PC Repair Shop Business - Worth doing or not?

Lil306

spud17 wrote: »

Wot? I prefer, (MSE) Approved Repair+Security Engineer.

Can I be a member

sho_me_da_money

After some serious thought and consideration, I may just do this on a part-time basis rather than go set up shop.

I do have one question for all the techies who have posted and a business running - How do you compete with PC World's prices? :

http://www.knowhow.com/set-up-upgrade-pillar.aspx

Sounds pretty cheap right?

cit_k

sho_me_da_money wrote: »

After some serious thought and consideration, I may just do this on a part-time basis rather than go set up shop.

I do have one question for all the techies who have posted and a business running - How do you compete with PC World's prices? :

http://www.knowhow.com/set-up-upgrade-pillar.aspx

Sounds pretty cheap right?

cheap but clueless, and misleading advertising.

for example, what if i turned up after reading their advert for installing more memory for 15 quid?

They claim the more memory you have, the faster you computer performs.

Except I already have 4 gig, and that is already more than xp can use on my laptop, so adding more memory would be a total and utter waste of time with XP, and just consume electricity for no reason.

sho_me_da_money

cit_k wrote: »

cheap but clueless, and misleading advertising.

for example, what if i turned up after reading their advert for installing more memory for 15 quid?

They claim the more memory you have, the faster you computer performs.

Except I already have 4 gig, and that is already more than xp can use on my laptop, so adding more memory would be a total and utter waste of time with XP, and just consume electricity for no reason.

Depends on your version of XP.

X86 has a limitation, X64 has a better limitation.

sho_me_da_money

BunShopBandit wrote: »

By going *to* the customer and offering better service! Also cost of parts. Even buying retail from someone like Ebuyer or Novatech (computer2000 is better if you can convince them to sell to you), you can still make a profit on parts *and* come in as cheap, if not cheaper, than that.

Like I say, it's about the thing as a whole. Have van, can travel, have loan machines = will make a living depending on how hard you are prepared to work and how good you are at what you do.

True lets say you have a shop, can one compete on those labour prices?

Mischa8

sho_me_da_money wrote: »

You are right however, the way I see it is that the customer is paying me for my knowledge therefore if I utilise a free online tool that will remedy the problem, I too will put a price on it.

To be competitive I have to try on the "No-Fix, No-Fee" crap and do a free diagnostic for customers within a certain radius. I may have to be clever with that though....

What about legalities - what do I need to look into to get this started? What about guarantee? - I do not want customers calling me back a month later telling me his PC has gone to pot again and expects a freebie.

Just a point to keep in mind. Bear in mind these days that a lot of people (even older silver surfers) are getting quite computer savvy these days, my 69 year old mum included. If you do utilise the free online tool which will fix a problem bear in mind that if you charge OTT for this FREE tool and your knowledge and your customer finds out then unlikely they will use you again or recommend you to family/friends. There's been quite a lot in the local news about pensioners being taught how to use internet etc lately too. So you need to be fair about that price. Also you don't want someone like Watchdog finding out about you charging OTT prices for a free tool and advertising it.

starlight_xx

Id definitely agree with the others whove suggested mobile. My old desktop ran into a few problems and when it came to the option of disconnecting it, taking it into town, leaving it for 3/4 days, going back to collect it and reconnect it OR phone the mobile guy who came to the house worked his magic and put it all back the way it was - usually within the hour, there was just no contest.
Id also happily pay slightly more than I would to PC world for the convenience

The guy I was using actually had a shop and gave it up and went totally mobile because thats where the business was for him

Mischa8

Here's some advice I would pass on. My mum (being one of your 'target customers' used to get her PC etc advice for free from her neighbours until they sort of fell out.

Then she got friendly with another neighbour who works as the local school's IT person (employed by the school). Rather than take this advice as free my mum agreed she would pay for this advice (eg for her Apple MacBook, PC etc). Sometimes this new neighbour would give the advice or spare charger (for a Mac) for nothing but my mum generally paid her and felt better for doing this. So what I am saying is this lady (the other neighbour) sort of does this job *on the side* from her current IT job. I suppose if she did want to publicise and make more money she would but AFAIK she just keeps it local.

Also another thing to bear in mind - where my mother lives - a fairly affluent part of SE London - the local PC repair shop closed down within the past I'd say 5 years at a guess. I don't know why this was, maybe the owners moved or something but maybe they just didn't get the passing trade. Just something to keep in mind.

If I were you OP, I'd do a lot of research before leaving a paid full-time job, no matter how unhappy you are there (and you seem to be unhappy there from previous posts) and graft hard and do this on the side for AT LEAST a year or so before quitting the full time job.

Also, politely - and I know you'll take this the wrong way but what the heck - in the past here you've shown yourself to be a bit rude and prone to name calling and even maybe ripping people off (and yes, I have also been rude etc here sometimes, I admit). Yes, you may have been proved correct in the end etc but there have been a few confrontational and downright rude posts here. Do you really want to go into a second career where good, polite customer service is at a premium? Could you handle that? I mean this as constructive criticism too and not as swiping at you.

Finally - good luck - it takes a lot of courage to set up by yourself or think about taking on a second career.

asbokid

sho_me_da_money wrote: »

Depends on your version of XP.

X86 has a limitation, X64 has a better limitation.

Or ditch microsoft swindles for LINUX and access as much system memory as physically possible, on any processor..

asbokid

spannerzone wrote: »

teenagers usually caused most problems for their parents PC. They'd download anything and click on everything and screw up the PC. Then mum/dad uses the PC and it's slow and unusuable so they think they broke it and call me out to sort. - When I'd identify the issue (usually pointing to when their child was doing something) they'd be sure it wasn't the child as they were very knowledgeable about PC's.... I'd ask why they called me to fix rather than get their kid to do it and they didn't really know why!

Anyhow, after discretely explaining what had happened " oh he must have accidentally downloaded that cracked software version" I think most parents understood that often their kids aren't as super PC clever as thought but rather have no fear of clicking anything until it works or breaks. Mum/dad then pay to sort it.

i would be tempted to take a CD of malware, just to create a bit of work for next time. Let's face it, most dentists are up for that these days.

One thing to watch our for is the frustrated housewife who manufacturers a PC health problem as a pretext for calling an engineer. Think ahead and always take anti-virus protection with you for those occasions.

And when you get down to sort out her problem, make sure that you have allowed enough time to finish the job before the husband returns to use the computer himself.