Firstly big apologises as i know this has been asked before but for the life of me i can't find the thread. Anyway if you saw my other thread you will know im heading out into the business of pc repair and now website design as i have had a few queries about it. Problem is im pretty clueless about what to charge, i tried looking at local competitions rates but unless i go into quite some detail with them about what i want then they wont offer any sort of prices (the gits) Now then pc repair prices should be fairly straight forward, parts + travel expenses + labour (£9 a hour sound decent?) Site building is bit more complicated as other people offer different 'plans' ie plan a) 5 pages + yearly support + whatever etc etc. However im looking at designing a 1 page 'who we are' sort of thing mostly as that is what the majority of businesses want around here and im at a loss at how much to charge. Something like £ per page wanted? Then an upkeep charge if they want the site supporting/maintaining by me. Charging yearly i suppose. My aim to be cheap, not stupidly cheap but enough so people would choose me who so far is relatively unknown.
"If we can't fix it, we don't charge" This saves you from a angry customer never charged hourly if you cannot guarantee a repair think of it this way you have a pain in the arse computer for 6 hours in an afternoon... Even the best repair guys can get stumped sometimes, if you go to a customer after that time period and say "Sorry i can't seem to find the problem thats £54 please" they will laugh at you HOWEVER! if you set a £9 solid hour fee somebody might say "Hey £9 just to see if its worth it is nothing" and might say to you "I'll pay you 1 hour" If you want to make money from it 100% of the time: maybe take have a 45 minute look of £5 if you need to and quick check (parts etc) and then gather if you think you could repair it, pc is a funny business you either fix it or scrap it sometimes it cost more to fix something than buy something new and better! So £5 - 45min diagnostic - You give the customer a initial outline of the suspected problem "I seems to be a harddrive failure" -You indicate them how it can be fixed "I would have to replace the harddrive" -Give them a price (Parts and labour) - You might say "fried mobo and processor, not worth fixing cost more than the pc worth" Just give them advice
It's a toughie, very much considering going into the same thing. Not necessarily full time. Problem is, a friend of mine has literally just gone into business, I guess it would be bad form to follow suit so soon after. I wouldn't say £9 p/hr though, taking into consideration the cost of living is less here, I would be happy at say, £6 p/hr. and then charge accordingly to the difficulty of the labour rather than the length, although I guess they go hand in hand.
Aye already planned on the whole 'if im to thick to fix it, you don't have to pay for my dumbness' I only want enough to cover my costs if i can't repair it, after all i could go out to a system that's completely screwed to hell and tell them its not worth repairing, i still need to charge a bit just to cover travel costs. £6 per hour? Seems very low, considering minimum wage isn't even that low. I won't be going at it full time either, 3 days a week and after 5pm all nights. If business heads in the right direction then i be going full time.
I hesitate to charge too much for something I enjoy so much Genuinely hope you have the best of luck with this and it all goes well
what you have to think about, is, you will be running a business, you will have to pay your own national insurance, and taxes, etc etc. you will probably have to buy some gear, which must pay for itself.
Received, again thanks alot. Il enjoy it until i get a system so virus ridden and clanky that il end up paying them to take it back lol Anyway thanks
Embed vimeo video Watch this...at least the first 10 mins where he covers how much to charge...and if you're interested, here are the slides
Was the £6 per hour a typo? Because I don't even put one foot out of bed for £6 per hour. You're running a professional business, not a charity. If you have the skills, knowledge and experience to do the job as well as anyone else locally can, then you have the right to charge adequately for the service and should do so. If not (i.e. if you are just starting out and still have a few things to learn or experience to gain) then you should keep your price as low as possible to be competitive and get a good enough volume of work. I still wouldn't be working for pennies though. If you're going to settle for £6/hour, just go to McDonalds instead and save yourself the bother of setting up a business. Oh, and remember that you are setting up a business, so do it legally. Otherwise it will come back and bite you in the ass in the not too distant future. I'm not speaking from personal experience regarding that, but I am glad that I did everything legitimately from the very beginning, much as I don't like paperwork.
I have to say, the idea that I was so far off with pricing is quite motivating. It's hard to judge from the perspective of someone that has done it for 'family & friends' for so long, i'm sure you know, the usual story, "PC broken? Give it here, needs a new XXXX, i've got a spare lying around, buy me a drink sometime, done." Paperwork is the daunting part, so good luck with that! I personally think it would be a nightmare for me, as said above though, I wouldn't want to push my luck, get it done and out of the way before you learn the hard way.
oh and if your income is below the vat threshold remember you must not charge vat unless vat registered, but you must pay it. you can charge them what it cost you including vat + any markup you want to make. its a good idea if you can, to setup some trade accounts with some suppliers, also join some of the partnerships on offer, microsoft, intel, etc this will enable you to get information that is not generally available. in the case of microsoft, you can join as a partner, then do a test and gain access to the maps pack, which, when i joined, gave access to around £10000 worth of licenses for internal use for around £220, although it currently costs over £300 Inc without discs.
Unicorn is so right, I've been thinking about doing something along the same lines, but with some modding thrown in aswell. The way I see it is that I still have to pay the same bills as they are not going to get any cheaper. I think PC world charge something like £50 for a reinstall and about the same for virus removal, if you can do it for half you'll still make some money. 4 jobs a day gives you a nice tidy £500 per week wage, decent money.
If you want to know exactly what PC World charges then have a look on TheTechGuys Have to agree with what's been said about a basic diagnostic fee; we charge £20 to figure it out and provide a quote. We refund it as well if they then take a higher value service, keep it if they decline. It's only fair, you've still provided an answer even if they don't want to have it fixed.
@VipersGratitude - cheers for the link, he actually made a ton of sense and i wasn't expecting that lol PC world charges are actually getting a bit more reasonable then but yeah i could easily half what they charge. Which is pretty rocking as there aren't many choices around here if you want to get your pc fixed.
Interesting topic. I know my nan was charged £80 for the replacement of a cpu fan on their old pc ( probably pentium 3 or 4, that kinda age ) several years back; the people took the pc away to inspect it ( £40 ) and then brought it back, asking for the £80 on top for the new fan. My nan ( bless her, shes not one of those quiet of frail old ladies ) threatend to punch the lady who returned the pc when she refused to pay £80 and the lady tried to take the pc away again. Still, point being that a minimum call out fee is a good idea, but if you cant fix the issue, then they dont have to pay- raping noobs is easy but not always advisable, lol.
It's sh*t like this that give the genuine people a bad name. A mate of mine threw his PC into a shop for repairs. £200 later it turned out to be a defective on/off switch, they put a new mobo in it, the mobo they fitted was worth about £35 What a bunch of rip off arse holes!! And a week after he got it back, it packed up again before they worked out it was the switch and tried to charge him for it.
I find it really hard to charge people especially family If i can do it cheap i will, if i have a spare lying around that works then i use that £80 is just robbery, my dad took his pc into a shop after i said to him i was'nt 100% so i would take it to an expert first and he came up with right ******** and ended up asking for £150 after spewing all this complete crap he thought i did'nt understand It was funny picking him apart and trying to get him to explain I fixed it for £25 and that was just the cost of a mobo
I love it when that happens , they think you're stupi and then you drop a bomb on them and make them look about 2 inches high...lol
