Ever change prices mid-job?

[Groundman One]

We had a lovely little job this morning. Hot as hell here so we were going to hit this sweet three-hour job and knock off at noon. But while I'm gettting the gear out, my climber prices a tree for the guy that wasn't in the original estimate. Long story short, he priced a $300 tree at $100. I didn't find out until it was said and done and half-hour had gone by.

I was tempted to tell the guy, "Look, my climber made a mistake and that should have been a $300 tree, but since it was our mistake in pricing, I'm willing to do it for $200. So you still get a deal, and we don't take a beating on it."

But I didn't. We did the tree for the $100 and that was that. I think once, maybe twice since I've been with this company (1998) we changed prices mid-job, but not more than that. (No written contracts. We're handshake kind of guys and most of our clients know us already.)

I'm curious how others go about this sort of thing.

 

[Matt Michael]

the only way I ever change a price is to charge less than what I told them

 

[treeclimber101]

I think that your your case your kinda screwed , since you know the customer and have a previous relationship with them take it as some good PR , but with a new customer or someone I don't particularly care for I will leave it open ended giving our hrly rate as a bench mark and if they persist with a concrete price than I shoot the high side

 

[Groundman One]

I think that your your case your kinda screwed , since you know the customer and have a previous relationship with them take it as some good PR , but with a new customer or someone I don't particularly care for I will leave it open ended giving our hrly rate as a bench mark and if they persist with a concrete price than I shoot the high side

Yeah, that about says it.

This doesn't happen often. Lots of times one of us will be high or low by $50 or so, but this was an obvious case of "Oops!" on my climber's part. And the guy did know us, he's a good customer, but not a great one. His property, though not big, is putting green perfect and we always spend more time at his place cleaning up than most places so I didn't feel too bad thinking about asking for more $$$.

But he did ask us to take the wood once the tree was down. That wasn't part of the deal he made with my climber, so I told him it would be $75 more, just because. He balked, told me again what a great customer he was, and told me he refused hiring another crew that was cruising the street in favour of calling us back (that pizzed me off when he said that. It was low). I told him he was paying less for that tree than I would have charged my mother so "you are getting good service, sir". He shut up after that, and the job was longer, but uneventful - and hot.

 

[treeclimber101]

Yeah, that about says it.

This doesn't happen often. Lots of times one of us will be high or low by $50 or so, but this was an obvious case of "Oops!" on my climber's part. And the guy did know us, he's a good customer, but not a great one. His property, though not big, is putting green perfect and we always spend more time at his place cleaning up than most places so I didn't feel too bad thinking about asking for more $$$.

But he did ask us to take the wood once the tree was down. That wasn't part of the deal he made with my climber, so I told him it would be $75 more, just because. He balked, told me again what a great customer he was, and told me he refused hiring another crew that was cruising the street in favour of calling us back (that pizzed me off when he said that. It was low). I told him he was paying less for that tree than I would have charged my mother so "you are getting good service, sir". He shut up after that, and the job was longer, but uneventful - and hot.

Yea today was a little sultry here as well we started at 6 and wrapped at 2, it was tough and we removed a black walnut tree and the saw dust burned my forearm and neck and left a horrible rash that burned like hell in the shower and I don't know why..

 

[Groundman One]

Yea today was a little sultry here as well we started at 6 and wrapped at 2, it was tough and we removed a black walnut tree and the saw dust burned my forearm and neck and left a horrible rash that burned like hell in the shower and I don't know why..

Weird. I've gotten burns (like chemical burns - :censored: painful) from carrying freshly peeled cedar logs, but not from anything else.

We don't have black walnut here. What's the wood like for heating or working?

 

[tree md]

I get add ons quite frequently. Every now and then someone will change their mind on a tree and I'll have to adjust the price. Not really a big deal, I always have everything written down in black and white, itemized and carbon copied. I just add to or subtract whatever I need to.

You need to be on the same page with the people you work with though. No one on my team had better be giving estimates on trees. There can only be one chief. That needs to be established before you ever run into that situation.

 

[jefflovstrom]

Yeah, that about says it.

This doesn't happen often. Lots of times one of us will be high or low by $50 or so, but this was an obvious case of "Oops!" on my climber's part. And the guy did know us, he's a good customer, but not a great one. His property, though not big, is putting green perfect and we always spend more time at his place cleaning up than most places so I didn't feel too bad thinking about asking for more $$$.

But he did ask us to take the wood once the tree was down. That wasn't part of the deal he made with my climber, so I told him it would be $75 more, just because. He balked, told me again what a great customer he was, and told me he refused hiring another crew that was cruising the street in favour of calling us back (that pizzed me off when he said that. It was low). I told him he was paying less for that tree than I would have charged my mother so "you are getting good service, sir". He shut up after that, and the job was longer, but uneventful - and hot.

How many guys you got bidding on jobs? Does your groundies bid? I guess I am confused.
Jeff

 

[treeseer]

I get add ons quite frequently... I always have everything written down in black and white, itemized and carbon copied. I just add to or subtract whatever I need to.

:agree2:

Add-ons are the spice of life, A SOURCE OF PROFIT AND SATISFACTION! damcaplock
If I see an issue in a tree that I'm ion needs more work, I can email them a picture, or a video. Seldom get turned down that way.
Add-ons come up all the time; we see more in the landscape than the tree owners do, so naturally we see more that needs done to keep it growing well.

 

[CNBTreeTrimming]

I have once. On a blow down Russian Olive. The ground was soft the tree not large and almost all of the roots were out of the ground. Told the customer based on what i see this is what I think I can do it for. Then said if I have to grind the stump and roots it will be a lil more. He agreed and said do it. I had to grind he got mad at the bill and I lost the customer.

 

[tree md]

I had to change the price on a job onetime from $2800 to $10500.

I started out on one tree that I was trying to remove by climbing. We had two others he wanted to take down but we needed a crane for those. I told him I that I needed to talk to my crane service and get back with him on a price for the other two trees. I got up in the first tree and it had a bad hollow in one of the leaders I needed to get out on to clear the power lines. It became obvious that the leader was too compromised to get out on as far as I needed to clear the lines. No other TIP except for one that would swing me into the phase three lines should the leader fail.

I came down and went to the HO's business to talk to him about it. I told him it was just too risky to climb out on the rotten, hollow leader. I told him there was no charge for what I had already completed. He told me to talk to the crane service and give him a price for taking all three out with the crane. I told him I would try to keep the price at the original $2800 on the tree I had worked on if he hired us to do all three with the crane. I did that along with $7700 for the two additional trees. The guy was pleased as punch because we came in just under $2000 less than the closest previous bid.

It was a win, win for everyone. Very rare that it works out that way but that time it did.

 

[Blakesmaster]

Never asked an HO for more money. I've lost on jobs but can't bring myself to make the HO pay for a bidding error on my part. Obviously an add on is a different story. They can be annoying because I run a very tight schedule and many times an extra hundred bucks worth of work can #### up my day but in the end it's for the best. My trucks and men are already there, may as well pocket some straight profit.

 

[forestryworks]

Bid high. If it comes out less, that's what I charge. Add ons are a whole new job.

 

[Mikecutstrees]

Iv'e had similar experiences to treemd. Got up in a big removal and found out that there was a huge defect not visable from the ground. I felt in those cases that I was honest and forthright with the homeowner and did my best to be fair. Normally if I just screw up the bid I always eat it and learn from it. Iv'e learned alot over the past 5 years.

Mike

 

[tree md]

To tell the truth, I was the only one dumb enough to attempt that tree without a crane. It was compromised with a large cavity at the base but I figured I could rig small and bring it down without a crane. It wasn't until I learned the tree was rotten and hollow through and through that I learned it was not climbable. It was the smallest of the three trees and even with a crane it was only worth around $32. The HO appreciated me trying to save him some money which helped me win the entire bid.

 

[BC WetCoast]

I've had to do it once. Bid a tree to remove 5-6 dead branches (broken and hanging in a 120' Douglas fir and specifically written into the quote). Climber gets into the tree and finds about 25 dead and broken branches sitting on other branches so weren't visible from the ground. HO not available to talk to, and the dead branches were sitting over the neighbour's back yard where they had a kid's play set. Climber made a decision to make the tree safe, then I had to go and beg a price upgrade from the customer. She was good about it and we reached an agreement. She was concerned about the safety of the tree and her neighbours, but I could have been screwed.

 

[Groundman One]

How many guys you got bidding on jobs? Does your groundies bid? I guess I am confused.
Jeff

Not as confused as me.

Most of the time it's just me and my climber working on trees. The bossman pals around with the other climber and they do a few jobs here and there, and some construction on the side, but most of the work is our crew of two, though we take on one or two extra guys for big jobs. We'll max out at about seven or eight guys (rarely) for the biggest jobs. (We're a small company as you can tell.)

The bossman prices some jobs, but about 90% are priced by me (the groundman as you can tell) and my climber. We look at a job, tell the customer we're going to talk behind his back for a few minutes (that always gets a laugh), and find the middle ground between my price and my climber's price. We're usually within 10% of each other's price. Most of the time we split the difference and that's the price the customer gets. In this case, though, my climber priced it himself while I was at the truck doing stuff and he thought the job would go much faster than it did.

 

[chip's-tree]

I never change my price unless there are add ons (sometimes they are a blessing) I have missed a lot of crap over the yrs---rot, lighting struck etc... and just sucked it up and went on with the job---HO is happy and i get called back.

 

[treemandan]

Wait, GM1, did the guy change the price midstream or just give a lower price than what you thought it should be at the start?

 

[Groundman One]

Wait, GM1, did the guy change the price midstream or just give a lower price than what you thought it should be at the start?

A lower price at the start. It was a $400 job to begin with (we did the estimate about two weeks ago), a few small takedowns and a few dead branches, full disposal and a nice clean up after. While I was unloading the truck, the owner took my climber to the other side of the house to look at another tree and asked how much to add that one on the bill. He said $100. When he told me after I thought he was joking. It was a balsam, about 60', maybe 16", ten feet from the house and leaning right over the house. "You charged a $100 for that?"

Maybe as a treat to a good customer just to take it down, but we had to move the truck and chipper around the corner and set up again and that means cleaning the road (a second time) when when we're done, and raking the lawn (a second time) where you dragged the branches, and the truck was sixty-feet from the tree and there were a lot of branches, and there is the risk factor of the where the tree was and to top it all off it was :censored: hot and I was looking forward to knocking off at noon.

Honestly, I thought he was pulling my leg right up until we got paid. And yep, $100.