Troubleshooting/Diagnostic Fees

Tiger

I'm curious about how other electrical contractors handle diagnostic fees. I'm using a multi-level fee based on my expected time and trouble involved in finding the problem. Unfortunately, I haven't tracked my actual time finding problems. Any tips would be appreciated. Dollar amounts aren't needed, just the theory behind the system you're using.

Dave

macmikeman

Dave, what I like to do is charge a dispatch fee first that gets me in the door, and I tell the customer that part of the fee is a 15 minute checkout of the service, panel, and grounding system, regardless of any work to be performed at the site. They all seem to dig this "survey". While doing my 15 minutes (and totally ignoring any drift to discuss the customer's problem) I am scoping for signs of homeowner do it yourself type stuff. Once I see that, I up my "diagnostic" fee quite a bit in my head before I quote it to the customer. This is because I have found that finding solutions to problems is easy and quick when the original system is undisturbed for the most part. It is when there has been modifications that it starts getting tricky. Examples are where customers have tried to add to three way switches with 2 wire cable and no common, and just botched up the wiring in general.

Tiger

One of my more difficult diagnostics was where a homeowner had installed a ceiling fan with conduit and hadn't reamed the pipe. The sharp conduit edge cut the wire and shorted the circuit. I had to pull the fan, switch and wire to find it. I replaced his poor conduit work and told him it would have cost less to have me do the original installation.

So you have two levels, one for an original professional electrical system, and a higher one for a non-professional system?

Dave