Wheel kickers

bambammy

I'm starting up a small business soon. ( expanding an existing one ) Self employment ins and outs i'm aware of. Quote requests, measuring the job etc. Going over the pro's and cons, I was asked - How will you handle the wheel kickers. Stating I'd get a lot of them.

Does anyone have any tips, on maximising time, and tactics to deter wheel kickers.

I've never heard of that saying before, wheel kickers.

brila

What on earth is a wheel kicker?

PassedAtFailing

Surely you are both jesting?!

Just another name for someone that wastes your time. A bit slangy mind...

bambammy

Yeah I got the jist of what it meant. I'd just never heard the saying before.

I emailed a few of my competitors, and none of them emailed me back with a price because I didn't supply a correct telephone number on their web page quote request form.

I don't fancy running around the district, measuring and quoting jobs on time wasters. Although part and package, and have to take the good with the bad, I was hoping someone would have tips on minimising that aspect of the bad. Enabling me to save some fuel and time.

PassedAtFailing

bambammy wrote: »

Yeah I got the jist of what it meant. I'd just never heard the saying before.

I emailed a few of my competitors, and none of them emailed me back with a price because I didn't supply a correct telephone number on their web page quote request form.

I don't fancy running around the district, measuring and quoting jobs on time wasters. Although part and package, and have to take the good with the bad, I was hoping someone would have tips on minimising that aspect of the bad. Enabling me to save some fuel and time.

I think your competitors have just given you a perfect lesson on how to avoid timewasters!

Could I ask what it is exactly you intend to do? It's obviously a service, and to be honest most people will get multiple quotes, meaning at least one company will always waste their time. On the plus side, charge as competitively as possible and your clients should have no reason not to choose you. Most people wouldn't be contacting you for a quote just for laughs.

Pennywise

Spend time talking to them on the phone first. Find out exactly what they want doing, timescales, etc. That way you can "filter out" any jobs you don't want anyway either because you can't meet the customers' timescales, the job is too far away and too small to justify travel time and costs, or if it is simply not your thing. Ten minutes on the phone is an awful lot better than losing an hour in travel and meeting time.

I would argue against the suggestion of pricing competitively. Have some self respect and always charge what you feel is the right price for your time for the job. It is a myth that people always want the cheapest - they don't, some will go for a better quality of service even if it costs more. Some people automatically reject the highest and lowest quotes and choose someone in the middle - usually the person who turns up on time, gives a good impression, etc. You don't want to end up as a busy fool.

PassedAtFailing

Pennywise wrote: »

Spend time talking to them on the phone first. Find out exactly what they want doing, timescales, etc. That way you can "filter out" any jobs you don't want anyway either because you can't meet the customers' timescales, the job is too far away and too small to justify travel time and costs, or if it is simply not your thing. Ten minutes on the phone is an awful lot better than losing an hour in travel and meeting time.

I would argue against the suggestion of pricing competitively. Have some self respect and always charge what you feel is the right price for your time for the job. It is a myth that people always want the cheapest - they don't, some will go for a better quality of service even if it costs more. Some people automatically reject the highest and lowest quotes and choose someone in the middle - usually the person who turns up on time, gives a good impression, etc. You don't want to end up as a busy fool.

Perhaps the word that escaped me at the time was "realistically"?

ryanpni

Doesn't the term "Tyre Kickers" suggest people just coming for a look..? As in when somone gets a new car you go round and kick the tyres? I would have thought that if you opened a shop this might be something you could expect, but not really from a service job..

Ryan

Pennywise

ryanpni wrote: »

Doesn't the term "Tyre Kickers" suggest people just coming for a look..? As in when somone gets a new car you go round and kick the tyres? I would have thought that if you opened a shop this might be something you could expect, but not really from a service job..

Ryan

You get a lot of it from a "service job". Some people ask for lots of "quotes" but what they really want is just to discuss what they think they need with several different people - i.e. pick their brains. There are often a number of different ways to do a similar job - different tradesmen will tackle it in different ways - often someone will give you ideas you hadn't thought of.

As an example, last year we wanted our living room redecorated. We got three decorators in to give a quote for what we thought was a very simple job. All three gave different opinions on how to do the same thing and we got three completely different quotes for different jobs, all to the same result. We gave the job to the guy that was most expensive, but he had explained why he wanted to do it his way and why the alternative methods wouldn't be as good. We considered getting the other two back to quote to do the job in the expensive guy's method, or even getting a couple of other decorators to quote, but at the end of the day, the quote was within what we expected anyway, so why waste our time and theirs getting more quotes we would be unlikely to accept anyway. In the end we were pleased with the result and could appreciate that the cheapest option would have been a mistake.

As an accountant, I used to get a lot of time-wasters. People phone and want an appointment to discuss taking us on as their accountant, but when they turn up, they have a list of questions and it is obvious they just want a bit of freebie advice and have no intention of becomming a client. It got so bad, I stopped advertising and now won't make an appointment with any prospective client unless they are a referral from an existing client - now I turn over 90% of prospective clients into real clients after the first meeting.

Time wasters are a real problem for any business and you need to have a system in place for weeding them out as much as possible before you waste your time on them.

bambammy

Thanks for all your replies. I know myself, i've tended to go for the middle mark quote.

The thing is with the quotes, cheaper, quality etc - they be would effectively getting the exact same product. My competition (well there's two manufacturers in the vicinity) a large majority of them use the same manufacturer, but sugar coat and dress up their advert stating to the fact that they are the manufacturer.

I'd emailed all the ones who receives their goods from my supplier. ( Family member is the manufacturing supplier ) I thought about matching in between the smallest middle quote ( price quoted + VAT ) and not charging the VAT. When my supplier gets phone calls for what I'm just about to embark. The quote is always substantially under quoted, as he's got to much work supplying as the manufacturer.

I'll get further quotes and telephone time saving lessons on the phone in the meantime and make a decision on the figure from there.

Quite nervous actually. Start my training on Thursday.

billsavings

Tyre Kicker: This is a company / person who pretends to be interested in your product / service. This term comes from the motor trade when customers would kick the tyres to fain interest when they had no intention of buying a car and were just browsing / looking for a test drive. Aka as a Fender Kicker if you sell boat,s.