Extra charges?

molerat

Don't take your car in to have a part replaced then, many car parts cost the garage half what they charge for them and their invoice from the supplier will show the retail price for them to charge you.  I can get car parts at trade prices and get 2 receipts, one for me for what I pay and another intended for the customer so I could charge and show them the price.

Albermarle

comeandgo said:

goodValue said:

So, for specialist parts (for plumbers/electricians) it appears you cannot check the price, as local shops don't have the parts, and there could be any one of a number of problems getting a price from a website.

I take the point about there being extra costs, but still think doubling the price for a high-cost item is too much.

I think I was a bit gullible during the visit due to the stress of not having a working boiler. I forgot about

asking about guarantees/warranties, total price, payments, and any of the other questions you should ask.

I used to work in a fashion shop, all items were 100% added to for sale price.  The shop had lots of overheads to pay, and my wages.

Mark up for retailers of all sorts of goods is typically 100% ( or 50% gross margin).
However you would not expect a tradesperson to add 100% to parts they have bought from an outlet who have already marked the items up by 100% ( if that is what happened) .

grumbler

molerat said:

...I can get car parts at trade prices and get 2 receipts, one for me for what I pay and another intended for the customer so I could charge and show them the price.

Which one do you use for your accounting and taxes then?

It's a rhetorical question.

goodValue

If time is spent picking up spares, then will the associated cost be part of the labour, rather than an increase in the price of the part to the consumer?

Interestingly, though he was informed that it was a pump or pressure sensor problem, he did not bring any spares.

Instead, he phoned his office during the visit, and went off to collect parts.

ThisIsWeird

Hi GV.
In general, you can expect to pay 'full retail' price for any part bought by a repair fellow, and this applies to things like cars as much as boilers.
The repairer won't pay that for it, of course, so this discount/mark-up starts off as extra profit for them (a win), but could also be swallowed up should they need to redo the job, say if that part fails (a break-even or loss).
It's their 'warranty' charge; if the part fails within, say, a year, you should expect them to replace it at no extra cost to you. For them, it'll take the same time to fix as before, and presumably the hassle of returning the part for recompense.
You can see, then, that a cheap part to replace - a thermistor, or a set of brake pads - will originally be largely a labour bill with a tiny 'mark-up' on the part, so if they needed replacing, the boiler/car mechanic would almost certainly lose out overall - they would only have 'made' a £enner or so on that part when fitted, and now they have double the labour time to cover.
This is probably why, when you go for a boiler 'Fixed Price Repair' job, the engineer will not only replace the faulty part, but anything else that appears to be dodgy or close to the end of its life. I was gobsmacked at the list of parts the guy was writing up the last time I called on this, and he explained it was because they must avoid being called back out within 3 months! 'Time' is clearly very/more precious to their working model.
You and I can usually buy these parts for way under retail, but then it's fully our responsibility should it go wrong again.

So, did this particular guy overcharge you for the parts? We don't know; we'd need to know the parts involved, whether they were 'genuine' manufacturer's parts, and their RRP.
I would suggest that charging more than retail price is wrong, certainly morally, and possibly legally, I don't know. I mean, you can't just pull any silly inflated figure out of the air and call that 'honest', can you? It is robbery.
A part I know only too well in my boiler is the P2P exchanger, and a quick Google suggests the highest price for this is around £140. SF has it for £120, and your gas-spares site for £116. If a repair guy tried to charge me £280 for this, I'd certainly be highly p'off, would request evidence that it was a genuine, valid retail price, and never use that person again. There would, if course, be a fair chance that GlowWorm do list it at RRP £280, in which case I'd be stuffed. But I'd know that the fitter was taking the mick, as it would almost certainly only cost him around £50.

Where does this leave us? No idea! I hope that helps

Risteard

ThisIsWeird said:

Hi GV.
In general, you can expect to pay 'full retail' price for any part bought by a repair fellow, and this applies to things like cars as much as boilers.
The repairer won't pay that for it, of course, so this discount/mark-up starts off as extra profit for them (a win), but could also be swallowed up should they need to redo the job, say if that part fails (a break-even or loss).
It's their 'warranty' charge; if the part fails within, say, a year, you should expect them to replace it at no extra cost to you. For them, it'll take the same time to fix as before, and presumably the hassle of returning the part for recompense.
You can see, then, that a cheap part to replace - a thermistor, or a set of brake pads - will originally be largely a labour bill with a tiny 'mark-up' on the part, so if they needed replacing, the boiler/car mechanic would almost certainly lose out overall - they would only have 'made' a £enner or so on that part when fitted, and now they have double the labour time to cover.
This is probably why, when you go for a boiler 'Fixed Price Repair' job, the engineer will not only replace the faulty part, but anything else that appears to be dodgy or close to the end of its life. I was gobsmacked at the list of parts the guy was writing up the last time I called on this, and he explained it was because they must avoid being called back out within 3 months! 'Time' is clearly very/more precious to their working model.
You and I can usually buy these parts for way under retail, but then it's fully our responsibility should it go wrong again.

So, did this particular guy overcharge you for the parts? We don't know; we'd need to know the parts involved, whether they were 'genuine' manufacturer's parts, and their RRP.
I would suggest that charging more than retail price is wrong, certainly morally, and possibly legally, I don't know. I mean, you can't just pull any silly inflated figure out of the air and call that 'honest', can you? It is robbery.
A part I know only too well in my boiler is the P2P exchanger, and a quick Google suggests the highest price for this is around £140. SF has it for £120, and your gas-spares site for £116. If a repair guy tried to charge me £280 for this, I'd certainly be highly p'off, would request evidence that it was a genuine, valid retail price, and never use that person again. There would, if course, be a fair chance that GlowWorm do list it at RRP £280, in which case I'd be stuffed. But I'd know that the fitter was taking the mick, as it would almost certainly only cost him around £50.

Where does this leave us? No idea! I hope that helps

It's perfectly legitimate and lawful to charge more than a retail price.

goodValue

My apologies for such a long delay. I didn't know there were further posts.
I only came across them because I've just found the mse "My Threads" link.

TIW
You make some good points.
Indeed, the engineer did replace a couple of items he said were showing signs of wear.
But there were a few signs that he was trying to maximise his profit.

Looking back now, I see that I wasn't happy that it cost almost a third of the price of a new boiler, to have the pump replaced.

ThisIsWeird

Risteard said:

ThisIsWeird said:
So, did this particular guy overcharge you for the parts? We don't know; we'd need to know the parts involved, whether they were 'genuine' manufacturer's parts, and their RRP.
I would suggest that charging more than retail price is wrong, certainly morally, and possibly legally, I don't know. I mean, you can't just pull any silly inflated figure out of the air and call that 'honest', can you? It is robbery.

It's perfectly legitimate and lawful to charge more than a retail price.

I notice you avoided the 'moral' part of my post.

"I would suggest that charging more than retail price is wrong, certainly morally, and possibly legally, I don't know. I mean, you can't just pull any silly inflated figure out of the air and call that 'honest', can you? It is robbery."

Would you ever charge more than 'retail' for a part you were fitting?

ThisIsWeird

goodValue said:

My apologies for such a long delay. I didn't know there were further posts.
I only came across them because I've just found the mse "My Threads" link.

TIW
You make some good points.
Indeed, the engineer did replace a couple of items he said were showing signs of wear.
But there were a few signs that he was trying to maximise his profit.

Looking back now, I see that I wasn't happy that it cost almost a third of the price of a new boiler, to have the pump replaced.

It's always a tough call to make. As a boiler ages, you should feel more inclined to cut your losses and go 'new'. But if you don't know what the likely repair cost will be, then it's hard to make that judgement.

Can't really comment on whether this guy's charges were excessive, as we don't know what was replaced, or what he charged.

Risteard

ThisIsWeird said:

Risteard said:

ThisIsWeird said:
So, did this particular guy overcharge you for the parts? We don't know; we'd need to know the parts involved, whether they were 'genuine' manufacturer's parts, and their RRP.
I would suggest that charging more than retail price is wrong, certainly morally, and possibly legally, I don't know. I mean, you can't just pull any silly inflated figure out of the air and call that 'honest', can you? It is robbery.

It's perfectly legitimate and lawful to charge more than a retail price.

I notice you avoided the 'moral' part of my post.

"I would suggest that charging more than retail price is wrong, certainly morally, and possibly legally, I don't know. I mean, you can't just pull any silly inflated figure out of the air and call that 'honest', can you? It is robbery."

Would you ever charge more than 'retail' for a part you were fitting?

Of course it's not immoral.