Rant!

[Mar_mite]

Just got to have a quick rant, this won't take too long.

Do you ever feel like people try to over simplify the work you do to their own ends? Went round to price a wall unit for a guy which was fine. Then he said "while your here" could you price for a dining table that is hinged to the wall and folds down to be used, with legs than swing into place, but while it is stowed in the upright position I can put a picture on the underside and the legs will look like a picture frame. In oak. He said he wanted to spend about £200 on it. (Including two benches!)I told him it wouldn't even cover the materials. He said "it's just a board screwed to the wall, how can it cost more than £200!"
Anyway, I'm fitting the wall unit tomorrow and I've just got a text from him saying "as I've got you tomorrow, could you spare 5 minutes and cut a letterbox into my front door." A spare 5 minutes!!

One of the neighbours to where my workshop is knocked a few day ago and said if I've got a bit of spare wood lying around, could I just renew all the facias and soffits on his porch. Spare wood lying around!!? I told him it was half a days labour and at least £30 for materials and he nearly had a heart attack.

Oh, I could go on and on.... Thanks for listening.

 

[rspsteve]

If you have a spare cuple of days could you build me a 6x6 mtr workshop out of offcuts please and charge me £30 quid a day ?

Cheers

Steve

 

[Mar_mite]

Why not? I'm doing it for everyone else.... Ha ha, cheers mate.

 

[Random Orbital Bob]

and while you're at it irrigate the Sahara and make vast new areas cultivatable

 

[Baldhead]

Mar_mite some people just take a lend don't they! anyhow you got any hardwood offcuts 25mm x 150mm x 2000mm doesn't have to be dressed, and if it's bigger don't worry, Ive got a saw! oh by the way I'm in Northumberland. :lol: :lol: :lol:

Baldhead

 

[carlb40]

I feel your pain. This is the reason i stopped doing foreigners. I was tired of going round looking at the jobs and being told they only had XXX to do the work. Wasting my time/ petrol etc.

 

[Mar_mite]

Thanks for the replies fellas. I feel better now.

 

[Grahamshed]

<gloat>I'm retired </gloat>

 

[MrYorke]

I'm pretty sure you could have done those jobs by now instead of posting your rant.......and had time to watch Strictly come dancing after ;-)

 

[Mar_mite]

I'm pretty sure you could have done those jobs by now instead of posting your rant.......and had time to watch Strictly come dancing after ;-)

Just knocked up a perpetual motion machine instead, £9.99 free installation if anybody is interested?

 

[Random Orbital Bob]

I'll take 3....oh of course...I only need the one! But can I have it for a fiver?

 

[tool-me-up]

Tomorrow I would remove the riving knife from your circular, lock the blade guard open and plunge it into the door - roughly where the letter box goes. Then tell him "there you go a 5 minute letterbox!"

To be fair my reply would probably be if its only a board screwed to the wall why havnt you already done it?

I know what you mean and I get this quite a lot too - just not with woodwork - usually fixing cars, or bikes.

 

[andersonec]

Let's face it, you could have screwed a board to the wall and you could have spent five minutes cutting a hole in the door and charged him a tenner, when he wants it turned into a letter box and a proper table tell him to find someone else 'cos your'e too busy, two can play his game, don't let it get you down, it cuts both ways.

Andy

 

[bugbear]

I get continual requests to make "quick" websites for people, with "just" the usual - rotating gallery, automatic email contact page, full sales portal, animation, "nice and simple".

For the cost of a beer.

BugBear

 

[Grahamshed]

I get continual requests to make "quick" websites for people, with "just" the usual - rotating gallery, automatic email contact page, full sales portal, animation, "nice and simple".

For the cost of a beer.

BugBear

Can I have one please ? but for a lemonade. Don't want you pi@@ed when you do it.

 

[marcros]

The public, in general, don't understand these things.

I don't think that they all deliberately take the mickey. My wife is as bad with little 5 minute jobs- lay laminate flooring.

They see power tools in b and q and that a hundred quid will get you a decent one- black and decker etc. it doesn't occur to them that a domino, for instance is many times that. They view double notice as furniture- they can get oak stuff from ikea, or real oak from oak furniture land. There is no adjustment for hand made, solid hardwood, and no appreciation of how long things take. Ditto the many thousands of pounds of gear in a workshop or tradesman a van.

Websites are probably worse. Unless somebody has actually bought one they probably wouldn't know how much what they want would cost- even to the nearest thousand pounds. They have generally used something simple and low budget that they want replicating- amazon, eBay, BBC etc. even if they know the time taken, I bet they still regard it as 99% profit!

 

[RogerS]

You are dead right about wives and DIY. Think refurbishing a bathroom. You need in all probability :

chisels/hammers/drills/screwdrivers/screws/ruler et al...all sorts of woodworking related stuff

probably some plasterboarding. So that's the knife to score the board, scrim tape, plasterboard screws, or dot'n'dab, polyfilla or plaster, floats, plastering tools, PVA, brushes, containers

then maybe a bit of plumbing. So that's pipe cutters, spanners, blowtorch, flux, solder, wirewool, fittings, pipe, connectors

and then a bit of electrickery maybe. So that's cable, strippers, maybe a stone chisel or two to cut out the hole in the wall for the pattress

and then the repainting. So that's ...you get the picture.

Then SWMBO will come along and say 'why do you need all that kit?' :evil:

 

[Mar_mite]

Just got to have a quick rant, this won't take too long.

Do you ever feel like people try to over simplify the work you do to their own ends? Went round to price a wall unit for a guy which was fine. Then he said "while your here" could you price for a dining table that is hinged to the wall and folds down to be used, with legs than swing into place, but while it is stowed in the upright position I can put a picture on the underside and the legs will look like a picture frame. In oak. He said he wanted to spend about £200 on it. (Including two benches!)I told him it wouldn't even cover the materials. He said "it's just a board screwed to the wall, how can it cost more than £200!"
Anyway, I'm fitting the wall unit tomorrow and I've just got a text from him saying "as I've got you tomorrow, could you spare 5 minutes and cut a letterbox into my front door." A spare 5 minutes!!

One of the neighbours to where my workshop is knocked a few day ago and said if I've got a bit of spare wood lying around, could I just renew all the facias and soffits on his porch. Spare wood lying around!!? I told him it was half a days labour and at least £30 for materials and he nearly had a heart attack.

Oh, I could go on and on.... Thanks for listening.

Quick update, went out this morning and the b**stard van won't start. Dead battery, if anyone has a spare lying around could they pop it over please..

 

[rileytoolworks]

Just got to have a quick rant, this won't take too long.

Do you ever feel like people try to over simplify the work you do to their own ends? Went round to price a wall unit for a guy which was fine. Then he said "while your here" could you price for a dining table that is hinged to the wall and folds down to be used, with legs than swing into place, but while it is stowed in the upright position I can put a picture on the underside and the legs will look like a picture frame. In oak. He said he wanted to spend about £200 on it. (Including two benches!)I told him it wouldn't even cover the materials. He said "it's just a board screwed to the wall, how can it cost more than £200!"
Anyway, I'm fitting the wall unit tomorrow and I've just got a text from him saying "as I've got you tomorrow, could you spare 5 minutes and cut a letterbox into my front door." A spare 5 minutes!!

One of the neighbours to where my workshop is knocked a few day ago and said if I've got a bit of spare wood lying around, could I just renew all the facias and soffits on his porch. Spare wood lying around!!? I told him it was half a days labour and at least £30 for materials and he nearly had a heart attack.

Oh, I could go on and on.... Thanks for listening.

Quick update, went out this morning and the b**stard van won't start. Dead battery, if anyone has a spare lying around could they pop it over please..

Just the battery, or a van and battery? :wink:

Adam

 

[acewoodturner]

The ones I like are when the bloke who wants samples for corporate gifts for companies or a big piece of one off bespoke furniture. They moan like hell when I tell them my charge is £25.00 plus vat and materials. They normally have a big flashy car outside costing 40k plus and have it regularly serviced in the dealer where they bought it from, who charge £100 and the rest plus vat an hour. They then tell me I am too dear per hour! The last bloke that did that to me I took him up to the back of the workshop and tipped all his samples into the stove and told him to phone someone in China! "Did I have a phone number?"