What is your hourly rate as a self employed electrician? (2023)

[oscar21]

Instead of an hourly rate some people charge by point, maybe £60 a point, if you do that and say you wire 6 downlights in a room with a 1 gang switch, would you charge for 6 or 7 points, similarly if you wired a spur controlling a single socket is that 1 or 2 points. Maybe even go as far as charging a switch out at £60 per switch so a 4 gang switch would cost £240 to install as opposed to £60 (or nothing if you include it with the installed lighting). What's the consensus on that one.

 

[oscar21]

The companies themselves are avoiding paying Income Tax and National Health contribution, holiday pay etc if found out the will end up in court, periodic checks are made of companies by HMRC.

A company I was consulting for had such a check together with other consultants, I was interviewed and only when I showed them the results of a VAT inspection and a list of my other clients was the investigation dropped.

This wasn't a problem back in the day though, when tories were tories they encouraged people to branch out and become successful, they wanted people to be self employed and get on in life. If that meant losing out on a bit of NI or tax then it didn't matter, people wanted to be their own boss and it suited everyone just fine.

Nowadays we have governments that are obsessed with blowing money left right and centre on vanity projects and they need the serfs to work themselves into an early grave to pay for it and one of those ways is to hound people into becoming an insignificant employee who has no other option other than to pay his dues.

 

[Mike Johnson]

Very strange view point, I don't know how old you are, but I am 75 and retired ten years ago, so my previous post was probably "back in the day"

 

[ipf]

Instead of an hourly rate some people charge by point, maybe £60 a point, if you do that and say you wire 6 downlights in a room with a 1 gang switch, would you charge for 6 or 7 points, similarly if you wired a spur controlling a single socket is that 1 or 2 points. Maybe even go as far as charging a switch out at £60 per switch so a 4 gang switch would cost £240 to install as opposed to £60 (or nothing if you include it with the installed lighting). What's the consensus on that one.

Per point is the general way of quoting for rewire, say. However, can't see how you would get away with that method for downlights in a room.
eg. Lighting, Price per 1way plus any extra lights at 'so much per unit'
Same for price per 2way.
Same for intermediate.
Power circuits just 'so much' per point
No way should you be charging one switch in room with 6 downlights as 6 'full' points.........unless you can get away with it, maybe.

 

[Risteard]

Per point is the general way of quoting for rewire, say. However, can't see how you would get away with that method for downlights in a room.
eg. Lighting, Price per 1way plus any extra lights at 'so much per unit'
Same for price per 2way.
Same for intermediate.
Power circuits just 'so much' per point
No way should you be charging one switch in room with 6 downlights as 6 'full' points.........unless you can get away with it, maybe.

If charging by points then each downlight/switch is a point. If people don't want to pay for 40 lighting points per room then maybe downlights aren't the answer!

 

[ipf]

If charging by points then each downlight/switch is a point. If people don't want to pay for 40 lighting points per room then maybe downlights aren't the answer!

I know what you're saying but I'm on about pricing for 6 downlights on one switch cct not 6 switch circuits and the wiring for 'em. It's not going to take as long to wire 6 in one room as 6 in 6 rooms

 

[Risteard]

I know what you're saying but I'm on about pricing for 6 downlights on one switch cct not 6 switch circuits and the wiring for 'em. It's not going to take as long to wire 6 in one room as 6 in 6 rooms

I find that measuring out downlights (to avoid joists etc.) can be extremely time consuming.

 

[LukeD]

Exactly ..On a new build type job its easy if exposed timbers .But you never know whats in the void on many jobs and Ive see a few come unstuck with a "rogue Nogging"

I find that measuring out downlights (to avoid joists etc.) can be extremely time consuming.

 

[Dustydazzler]

Per point pricing is for much bigger jobs / new builds when you plan to be there for weeks on end and need a method of pricing for the whole job and lot.
I haven't done per point pricing in ages as most of my work is small jobs 3 maybe 4 days on the job Max so hourly works better

 

[oscar21]

Per point pricing is for much bigger jobs / new builds when you plan to be there for weeks on end and need a method of pricing for the whole job and lot.
I haven't done per point pricing in ages as most of my work is small jobs 3 maybe 4 days on the job Max so hourly works better

Not necessarily, people constantly want prices off you so instead of sitting down for hours on end working stuff out time and time again you just give them a price per point.

That's what we do when we are doing these insurance jobs. Ours is £60 per point, doesn't matter what it is, its £60. The fans cost us more than £60 to buy and sometimes so does the shower cable and pull cord, not to mention the smoke/heat alarms with lithium batteries but when a 1 gang light switch is also £60 then it evens itself out again. Its surprising how near the total always is to what we would want if we priced the job anyway or did it on a day rate.

The exception is if its only 3 sockets in a bedroom but they take all day to do, sometimes its a non payer but most of the other bigger jobs make up for it.

 

[Dustydazzler]

Not necessarily, people constantly want prices off you so instead of sitting down for hours on end working stuff out time and time again you just give them a price per point.

That's what we do when we are doing these insurance jobs. Ours is £60 per point, doesn't matter what it is, its £60. The fans cost us more than £60 to buy and sometimes so does the shower cable and pull cord, not to mention the smoke/heat alarms with lithium batteries but when a 1 gang light switch is also £60 then it evens itself out again. Its surprising how near the total always is to what we would want if we priced the job anyway or did it on a day rate.

The exception is if its only 3 sockets in a bedroom but they take all day to do, sometimes its a non payer but most of the other bigger jobs make up for it.

I have never been able to make per point pricing pay me more than my £95 per hour rate.
For example a bathroom refit with 4 spots , 1 switch and a fan you would come out at 6 points so £360 all in ? there is no money at £60 per point on a job like that Imo

I would probably be 4 hours + materials so a job like that say all in with decent materials nearer £600

 

[oscar21]

I have never been able to make per point pricing pay me more than my £95 per hour rate.
For example a bathroom refit with 4 spots , 1 switch and a fan you would come out at 6 points so £360 all in ? there is no money at £60 per point on a job like that Imo

I would probably be 4 hours + materials so a job like that say all in with decent materials nearer £600

You would probably make £200 profit so its not the end of the world, especially if you could finish by early afternoon. Its still a grand a week if you could do stuff like that every day. I know its a different world pricing wise in london but no-one would pay anywhere near £95 ah hour in the north, you might get away with it if it was a 1 hour call out and you got their electrics back on after them freezing to death for a day but to just wire some sockets in an extension, no-one would dream of paying £700+ for a days work.

 

[Dustydazzler]

You would probably make £200 profit so its not the end of the world, especially if you could finish by early afternoon. Its still a grand a week if you could do stuff like that every day. I know its a different world pricing wise in london but no-one would pay anywhere near £95 ah hour in the north, you might get away with it if it was a 1 hour call out and you got their electrics back on after them freezing to death for a day but to just wire some sockets in an extension, no-one would dream of paying £700+ for a days work.

I get what you are saying but for the example of the job I gave which is about a 4 hour job maybe 5 hours by the time you unload and then load up all your gear and tidy up etc. I would want to take more than 200 quid out of it especially if it were a fair distance from where I live.

 

[HappyHippyDad]

On a larger job I tend to work it out per point (£60 or £65 depending on how I'm feeling about the job). I then have a quick think how long it will take me (adding on a few days) and see which is the highest, I then go for that one. They are generally fairly similar.

Up to a few months ago I would class each downlight a little less than a point (£50 - £55). I have recently just started to just class them all as a point when quoting. Although...

I'm currently fitting over 100 downlights in a customers house. I must admit that I did advise them to just pay me a day rate (£350) as it really did seem a bit too much to charge £6000 for just the lights!

Glad this thread is going well. We've had quite a few more on the poll, so I'll try and get around to working out the average again... when I've stopped fitting all these bloody downlights!!

Decided to quickly work it out...

Mean average hourly rate for 2022 was £41.48
Mean average hourly rate for 2023 (so far) £46.30

 

[Risteard]

On a larger job I tend to work it out per point (£60 or £65 depending on how I'm feeling about the job). I then have a quick think how long it will take me (adding on a few days) and see which is the highest, I then go for that one. They are generally fairly similar.

Up to a few months ago I would class each downlight a little less than a point (£50 - £55). I have recently just started to just class them all as a point when quoting. Although...

I'm currently fitting over 100 downlights in a customers house. I must admit that I did advise them to just pay me a day rate (£350) as it really did seem a bit too much to charge £6000 for just the lights!

Glad this thread is going well. We've had quite a few more on the poll, so I'll try and get around to working out the average again... when I've stopped fitting all these bloody downlights!!

Decided to quickly work it out...

Mean average hourly rate for 2022 was £41.48
Mean average hourly rate for 2023 (so far) £46.30

I get what you're saying, although I charged 15 downlights a couple of years back at €80 + VAT per fitting and the customer went ahead with it. I know on paper it makes it look expensive, but to be fair it takes a lot of work to do it.

 

[ipf]

I find that measuring out downlights (to avoid joists etc.) can be extremely time consuming.

Must admit to a few of those in the past, always on hourly, though.
Not much domestic these days....in fact at last NIC Assessment they'd wiped me off their details regarding Part P even though I'd registered one job through them.

 

[Mike Johnson]

When a client says, "but I can get that done my so and so much cheaper" I always replied "go ahead with so and so if you want, but when you get in trouble, you know my contact details" inevitably they came back to me eventually if not immediately.

 

[nicebutdim]

When a client says, "but I can get that done my so and so much cheaper" I always replied "go ahead with so and so if you want, but when you get in trouble, you know my contact details" inevitably they came back to me eventually if not immediately.

Relating more to previous work than electrical I've never haggled on prices quoted, but nor did I ever make any comment other than 'that's okay' when told about a cheaper option. Sometimes customers went with the cheaper price and that's fine with me. Sometimes they took 'okay' to mean 'I'll match that price' and I'd politely explain that my price wasn't negotiable. My personal favourites were those who simply looked shocked, as clearly there was no competition, and then inexplicably decided to go with your 'expensive' quote. The latter were people to tread carefully around and sometimes it felt best not to deal with them at all. I don't mind people trying to find the best possible value, but there are ways of going about doing so and there are ways which scream untrustworthy.

 

[LukeD]

Relating more to previous work than electrical I've never haggled on prices quoted, but nor did I ever make any comment other than 'that's okay' when told about a cheaper option. Sometimes customers went with the cheaper price and that's fine with me. Sometimes they took 'okay' to mean 'I'll match that price' and I'd politely explain that my price wasn't negotiable. My personal favourites were those who simply looked shocked, as clearly there was no competition, and then inexplicably decided to go with your 'expensive' quote. The latter were people to tread carefully around and sometimes it felt best not to deal with them at all. I don't mind people trying to find the best possible value, but there are ways of going about doing so and there are ways which scream untrustworthy.

Never respond . Make excuses and move on. Ive never ever price matched a lower quote

 

[nicebutdim]

Never respond . Make excuses and move on. Ive never ever price matched a lower quote

I wouldn't respond to such a message, but face to face or on the phone it would be a bit rude to say nothing.