what do i charge?

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Hi, firstly, a big hello to everyone, been very busy at work of late so haven't posted for a while!

I was wondering if anyone is currently doing a sideline in home pc upgrades/repairs? If so on top of the cost of parts what kind of charge do you apply for service? (your valuable time!) I'm not sure what to charge customers at the moment and always feel like i'm short changing myself! Even though things are better these days as i never used to charge anyone!! (we've all been there right?) Friends and family do tend to take advantage till you start charging them! These days i still go the extra mile, but i actually get paid for giving up my free time (it all goes back into the bank and is a nice little extra!)

Let me know if anyone has any views on this as i know pricing can be regional (i live in the west midlands and things are much cheaper than that of similar london based outfits, for obvious reasons)

 

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Two cups of Coffee!

Seriously, for friends and family I don't charge anything. What I do is a favour for a favour. For instance my friend is an Electrician, I fixed his PC for him for nothing, now he's going to do some wiring for me for free.
I find that doing things like this helps me keep my friends!

 

OK, prize to whoever retrieves the excellent thread we had on this issue some time back and posts it here. I can't actually remember who started the thread (if guilty, please step forward)

Personally, I'm with a bit of each from above. Family and good friends = no charge (which usually translates into beer being gained). Word of mouth jobs are charged at "a suitable rate" - aka whatever I think is reasonable for my time - no rip-offs, tho.

But my neighbour is a painter & decorator, and I recently got our whole hall and landing papered and painted FOC - simply cos I re-installed Windows for him a month or so ago (a no brainer to me, as the papering prob was to him).

I don't use a fixed price range for this - just try to be fair

 

Sure, m8 - the prize is a position as Moderator here - which for you now means a pay-cut !

Seriously, thanks AJ - good digging. That's a really good thread to answer Trislloyd's question.

 

I Will take a look, havent' been back here for a while, currently getting to grips with citrix and eps9! lol

Wish me luck!

In hindsight i have also come to the conclusion that i am not a bad person and therefore wouldn't feel right charging my sister x amount for doing something that comes easy to me. I do try and cut down on the amount of extra work just before an exam though, kinda eases the load!

Cheers guys

 

This is a tough one. I've done several 'private jobs' for people some through work some through friends and family. I charge a going rate of £40 p/h for giving up my personal time. For friends and family I don't charge anything.

When I do a private job for someone I will always say to them to call me if anything goes wrong, they always do and it will not have anything to do with the work carried out eg- work done = broadband wireless router installed, configured, secured + 3 PC's/laptops wireless LAN cards installed, configured everyone using wireless broadband -job done.

Phonecall next day……… 'Hey my printer doesn't work' or 'I'm getting lots of unwanted emails since you installed the internet connection can you come back and fix it please!'

This is why I charge a flat rate of £40 p/h (for London) and don't feel bad about it, because I'll always end up doing more than I'm paid for..

As for family- my mother calls me up a lot with questions and other computer issues- I remote control her from home now through remote desktop connection