Heated Towel Rail/Radiator Replacement

jumpedtheshark

Quoted £240+VAT for labour. Oxford area. I'm supplying the new towel radiator.

Quote is to replace a rusted chrome towel heater/radiator (after less than 2 years!) in the bathroom with a stainless steel one. Width is the same, and pipe centres measure the same. The plumber said he won't know until the current one's off whether the pipe work needs adjusting at all to "make it square". Might also include replacing some tiles (which we have), depending on where the fixings need to go compared to the existing ones.

Seems a lot for what I thought was a small job. Having said that, I know they do good work as we used them for the downstairs cloakroom (after having cowboys do this main bathroom first time round); they were also on the high end for that compared to the other 2 quotes we got but the bad experience with cowboy outfit made us happier to pay for it.

Any thoughts on whether this is a reasonable enough price gratefully received.

southcoastrgi

at least double what you should be paying but just remember if they are replacing tiles they will have to let the tiles set before they can re-drill them so that will prob mean a second visit however if the rail is the same size i can't see any reason they can't use the same fixing holes, unless they have cross threaded the valve tail into the rail sometimes they don't come out perfectly straight so IMO no pipework needs to be altered

jumpedtheshark

Hmm. Should we just ask a decent plumber to come on an hourly rate instead? Maybe through the "buy with confidence" scheme?

This plumber's hourly rate is £85 for the first hour, £65 for each thereafter. So they seem to think it would take 3 hours give or take.

Edited to add: What's coming out is a Kudox chrome 1100 x 600. What's going in is an Abacus stainless 1120 x 600.

southcoastrgi

depends where you are but that is a high rate, 3 hrs to take four screws out & put four screws in with a bit of ptfe tape wow i'd get some more quotes

cddc

It can sometimes feel that Oxford is part of London when it come to labour rates.

That does sound a bit steep to me, like a day rate charge for a 2 hour job. Not sure you would get it for half that, but you should be able to get for two thirds of it.....

southcoastrgi

well put it this way if i was quoting a direct replacement (labour only) without any tiling the customer would be looking at getting change out of £100

jumpedtheshark

I'll call a couple of other places tomorrow and report back. I appreciate the advice as I feel a bit stuck between cowboys and potentially overpaying. We had a really good plumber come correct some of the cowboy work, but he had to retire due to ill health.

keystone

At the end of the day he has given you a fixed price quote. If it all takes him two hours he is well in front. If it all takes him five hours for whatever reasons including more than one visit then he loses. As such it is at his risk. Your alternative is to contract him on hourly rate and hope he gets it all done (including any pipe adjustments and tiling changes that might be required) inside two hours. Then you pay £ 150 plus the dreaded. If it takes him five hours then you pay £ 345 plus VAT. Thats because on an hourly rate basis it's totally at your risk.

It would be totally unfair to accept his fixed price and then try and negotiate it down to £ 150 when it is done in two hours though.

You pays your money you takes your choice.

So the question you have to ask yourself now is how do you assess the risk?

Cheers

keystone

jumpedtheshark wrote: »

I'll call a couple of other places tomorrow and report back.

In my post above I deliberately didn't address the question of the hourly rates for this guy as it wasn't appropriate in discussing the merits of a fixed price vs a variable one.

So, would be interested to hear what you got from others.

Cheers