Non-transparent charging
An updated review following new information from this company ...and it doesn't get any better!
It seems that the labour rate is £80.00 per hour, not £100.00 BUT each part-hour is charged at £80.00 too so a 90 minute job will cost £160.00, not £120.00 which one might expect. That also means that a job taking 1 hour and ten minutes would also cost £160.00 in labour too.
Not content with that, mark up on goods supplied appears to be 100%. Parts for my job would have cost at most, £10.00 yet I was charged £20.00 making £180.00 in total.
My advice remains the same -best avoided as charging for time not spent on the job and double the cost of basic items like a light switch and rose and a short length of cable are simply unacceptable.
Reply from Hiskins Electrical Services
Hi David, thank you for taking the time to post a review. It's unfortunate you feel unhappy with the service received, as I have explained to you recently we strive to provide the best possible service to our customers, focusing on good communication, being where we say we will, when we say we will and complete the job agreed as described.
To address your concerns and those of any others reading your review and this reply, the materials provided to complete the works at you home were not marked up by 100% and this isn't something we do as a business, as explained to cover any potential failures of supplied materials we apply a 20% mark-up to cover a return visit to replace and a return trip to collect said items from suppliers.
Further to this, customers should keep in mind that materials for any works have to be ordered and collected, this takes time and other overheads such as fuel, all of which if a business is to be profitable, support it's members of staff consistently, and operate sensibly, have to be taken into account. This allows us to continue to ensure we strive to meet our company values of providing the best possible service.
With regards to hourly charging, in your specific case, a charge of £180 was agreed over the telephone prior to our visit, this was established taking in to account the quantifiable tasks you required and an ambiguous task of finding a fault. 1 hour to cover the quantifiable tasks, the materials required for them, there procurement and collection and a further hour of labour to find the fault. As faults are not something that anyone can judge how long they will take to find, I find the fairest way for all parties to approach them, is to agree an amount of time to spend looking for the fault, if the fault is found in this time, it is either fixed if straight forward enough, or if remedy requires a longer amount of time and materials, this is then discussed and an approach agreed. If the fault isn't found in this time, this is discussed and again further steps agreed. This method is agreeable to 99.99% of our clients to date, and in instances where the fault is found and remedied very quickly, for instance in just 10 minutes, the customer would not be charged for the hour as this would be unreasonable. In the case of David's fault, the fault was found and materials provided to repair free of charge in a little over half an hour, as such, the full hours charge was applied and you paid exactly what you were expecting to pay.
In summary, when the public deals with companies it is best to keep an open mind and try and remember that the time spent at your property is not always reflective of the full amount of time, resources and costs associated with completing the works you require. In the electrical trade especially we have a lot of paperwork we have to complete for every property we work at, regular training costs to keep our qualifications up to date, annual costs for trade memberships and annual cost for assessments to show we remain competent. On average paperwork alone for each and every job we attend takes up 34.2 minutes, this includes creating quotes, creating invoices and where applicable creating certificates, which is also a cost to a 3rd party for each one we create. If a visit to quote is required also, this can easily be another hour of time that should be taken into consideration.
I'm regretful that on this occasion we have a customer who feels unsatisfied, however I am grateful that this is an isolated incident and that many of our customers use us time and time again, this gives me reassurance that we are definitely doing many things well and delivering on our company values for our customers.
Kindest of regards,
Hiskins Electrical Services