Rounding billable time???

[RC3]

Trying to get some help on how others charge. If company charges by the hour- how is the time rounded? Here is what I am seeing that makes me think money is being lost. Tech works at job from 8:53-9:36. Most of the techs would round this as 9:00-9:30 and billed at .5 hour. While I think it should be 43 minutes and billed at .75 hour.

Any help on how you view or address this would be appreciated.

Thanks,

 

[Daja7]

Always a minimum. In your case 1 hour. Not sure what your hrly rate is but you have to factor in travel time.

 

[gadfly56]

It very much depends on what kind of call your tech is on, but for simple service work during normal business hours within a reasonable distance (<1 hr) from the office, we would probably charge one (1) hour minimum and for each quarter hour or fraction over. Tech arrives at 0900 and finishes up at 0948, it's an hour. If he finishes at 1048, it's two (2) hours.

 

[RC3]

Thanks for the responses. We have a 30 minute minimum call- maybe we need to bump it to an hour minimum. We usually bill in 15 minute increments after the first 30. We lose time in the rounding down/up to get to the quarter hour. I guess I should make the tech's count total minutes on the job and round that- instead of rounding arrival and departure times.

 

[cowboyjwc]

It very much depends on what kind of call your tech is on, but for simple service work during normal business hours within a reasonable distance (<1 hr) from the office, we would probably charge one (1) hour minimum and for each quarter hour or fraction over. Tech arrives at 0900 and finishes up at 0948, it's an hour. If he finishes at 1048, it's two (2) hours.

That's kind of the way I did it. 9:00-9:48 was an hour. Anything else I just rounded to the nearest 15 minutes, meaning 10:05 may be 10:00 and 10:07 is 10:15.

 

[Rewire]

We do residential service and moved away from hourly billing to straight forward pricing and have tripled our average ticket. We charge 68.00 to send a truck and then price the job from the price guide. Our price guide is based on $175.00/hr.

 

[Dolfan]

Mr Ozarks, teach me your system and I will take you fishing:thumbsup:

 

[Rewire]

Mr Ozarks, teach me your system and I will take you fishing:thumbsup:

It is not my system it is ESIs system .
David Boyle
Direct: (941) 893-2903
Call David and he can set you up with a profit day so you can look for yourself.

 

[Dolfan]

can't we just cut out the middle man....man? :lol:

 

[LEO2854]

can't we just cut out the middle man....man? :lol:

Google flat rate pricing for electrical contractors.:thumbsup:

 

[LEO2854]

Trying to get some help on how others charge. If company charges by the hour- how is the time rounded? Here is what I am seeing that makes me think money is being lost. Tech works at job from 8:53-9:36. Most of the techs would round this as 9:00-9:30 and billed at .5 hour. While I think it should be 43 minutes and billed at .75 hour.

Any help on how you view or address this would be appreciated.

Thanks,

You should have a minimum service charge fee that covers the time for the guys to leave the shop do the job and come back to the shop.

So your guys leave the shop at 0700, they arrive at 0720,they finish the job and collect the check at 0750 they arrive back at the shop at 0810,,, that's 2 hours...:blink::lol::thumbsup:

 

[220/221]

IMO, you shouldn't be billing by the minute (or 1/4 hour).

Unless your hourly is around the $200 mark, I'd guess that you are losing money 90% of the time on service type work.

If you feel the need to do it, round up.

 

[Daja7]

We do residential service and moved away from hourly billing to straight forward pricing and have tripled our average ticket. We charge 68.00 to send a truck and then price the job from the price guide. Our price guide is based on $175.00/hr.

This is definitly the way to go. Find a system of flat rate or upfront pricing. it will have a formula to tell you what you rate should be that is based on your overhead fees and expenses. you will be amazed at how much money you are leaving on the table. Of course there is the service method that needs to instill value to the customer alot to it but not complicated.

 

[RC3]

Thank you guys for your responses. I have been thinking about switching to a flat rate system and this is pushing me further to make the switch.

Thanks again,

 

[Rewire]

I tried several flat rate systems and all were pretty much the same. The one thing that they all lacked was the training to implement the system throughout our company. A flat rate system is worthless if you cant get the tech in the door.

 

[Fulthrotl]

Thank you guys for your responses. I have been thinking about switching to a flat rate system and this is pushing me further to make the switch.

Thanks again,

+1 on the flat rate.

flat rate when you can define the scope of the work, T+M when
you can't.

customers usually want to know three things:

how much will it cost?
how long will it take?
when can you start?

they don't want to know that you are god's gift to the electron,
that everyone who worked on their property before you sucked,
or, that you don't know how much it will cost, 'cause you don't
know how long it will take.

rounding up? let's get real. if you go off on a service call, and
get it done, then you have a second service call, and get it done,
guess what? the day is pretty much over. can you get to a third
service call and get it done?

can you get THREE different people to have their schedules line up
so you can make that day a full and productive one? sure you can. :lol:

so, each of those service calls is half a days work, 'cause it's eating
half a day of your life, and that is gone forever.

so, whats half a day of your life worth? write that down.
how much is the material? add markup. write that down.

add them together. write that down.

that is your service call amount. now, you have to write a bill that
has a number that looks like that number, but doesn't cause the
customer to have a stroke.

flat rate is how you do that. a paragraph describing what you are
doing, and an amount at the end of the paragraph saying how much
it is, for service call type work.
now, go to the spreadsheet of your costs of doing business...
(you made it when you did your business plan, remember?)
and see what your REAL cost of doing business is.

you don't have one of those? ok, either quit reading opinions
here and do a sheet, NOW, or just save yourself the grief
and close your business now, rather than wait until you are
deeply in debt to fail. save yourself some money.

if you are selling something that you don't know how much it
costs to buy, this isn't gonna go well.

when i ran my numbers, it came up $128 an hour to maintain
level flight. not get rich, just level flight. i have no overhead to
speak of. most electrical contractors are closer to $200.

and my pricing is middle of the pack for quotes, based on what
i've seen.

 

[Daja7]

I tried several flat rate systems and all were pretty much the same. The one thing that they all lacked was the training to implement the system throughout our company. A flat rate system is worthless if you cant get the tech in the door.

Agreed! There is more to it than just showing up and hoping they will agree to pay your price. You have to put some effort into it. a little salesmanship a little polish and yes they do care about who you are and how you will be taking care of them. Value confindence and trustworthyness. Most of all it must be genuine and sincere. No tee shirts and dirty genes. clean truck, well spoken no nose rings or facial tats. again, a lot to it but not difficult. phsycology plays a big part. but again sincere. You really do want to help the customer. and profit is not a dirty word. When a customer asks why it costs so much we just say we have to pay well to get the best techs we have to cover our costs and yes we have to make a proffit to stay in business. they always understand. there are some good training sessions on the internet, cant remember name right now but it helps. i will come back with the name latter.

 

[gadfly56]

Agreed! There is more to it than just showing up and hoping they will agree to pay your price. You have to put some effort into it. a little salesmanship a little polish and yes they do care about who you are and how you will be taking care of them. Value confindence and trustworthyness. Most of all it must be genuine and sincere. No tee shirts and dirty genes. clean truck, well spoken no nose rings or facial tats. again, a lot to it but not difficult. phsycology plays a big part. but again sincere. You really do want to help the customer. and profit is not a dirty word. When a customer asks why it costs so much we just say we have to pay well to get the best techs we have to cover our costs and yes we have to make a proffit to stay in business. they always understand. there are some good training sessions on the internet, cant remember name right now but it helps. i will come back with the name latter.

If I can summarize: you're there to solve the customer's problem, not become part of it.