Billable Hours

[bertsmobile1]

Big Snip
When it comes to oils leaks there is usually extra time spent on cleanups which gets billed as additional labor time. Like the replacing of an oil seal that another shop failed to replace twice and customer ran the mower until there was gas and oil from front to back which made a 30 minute into a 4 hour job. That customer was a little ill about the cost until I explained why the charges were what they were.

I don't usually charge for cutting my own lawn with the customer's mowers. It usually needs it considering it is 6 acres.

I don't charge for mowing all my grass either but always list the testing on the bill and always test .
And my workshop is on 1000 acres of mixed farm
My "rent" includes mowing the verge, there is around 15 miles of it .
The workshop area is about 1 acre fenced off from the main farm and used to isolate stud animals .
I like to have one of the bulls in here as it tends to keep unwelcome people out.

First thing I try to do with a running mower is to do a test mow, because I will notice problems that the customer does not because they have been coming on slowly .
The first test happens when the mower is rolled off the trailer where I can determine the condition of the hydros & brakes .
Then it is about 1/2 hour to 1 hour of mowing do whatever needs to be done, another test mow and back to the customer .
One of the problems with factory type workshops is most don't have a test lawn or in many cases even some where that they can leave a mower running for an hour supervised , let alone a line trimer or blower .
Very hard to test "mower runs fine for 1/2 hour then bogs down in long grass" unless you can mow for 1/2 hour then hit some long grass .

While I agree the "Book" time is close the the actual spannar time I stand by my original post that it is not a true representation of billing hours .
For starters there is no "office time" included and we both know just how much time can be consumed just trying to find a part, let alone ordering it .
We have swing back blades down here and it is not uncommon to find a blade bolt stripped out to the point that the only way to remove it is to weld it to the blade to stop it turning.
Then you get rear wheels that have never been off in 5 years or more and are rusted solid onto the shaft, going to be more than the 3 minutes the book allows for it and on the subject of blade bolts, the bar blades that have been worn down to a stump, never removed and ends up needing to be cut off after spending a lot more time than the 2 minutes of allotted time to remove the blades .

 

[Scrubcadet10]

I like to have one of the bulls in here as it tends to keep unwelcome people out.

Pit or Bovine?

 

[KevIsland]

Thanks. I don't want to rip people off, but I need to raise my prices (rates). This job took me 2-3 hrs and parts $50-$60. I charge $50 hr. So I'm still pretty cheap, no wonder I'm still too busy to relax.

 

[bertsmobile1]

FWIW in Aust $
I charge $ 60 / hr because I am mobile and have very little in the way of monetary overheads other than running the vehicle & insurances . I only do repairs
The nearest shop 3 miles away, charges $ 90 / hr . He owns his shop & lives behind so his fixed weekly outgoing are not particularly high either
He also sells new mowers so I send people with dead mowers to him to get a new one & he sends hopeless cases that are all hours down to me .
We don't actually get along but this informal arrangement is mutually beneficial .
10 miles away is the city
They have 4 glass front mower shops and 2 backyard mower repair workshops .
The glass fronts charge between $ 120 & $ 160 /hr. And $ 60 to $ 100 each way pick up & delivery , I do it for free.
They do not want to fix anything because they are all in rented workshops and the retail mark up on mowers down here is 100% .
Despite the fact that 99.9% of the land mass down here is empty , commercial rentals are rediculous so they will be paying anything up to $ 5000 / wk in rent and you could never meet those costs doing mainly repairs .

IF you are charging scheduled rate then you should be billing out near double those hours at your labour rate .
However make sure the invoice has some sort of break down so they don't see a 5 hour block of time for what looks like a simple a 2 hour job.
Don't know how transport fees are done in the USA but several shops will add a "Courier fee" of anything between $ 5 & $ 15 to any bill that has signifiacnt amount of parts included .

I once charged $ 140 to put a tube in the rear wheels of a Husky Rider 14 Pro
14 years old never had either one off and it was getting to the point I was considering taking the whole tranny out and putting it in the big press .

Over the few years I have been ding this what I have found works best is keeping the hourly rate low but building up the hours.
I the customer thinks you have spent 10 hours on the job the $ 500 is not unreasonable.
But if you show 5 hours then the customer will feel that $ 500 is being ripped off .
Also invoicing a lot of hours tends to make the customers understand long turn around times .

after adding a cleaning fee quite a few customers started presenting me with clean mowers .
And because they were cleaning them they noticed things going wrong earlier so send the mower to me more often.

 

[Hammermechanicman]

Thanks. I don't want to rip people off, but I need to raise my prices (rates). This job took me 2-3 hrs and parts $50-$60. I charge $50 hr. So I'm still pretty cheap, no wonder I'm still too busy to relax.

3 hr x $50 = $150 labor
$60 parts x 40% markup = $84
Total $234 plusr tax
Sounds reasonable to me.