "With so many cowboys out there it's hard to find someone you can trust" she said to me. A few months later we got the job to rewire two small warehouses for a local online retailer, the MD of the company was the brother in law of the old dear's daughter. We still carry out work for them now.

It comforts me to tell myself that my good will had something to do with this :)

Now I've done plently of tiny jobs for old ladies where I've either not charged at all or charged just a token amount. To be honest, it's not the prospect of more work that I think about when I do someone a favour, it's just the fact that I'd find it incredibly hard to relieve a little old lady of her whole week's pension just to flick a switch!
 
No charge, you know she will call you back if she needs more work and old people always have friends!

Put it down to "marketing".
 
I wouldnt have charged either. The funniest one happened to me a few years back when I was walking down the road, not in work clobber, and saw an old dear waving at me frantically through her window. Thinking there was an emergency I dashed over, and she leaned out and said "Young man, do you know anything about tv's cos mine's just lost the tuning and Loose Women is about to start!!" So in I went and sorted her out, and gave her a lecture on not to have been so trusting - I could have been anyone, etc.
 
How about this one? A Woman phones me at work to tell me that her shower would not turn off, so she turned it to cold and left it running in the bath. She asked if I could pop around on my way home from work? When I arrived I parked behind a porch outside the block of flats, went in a for a cup of tea and turned the water off at the mains. It so happened that she had an old shower in a box in the cupboard that was of the same make, so I stripped out the old valve, fitted it to the shower and informed the customer that it's good. I told her she would need a new shower soon, she said "how much?". I told her when she needs a new shower to give me a call. When I got outside to my van I had been issued a £60 parking fine.

What can I say?

Well, not much with any grammatical sense or spelling accuracy anyway.

Good skills with the shower though, now off you go and do your homework.

The Grammar Police (no charge!).
 

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