Hours charged for tractor work

[Gord Baker]

I believe that the Tractor Hour Meter is based on operating at a certain RPM. They used to work that way. I charge a flat rate, Portal to Portal (Home again).

 

[paulsharvey]

Quite the definition of a successful business, and not much respect for a talented craftsman in any trade.

Not ment as an insult; just meaning if you can't put hired help on the machine, and still turn a profit, the Company isn't making money. That's not to say, you can't do ok paying yourself, and no profit, but your not going to be sustainable for the long term, and if you ever want to sell the business, it will be basicly, just the assets owned, as there is no business profit. Also, going to be hard for the business to buy anything without company money.

 

[FERLING]

When using a tractor to do work for other people and charging by the hour my understanding is the hours are measured by the hour meter on the equipment versus the wrist watch.
What say you ?

Depends whether you are the payer or the receiver.

 

[donut3464]

When using a tractor to do work for other people and charging by the hour my understanding is the hours are measured by the hour meter on the equipment versus the wrist watch.
What say you ?

I just wanna know what your picture is of. Otter?Squirrel?

 

[FERLING]

It is local work so there is no travel time , is the hour meter as accurate as the watch on a minute by minute basis ? I only want to charge them when the machine is actually being used if that is a normal way of figuring a bill , I want to be fair with my customer and myself.

Fair with a customer is answered by the look on his or her face when you are done!

 

[paulsharvey]

Regardless of your model to charge; you really need to track your time/expenses off the active job. It's great that you made $400 profit; but if yiu spend 2 hours the next day sharpening, greasing, talking to the next prospective client; that's not really $400 profit. It's easy too loose money and not know it, till you need new equipment, and have no reserve for replacement. Very common for lawn care guys; great money for 24 months; then that $15k dixie chopper, pick up, trailer, edgers, need replaced, and they don't have the money for it.

Knew a guy one time that said; "I'll work all day, every day for cost plus 10%, If I get to define cost".

Small things add up; shovels, grease, tire repairs, tie downs, ect.

 

[CoyPatton]

I have only looked at the first page of responses, but 1 thing I have not seen is the fact that time hours and hour meter hours are never the same! Your hour meter only register real time when you RPM’s are at 540 operating levels as determined by the manufacture. Lots of work may never be above a high idle so perhaps less than .5 hrs on the meter for every hr worked—such as clearing brush.
Charge how you wish, just be sure that when you quote a price, it includes all your variables—loading/unloading time including securement at both locations, travel time, off tractor time spent working including time spend with customer walking the job, insurance—yes look into it—if you damage something the customer will expect you to cover its repair—homeowners will likely not cover this since it is not your home or a non owner of the home caused the damage, variables are massive and potentially different for each individual.

 

[redmt]

I often use a transport for moving a dozer or grader. The customer pays transport plus hourly labor rate while I'm traveling, 1 time. From the time I'm on the job running equipment it's straight hourly tractor rates if I'm operating, getting off to get a different view of things or discussion with the customer. I use the hour meters for a guideline for service. My dozer rates are probably a bit higher than what you may be charging. It doesn't take much of a BS session with the customer to loose out on a couple hundred bucks.

 

[aircommuter]

It’s been a long time since I did hourly work or any work for others.
But when I did it was a move in fee within a given area of $250. To cover truck, trailer related expenses plus me. Then the clock time for a given machine. Tachometer clock is if no use for billing since doesn’t accurately pay operators time.
Then I went to doing jobs with engineered plans so what was to be done was specifically agreed to on paper. That filters out flaky competitors and makes a lot more money if you have a better or faster method of doing the work.

 

[LittleBill21]

I just do per job in my jobs, there is no unexpected surprises and people know what they are paying upfront, sometimes they win, sometimes I win, but i get better at bidding everytime, and I don't get mad cus i know what i quoted.