Turning down work

Donny

A wise old guy once told me that if your getting more than your fair share of proposals accepted perhaps your working too cheap. Not necessarily true but recommend reviewing your cost of doing business, with the thought in mind of where you want to be in say 10 years.

Josh_10

Some of you remember about a month ago I posted about expanding my company due to having more job opportunities than bodys. I have decided that there is absolutly no reason to take on any more risk when we are making good money doing what we are already doing.

However I have recently had to turn down alot of work due to already being over booked. This makes me a little nervous which brings me to my question. I am hoping some of you guys can offer this youngster some good advice on the subject.

Can turning down work right now cause a slow down in the future? What if the inquiries stop coming because all of the contractors I have been turning down assume that I will turn them down again?

What do you guys think? Am I just being paranoid? Is there a good way to handle these iquiries?

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bob young

only have two hands

stands to reason if you turn a job down they will find someone else. if they are satisfied with that contractor they will stick with him. you sometimes cannot do every job but also can't have it both ways. if you overextend yourself quality suffers and that is worse than declining the project. i have lost a few good accounts over the years but life goes on. i realize i am not the only plumber in the world. better your reputation to be too busy than you did a inferior job. reputation is everything.

Mitch_6

Team up with other companies

I have a couple of other companies I work with, heating, plumbing and drain cleaning. We will team up on large projects some times paying a discount or split up the work like one does the heat and one does the plumbing or one does near boiler and one does the radiation.

We also give them work if a customer calls and we cannot get there in time we ask if we can send one of the other companies over. They usually bill us just under the rate and we make a couple of small bucks for the coordination.

This way we do not loose a potential job down the road and most people are happy we could get someone right over. Some of the other companies are actually larger and can shake someone free quick in an emergency, if it is in a pinch they will usually bill full rate since they are doing us more of a favor just putting out a fire.

It also works good in reverse if we slow down a little we can usually loose an employee for a couple of days and bill them out at cost so we are not loosing money haveing a truck just sitting at the shop.

Mitch S.

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Ragu_5

Good Advice Guys

I especially agree with Mitch; that inter-trade cooperation can really be win-win.

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singh

josh

there was a good article in JLC a couple of months ago , i'll see if i can find it.
summary , if your good enough and customers willing to wait, book down the road. may not work on all projects, but nice to know work is there in the future.

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John Ruhnke

Know your priorities........

Josh,

I have som e clients that have been with me for ten years. They always come first. Recomemdations from good clients come second. When it is new clients from advertising, then its taking the radiant work over plumbing work that counts. If I am really really slow then I will take a plumbing job from a yellow page add. Also with new clients I pick and choose a lot. I screen them over the phone, ask questions, feel them out. Any bad vives and I won't work for them. Once a client got rude with me because I was asking to many questions. They said "Hey this is rude asking all these questions you can't expect to receive much work can you." I said, " I have three other clients wanting me to bid on stuff. I can only handle one project at a time."

Persistance pays off. If I tell a new prospect that I am to busy call back in a month and they do, I usually try and squeeze them in. If a new prospect really wants me and no one else and shows it, then well I will fit them in.

I always try my best to make my clients happy. I bring the job in on time and always get the job done right. Any slight problems and I run over quick to handle it. Reputation is very important to me. My clients are willing to pay more for me and my reputation. Yellow page clients often never heard of me and think I am just like every other contractor. If I sense they don't value me then I just pass there names on to another contractor I know.

Finding good help is always harder then finding work. Work has always been easy to find.

JR

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frank_25

since'64.....

....that has been the answer most wanted by a lot of guys in our trade. Times come when you wish you had more installers, then when you have too many guys. It's a sea/saw thing. I've seen it, been there, done that. If you can maintain your ethics, level of professionalism, and stay sane, then put on the help. If'n it don't work out, well there is always the pink slip. That's why you can't get connected [ personal] with the help. You can't be a friend of your employees. You've got to be a boss when the bottom line is at stake.

Darin Cook_5

Frankie

There is alot of truth in your statement. It is a lesson almost always learned the hard way.





Darin

Josh_10

Thanks guys. There is some really good advice here. I especially like the system that John has. Boy of all of the decisions that I thought I would have to make none of these came up in my mind while I was planning my business.

Donny- That is a very true statement. A wise man told you that for sure. I did make that mistake in my first two months of business. It wasn't that I was cheap more less but that I was trying to match other contractors prices instead of selling myself. However now we are charging quite a bit more than the competition these days. We charge what it takes to make the money we DESERVE and keep Mitchell Mechanical, Inc. in business so we can serve our clients for generations to come.

Early on we fixed half a dozen radiant floor systems that were installed improperly. On a couple of houses we actually lowered the gas bills by 40%+. It was a blessing for us for sure. Those people are always telling their rich friends about us. That and 11 successful installs and the calls come in like crazy.


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Ken D._2

work

If you do turn work down, be sure to extend common courtesy and call the customer to explain. Many times people would rather you be honest as opposed to ignoring them. If you don't call, you will definitely never hear from him again and he will tell anyone who will listen that you were rude and discourteous among other things.