Building and wasting time..can you help?

building

it is not because they are not interested it is because a lot of clients are stringing them along and quotes take time and a lot of customers dont realise that some written quotes can take several days of planning and research!

robv wrote:

Trades men turning up, agreeing to give a quote and then hearing nothing from them. If they just told you there were not interested.

newfunk

John_M_Business wrote:

From my perspective - those builders that spend time on a quote often 'add value' to the customer... so that if their price is higher, they can point to the itemisation of what is actually in the quote.

If you make a 'template' in Word then there is no reason why you cannot make a really nice quote within a couple of hours, put it in a nice presentation file and take the customer through it in detail. After all, how many different ways are there to describe a job? Most involve plumbing elements, plastering, wiring etc...

Otherwise, if you end up giving a 'verbal' on the cheap, then you're probably going to have issues down the line. Or if you just provide a letter, then where's the back-up.

The other thing is to find out very quickly whether:
a) You want the job
b) The customer is purely price-driven
These should be very easy to work out. If you don't want the job, or the customer is price-driven then don't spend any time on the quote, just offer a high verbal quote and send them on their way. Then concentrate on the people who are prepared to pay good money for good work.

Brilliant post totally agree with u. i always give 100% good work! Im not the cheapest, but i aint dear, and I give the client what they want!!

alanobrien

building wrote:

can anyone give us some tips. We find we waste a lot of time running around to give people quotes but we often find they use us as a second/third quote to bounce off someone else. This involves time and money (diesel etc). I have suggested we charge a fee that then gets credited back when they go with the work. Considering that we offer like for like quotes and we do an excellent job I wonder if anyone has any ideas.

Ever thought about quoting references from past jobs in a sheet sent out with your quote ? I know that would impress me, especially if it were easily verifiable.

or, setting up pictures etc on your web site of past jobs and putting your www link in big lettering on your quote.

It all helps us Joe public types to have some confidence in employing trades people that were not directly recommended by a friend.