Hi Rob Saw a post from Dannypipe on here a rew days ago saying he was busy and killy bing was helping out I dont think you are far from him why not send him a PM to see if you can help each other out .....regards Turnpin😛unk:
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- Thread starter gasmanrob
- Start date
R
Ray Stafford
Coming back to the OP for a moment, another suggestion is to spend some time working ON your business, rather than IN your business.
When you first go SE, most people quite rightly snap up every job that comes along, being desperate for work. Thats fine when you first start up, and probably the only way to survive. However, there is a danger that it becomes a habit, and your "business" actually ends up just servicing whatever work comes your way. Thats what I mean by working IN your business.
The tricky part is stepping back and working ON the business. Asking questions like:
What sort of work am I best at?
What sort of work do I enjoy most?
What sort of work is most profitable?
What sort of customer type is best/most enjoyable/most profitable?
How can I change my business so that I get more of this good/enjoyable/profitable work, and less of the other stuff
You can't change everything overnight, but you absolutely have to have business objectives and plans, and you absolutely have to do something different if you want things to change.
Einstein reckoned "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing year after year and expecting different results"
It took me 14 years and a whole lot of stress to learn that simple business fact. I can't honestly say that everything has been easy since accepting it, but at least there has been progress.
One of the best suggestions I ever heard was that you should imagine that you are wheelchair bound, and no longer able to work yourself. However, you hire a plumber who by sheer chance happens to have exactly the same skills and experience that you have. Your job, from your wheelchair, is to direct the business, do the marketing, and make the highest possible amount of money from directing your "employee".
Just a thought.
When you first go SE, most people quite rightly snap up every job that comes along, being desperate for work. Thats fine when you first start up, and probably the only way to survive. However, there is a danger that it becomes a habit, and your "business" actually ends up just servicing whatever work comes your way. Thats what I mean by working IN your business.
The tricky part is stepping back and working ON the business. Asking questions like:
What sort of work am I best at?
What sort of work do I enjoy most?
What sort of work is most profitable?
What sort of customer type is best/most enjoyable/most profitable?
How can I change my business so that I get more of this good/enjoyable/profitable work, and less of the other stuff
You can't change everything overnight, but you absolutely have to have business objectives and plans, and you absolutely have to do something different if you want things to change.
Einstein reckoned "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing year after year and expecting different results"
It took me 14 years and a whole lot of stress to learn that simple business fact. I can't honestly say that everything has been easy since accepting it, but at least there has been progress.
One of the best suggestions I ever heard was that you should imagine that you are wheelchair bound, and no longer able to work yourself. However, you hire a plumber who by sheer chance happens to have exactly the same skills and experience that you have. Your job, from your wheelchair, is to direct the business, do the marketing, and make the highest possible amount of money from directing your "employee".
Just a thought.
Sorry chaps been out for the evening.
Yes billy did come along on a few and I'd gladly have him back doing more. And going back to an older post yes I have phased out plumbing, but not all plumbing. It is the bathrooms and wet rooms that gave me the most head ache and caused me the most grief. I'll keep small plumbing jobs as they are often my most profitable jobs. At one point I cleared rays Gillingham branch out of fluid master over the course of a week.
I've sat and had a chat with the wife and she has agreed to lay off a bit and see if I can turn things around. She has tried to take on some of the office work but with two under 2's that nap at different times of the day she just doesn't have the time to dedicate to it. However one of her friends is looking for extra cash so will get her in on 2 half days.
My good reliable bread and butter comes from an insurance company a letting agent and corgi.
originally I was traveling all over for the insurance work and it took up too much time so I put them in touch with billy for the Maidstone stuff and Danny pipe for the TN postcode stuff, that's helped cut my fuel bill and given me some extra time to claw away at the stuff closer to home. Corgi is easy and pays promptly same goes for the letting agent. That's my core work now I've dropped the wet rooms etc as it never paid on time, and kept me away from the gas.
for me breakdowns are king! That's where I'm heading. That's the goal. I'm not just good I'm M & S good. Component testing and loom faults. Weird and wonderfull un explained phenomenons are where I shine. Off the back of that the boiler installs and upgrades.
My push product wise is best of British. People love abit of home grown support the economy jazz. So far it sells well.
Getting a lot of support from baxi too, finance for boilers, approved installer and a new installer scheme coming from them very soon once the 3 new boilers have been launched. Followed by a decent tv campaign on sky.
like I say getting the work in the door touch wood has been easy. Getting money from certain sectors has not.
Also me and the wife are cut from very different cloths. She is steady and stable don't want to rock the boat. Where as I joined the industry with every intention of running my own. I want to sit back in years to come and say I built that. I'm not interested in being massive but I am set on being known as the best and untouchable on quality and service. Too many times as a youngster I was told I'd never amount to anything and my company name known as the best there is, is me sticking 2 fingers up at the system! That's my determination. But equally it's not fair to make the family suffer for my ambitions.
things made harder are it's not just me and mine I need to look out for. My mum.. Since dad passed I've been helping out with her bills. Nothing major just top ups and treat your selfs. But promised the old man I'd make sure everyone was ok and looked after. A promise I will NOT go back on.
Yes billy did come along on a few and I'd gladly have him back doing more. And going back to an older post yes I have phased out plumbing, but not all plumbing. It is the bathrooms and wet rooms that gave me the most head ache and caused me the most grief. I'll keep small plumbing jobs as they are often my most profitable jobs. At one point I cleared rays Gillingham branch out of fluid master over the course of a week.
I've sat and had a chat with the wife and she has agreed to lay off a bit and see if I can turn things around. She has tried to take on some of the office work but with two under 2's that nap at different times of the day she just doesn't have the time to dedicate to it. However one of her friends is looking for extra cash so will get her in on 2 half days.
My good reliable bread and butter comes from an insurance company a letting agent and corgi.
originally I was traveling all over for the insurance work and it took up too much time so I put them in touch with billy for the Maidstone stuff and Danny pipe for the TN postcode stuff, that's helped cut my fuel bill and given me some extra time to claw away at the stuff closer to home. Corgi is easy and pays promptly same goes for the letting agent. That's my core work now I've dropped the wet rooms etc as it never paid on time, and kept me away from the gas.
for me breakdowns are king! That's where I'm heading. That's the goal. I'm not just good I'm M & S good. Component testing and loom faults. Weird and wonderfull un explained phenomenons are where I shine. Off the back of that the boiler installs and upgrades.
My push product wise is best of British. People love abit of home grown support the economy jazz. So far it sells well.
Getting a lot of support from baxi too, finance for boilers, approved installer and a new installer scheme coming from them very soon once the 3 new boilers have been launched. Followed by a decent tv campaign on sky.
like I say getting the work in the door touch wood has been easy. Getting money from certain sectors has not.
Also me and the wife are cut from very different cloths. She is steady and stable don't want to rock the boat. Where as I joined the industry with every intention of running my own. I want to sit back in years to come and say I built that. I'm not interested in being massive but I am set on being known as the best and untouchable on quality and service. Too many times as a youngster I was told I'd never amount to anything and my company name known as the best there is, is me sticking 2 fingers up at the system! That's my determination. But equally it's not fair to make the family suffer for my ambitions.
things made harder are it's not just me and mine I need to look out for. My mum.. Since dad passed I've been helping out with her bills. Nothing major just top ups and treat your selfs. But promised the old man I'd make sure everyone was ok and looked after. A promise I will NOT go back on.
A bit off the point rob i know but corgi have contacted me several times recently offering work. Im more of an installs kind of guy. Do they do much installation work?
Cheers
Cheers
E
Ermintrude
I'm getting fed up with being self employed as such but that's mostly because the good times are very good and the bad times sting a bit. It's difficult but being PAYE is defo 100% easier when you have family. Why not keep your business ticking over but go PAYE? Your kids are only here once. When they are grown up you will 'hopefully' have less responsibility and can afford the ups and downs of self employment?
For all those who said Erm was out there somewhere milking cows in a field, well, look, look, he is here.
Back to gasmanrob, I would say stick with it. But truely, only you can make that decision. You know better where it hurts. Personally, I could never work for anyone, ever again. Besides, I doubt they will have me for long. I will blarb my mouth so loud they will be in a hurry to ''kick me to touch''.
Hope you can get back to good relations with your mom. She needs you now more as her other half has moved on. Don't leave it too late. I know with age they can be a pain sometimes to reason with, but you only have one mom
Back to gasmanrob, I would say stick with it. But truely, only you can make that decision. You know better where it hurts. Personally, I could never work for anyone, ever again. Besides, I doubt they will have me for long. I will blarb my mouth so loud they will be in a hurry to ''kick me to touch''.
Hope you can get back to good relations with your mom. She needs you now more as her other half has moved on. Don't leave it too late. I know with age they can be a pain sometimes to reason with, but you only have one mom
I know you say youve turned your back on bathrooms n wetrooms and thats great but it might be better to keep all in the fold until your that busy that you could afford to put them on back burner. On the other hand if there givin you nothin but hassle your maybe right. Ill unblock wcs all day as long as we get paid for our labour.
What annoys me is the fact that just about every customer that seems to be tight. If you work out what you need to be turning over a week to get 32k it is pretty high. That level of turnover takes time. I made no money 1st 2 yrs and a small profit in the 3rd and have kept growing steadily since. It is hard, really hard nearly been bust several times.
It is still hard but, it is getting easier as I have a decent amount of referrals, recommendations and repeat business from older customers but I still need to run ads to keep busy. I reckon that you need about 3-5 different ads out there to keep the phone ringing with any consistency.
It is still hard but, it is getting easier as I have a decent amount of referrals, recommendations and repeat business from older customers but I still need to run ads to keep busy. I reckon that you need about 3-5 different ads out there to keep the phone ringing with any consistency.
I love discussions like this it really helps to see the real pros and cons of working for yourself. I haven't got half the experience of most on here but I will give my 2ps worth.
I was SE for about 2-3 years, wasn't easy but I loved it and between subbing to one or two and my own work I was always busy enough to live ok, wasn't rich, but always had enough to cover bills etc and some weeks I earned ridiculous money. I then by chance applied for a paye job local to me and got it. I thought give it a go see what happens. It was working for Dyno Plumbing doing the BG Homecare contracts. At first I loved it, company van, holiday pay, van full of stock, diesel card etc.
Then as some have already mentioned, the goalposts were moved. Going on call was the only way to make any 'real money' and so I would do it usually at least twice a week, usually a weekday and a Saturday. You used to only get paid if you actually completed any jobs, so there was no extra wage if you didn't get called out. This was fine as Saturdays you'd usually get 10 calls minimum, and you'd get £30 per completed job so could earn some good dough. They then realised (I think) that some of us were earning bit too much, so they then said that they were considering changing call out so instead if getting paid per job, you'd get an extra days flat rate regardless of whether you got called out or not. This for me was when I started to question it all.
sadly after that I got ill, had 3 ops in the space of 2 months. On my last op I was signed off for 1 month, after about 10 days I went to my parking space and the work van had gone, thinking it's been stoked I phoned into office, and they said oh no the boss and workshop monkey had come and taken it, without so much as a word to me, basically saying that they didn't want me using it while I was off sick (I hadn't used it once, I was sofa bound) this really put my back up not least because I had about 2k worth of my own tools etc inside it. This made me worry so I phoned boss and said can I come to work following Monday (this being the Thursday) he said he would get a local lad to pick me up and bring me in on the Monday. So he did, and I was in office sorting paperwork etc when I got called into boss office with the head supervised woman, and was told that while I was signed off I wasn't making the business any money and they needed my van so they were cancelling my contract!
i was disgusted, I'm pretty sure what they did was illegal, especially as was still signed off for another 2 weeks. I felt ashamed though, haven't been sacked before and it wasn't a nice feeling. So they arranged for my tools to be loaded onto another van and workshop monkey gave me a lift home, even stood in my lounge and made me take off my uniform so they could take it back!
Sorry to be so long winded but guess what I'm trying to say is there's no loyalty these days even if you're paye, I genuinely worked my nuts off for them and I never said no to covering call out or just doing one more job for us or going to help out someone else etc. I was doing average 4-5k worth of work every week, as we had to document this on our paperwork etc, and I didn't even get a thank you, just thrown to the lions after having operations on my head ffs!
now I've been SE since. Subbing to a bloke who's local to me, and has a very good reputation amongst my plumbing friends who've known him for a few years basically they call him the oracle, he knows everything about plumbing/heating apparently lol but forgetting all that the thing I love is he's very patient with me, doesn't care about timescale etc long as I can walk away from a job saying I'm proud of that. It has to be neat and it has to be right, no corners cut, that's pretty much his motto. And above all, he says THANK YOU!
all the best with what you do Rob but if you want my honest answer mate, stick with what you're doing. You sound like you're the dogs danglers at breakdowns etc,don't let someone who knows fark all make money off the back of that and then drop you like hot potato if he doesn't need you.,use that knowledge to make your own money, build your own business and build a future befitting of your wife and 2 nippers, you know it'll work out.
I was SE for about 2-3 years, wasn't easy but I loved it and between subbing to one or two and my own work I was always busy enough to live ok, wasn't rich, but always had enough to cover bills etc and some weeks I earned ridiculous money. I then by chance applied for a paye job local to me and got it. I thought give it a go see what happens. It was working for Dyno Plumbing doing the BG Homecare contracts. At first I loved it, company van, holiday pay, van full of stock, diesel card etc.
Then as some have already mentioned, the goalposts were moved. Going on call was the only way to make any 'real money' and so I would do it usually at least twice a week, usually a weekday and a Saturday. You used to only get paid if you actually completed any jobs, so there was no extra wage if you didn't get called out. This was fine as Saturdays you'd usually get 10 calls minimum, and you'd get £30 per completed job so could earn some good dough. They then realised (I think) that some of us were earning bit too much, so they then said that they were considering changing call out so instead if getting paid per job, you'd get an extra days flat rate regardless of whether you got called out or not. This for me was when I started to question it all.
sadly after that I got ill, had 3 ops in the space of 2 months. On my last op I was signed off for 1 month, after about 10 days I went to my parking space and the work van had gone, thinking it's been stoked I phoned into office, and they said oh no the boss and workshop monkey had come and taken it, without so much as a word to me, basically saying that they didn't want me using it while I was off sick (I hadn't used it once, I was sofa bound) this really put my back up not least because I had about 2k worth of my own tools etc inside it. This made me worry so I phoned boss and said can I come to work following Monday (this being the Thursday) he said he would get a local lad to pick me up and bring me in on the Monday. So he did, and I was in office sorting paperwork etc when I got called into boss office with the head supervised woman, and was told that while I was signed off I wasn't making the business any money and they needed my van so they were cancelling my contract!
i was disgusted, I'm pretty sure what they did was illegal, especially as was still signed off for another 2 weeks. I felt ashamed though, haven't been sacked before and it wasn't a nice feeling. So they arranged for my tools to be loaded onto another van and workshop monkey gave me a lift home, even stood in my lounge and made me take off my uniform so they could take it back!
Sorry to be so long winded but guess what I'm trying to say is there's no loyalty these days even if you're paye, I genuinely worked my nuts off for them and I never said no to covering call out or just doing one more job for us or going to help out someone else etc. I was doing average 4-5k worth of work every week, as we had to document this on our paperwork etc, and I didn't even get a thank you, just thrown to the lions after having operations on my head ffs!
now I've been SE since. Subbing to a bloke who's local to me, and has a very good reputation amongst my plumbing friends who've known him for a few years basically they call him the oracle, he knows everything about plumbing/heating apparently lol but forgetting all that the thing I love is he's very patient with me, doesn't care about timescale etc long as I can walk away from a job saying I'm proud of that. It has to be neat and it has to be right, no corners cut, that's pretty much his motto. And above all, he says THANK YOU!
all the best with what you do Rob but if you want my honest answer mate, stick with what you're doing. You sound like you're the dogs danglers at breakdowns etc,don't let someone who knows fark all make money off the back of that and then drop you like hot potato if he doesn't need you.,use that knowledge to make your own money, build your own business and build a future befitting of your wife and 2 nippers, you know it'll work out.
M
MOSSEP
Ive run a business now for 13 years and its never got any easier. Every progression Ive made, be it employing extra staff to give me more free time or increasing prices to get more free time has resulted in less free time! I have admin staff ad still have to do large amounts of paperwork. I can't see it ever getting easier, you can either accept it or not.
Im really lucky that my wife doesn't nag one bit. It must be tuff for her but I only have saturday off work (but its still constantly on my mind) every other bit of time is spent at work or doing paper work.
If you've got an opportunity to earn good money going PAYE don't discount it, running a business (I don't mean subbing for builders) isn't for everyone and thats nothing to be ashamed of.
Im really lucky that my wife doesn't nag one bit. It must be tuff for her but I only have saturday off work (but its still constantly on my mind) every other bit of time is spent at work or doing paper work.
If you've got an opportunity to earn good money going PAYE don't discount it, running a business (I don't mean subbing for builders) isn't for everyone and thats nothing to be ashamed of.
Last edited by a moderator:
M
MOSSEP
Oh, and if you don't want your bathroom and wet room jobs, send them my way and I will sort you out ;-)
I
IDCHAPPY
Stick with it mate, we are just over the 3 year mark now and apart from the occasional quiet spell it's picked up.
Last week was a PITA but uit can't all be a smooth ride 🙂
Last week was a PITA but uit can't all be a smooth ride 🙂
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