Am I missing anything before I get started? Any advice appreciated! Thank you.

[JakdeDiamond]

Another point which may be of benefit to yourself.

Do you have a strong healthy back

Wearing a BOAB often gives the impression to new starters that you have to load it up to the hilt with everything.

Once you have a belt pouches you'll soon feel the strain around your waist and lower back.

Heres a heads and some of my well sourced trade tips.

Window cleaning suppliers sell fancy gucci pouches and belts etc

Have a look into the military, army, combat mark and you'll find very affordable ammunition dump pouches webbing belts and other great pieces of kit well suited to window cleaning such as my Condor PLCE webbing. It makes trad easier comfortable and bearable 

More great tips by the look of it, thanks Apw. That's a good point not to overdo it. I imagine some windys might think they look more 'pro' with all the gear strapped to them like Terminator. 

I confess I have got one of the facelift pouches, when I need more personal storage I'll hit up the surplus store because I didn't even think of it, loads of cheap webbing out there. In fact i'll dig out some airsoft stuff up the loft and see if it's any good. 

Just my 2pence.

When i started i had 'discount for OAPs' on the flyers

I ditched this as soon as i cottoned onto the fact that ALOT of pensioners are way more affluent than the majority of non pensioners. 

Personally i dont discount anybody unless they are family (mother inlaw gets freebie, sister inlaw gets a £15 for a tenner)

How are you attatching ladder to roof rack? (Straps are a nutache)

Business cards ive found to be pretty pointless in bulk but handy to have 4/5 in your wallet for ease.

Ive not touched GC and i only offer cash/cq/bacs as payment options, but thats my preference.

I always txt the night before and the txt always includes

"Good afternoon, Just letting you know that weather permitting, we will be round tomorrow to clean your windows.

Jon

HWCS"

No discounts for the OAPS haha, I'm looking forward to having a good natter with some of them though lol. 

Ladder is attached with clamps that have locks fitted to them. I figured in the future I will want a van as growth permits so may as well buy once. 

Hindsight of the business cards there then as your not the first to say that! More leaflets less cards. Thank you. 

How are you doing your texts @HWCS? Manually or through Squeegee? 

 

[HWCS]

How are you doing your texts @HWCS? Manually or through Squeegee? 

I dont use squeegee mate, i use the same/similar forms as @Pjj, they are a form of spreadsheet.

See below, then i have a gruop set up on my phone with the round name and all the contact details so i just send a group txt.

I put the clean date above date paid, then just fill it in as they pay and once a day i go onto bank account and mark off any bank trfs. 12/4/21C 12/4/21B

C if cash

B if bacs/cq

 

[Deleted member 7446]

More great tips by the look of it, thanks Apw. That's a good point not to overdo it. I imagine some windys might think they look more 'pro' with all the gear strapped to them like Terminator. 

I confess I have got one of the facelift pouches, when I need more personal storage I'll hit up the surplus store because I didn't even think of it, loads of cheap webbing out there. In fact i'll dig out some airsoft stuff up the loft and see if it's any good. 

No discounts for the OAPS haha, I'm looking forward to having a good natter with some of them though lol. 

Ladder is attached with clamps that have locks fitted to them. I figured in the future I will want a van as growth permits so may as well buy once. 

Hindsight of the business cards there then as your not the first to say that! More leaflets less cards. Thank you. 

How are you doing your texts @HWCS? Manually or through Squeegee? 

One of my many videos 

https://youtu.be/W71a9phu8Bg

 

[JakdeDiamond]

I dont use squeegee mate, i use the same/similar forms as @Pjj, they are a form of spreadsheet.

See below, then i have a gruop set up on my phone with the round name and all the contact details so i just send a group txt.

I put the clean date above date paid, then just fill it in as they pay and once a day i go onto bank account and mark off any bank trfs. 12/4/21C 12/4/21B

C if cash

B if bacs/cq

View attachment 24221

This is great mate thanks for sharing that, some might not be so inclined haha. 

Hadn't thought about making a group on my phone to be fair, that's a good idea. 

Investigating a few of these options and I really can't thank everyone enough for taking the time to help!

One of my many videos 

https://youtu.be/W71a9phu8Bg

I'm all over that mate, I'll be honest I didn't know you had a channel so I will give it a binge! I'm all out of Squeeky vids so welcome a new channel! Thank you ?

 

[Deleted member 7446]

This is great mate thanks for sharing that, some might not be so inclined haha. 

Hadn't thought about making a group on my phone to be fair, that's a good idea. 

Investigating a few of these options and I really can't thank everyone enough for taking the time to help!

I'm all over that mate, I'll be honest I didn't know you had a channel so I will give it a binge! I'm all out of Squeeky vids so welcome a new channel! Thank you ?

Plenty of useful video too. Hit subscribe if you wouldn't mind. I'd appreciate it 

 

[Jaygti]

More great tips by the look of it, thanks Apw. That's a good point not to overdo it. I imagine some windys might think they look more 'pro' with all the gear strapped to them like Terminator. 

I confess I have got one of the facelift pouches, when I need more personal storage I'll hit up the surplus store because I didn't even think of it, loads of cheap webbing out there. In fact i'll dig out some airsoft stuff up the loft and see if it's any good. 

No discounts for the OAPS haha, I'm looking forward to having a good natter with some of them though lol. 

Ladder is attached with clamps that have locks fitted to them. I figured in the future I will want a van as growth permits so may as well buy once. 

Hindsight of the business cards there then as your not the first to say that! More leaflets less cards. Thank you. 

How are you doing your texts @HWCS? Manually or through Squeegee? 

I personally don’t do any discounts ( apart from my mum). 
I don’t do any gimmicks at all. No free cleans after a year etc etc

just be professional, friendly and get on with it????
 

Hope it goes well by the way. 

 

[Deleted member 7446]

I personally don’t do any discounts ( apart from my mum). 
I don’t do any gimmicks at all. No free cleans after a year etc etc

just be professional, friendly and get on with it????
 

Hope it goes well by the way. 

Great comment mate. Discounts don't pay the bills and friends who ask for money off aren't real friends 

 

[HWCS]

I love a gimmick at xmas i dont do xmas cards for customers, i spend the money on a trolley of food for the local foodbank, i put it on my facebook page in my xmas message to customers for last 2 years its generated 10x more in revenue than its cost me.

Last week when i hit 500 customers i did a facebook live video draw from all 500 and gave away a yrs free cleans to 1 customer, coulda bit me on the ass and been an expensive customer but it worked out well it was a £10 customer in a row of terraces where i do 5 houses so wont feel the loss, and ts generated way more new work than it will cost me.

 

[Iron Giant]

Personally I wouldn't.  There is some resistance out there and people won't feel comfortable with the notion of signing up to a form of direct debit to a bloke at the door with a bucket and ladder.

Your focus is to get as many good quality customers as you can - once you have done this and built up a level of trust and continuity, then think about getting customers signed up to GC.

I agree,  as for me you need a website, online presence and a long standing reputation to be able to get peoples trust, I have no issue with this myself as I put a lot of work into making sure everything was in place, only had 3-4 people not want to sign up to GC in over 7 years on the whole people readily sign up without issue. 

I think the fee is currently 1%+20p per transaction.  I only have 5 customers signed up to it so the cost is negligible for me.  Obviously for you the costs would be far more significant.

337 custys signed up and counting would have had a lot more but people have moved away etc no doubt well over 400, cost wise I just compare mine to the old days of spending 6hrs collecting a week wear and tear on vehicle fuel etc and the cost is far cheaper as I was at one point putting diesel in every week then every 2 now just every 4-5 weeks but my work area is quite local travelling less than 5 miles to my furthest jobs.

 

[JakdeDiamond]

I agree,  as for me you need a website, online presence and a long standing reputation to be able to get peoples trust, I have no issue with this myself as I put a lot of work into making sure everything was in place, only had 3-4 people not want to sign up to GC in over 7 years on the whole people readily sign up without issue. 

337 custys signed up and counting would have had a lot more but people have moved away etc no doubt well over 400, cost wise I just compare mine to the old days of spending 6hrs collecting a week wear and tear on vehicle fuel etc and the cost is far cheaper as I was at one point putting diesel in every week then every 2 now just every 4-5 weeks but my work area is quite local travelling less than 5 miles to my furthest jobs.

Great point regarding building a trustworthy business first. I am going to stick to card/bacs payments for the start I think based off of the advice from everyone. 

Lots to think about now, really appreciate all the well wishes too!

 

[Jaygti]

I’m struggling to see the big upside to having customers on DD. 
BACS and cash/ cheques are fine. 
All my customers pay up. Ok some forget and you may have to wait a month.
 

But any bad payers would be ditched anyway. 
 

I understand it helps with cash flow etc, but any well run business should have a decent float anyway. 
your just paying for basically another middle man, which seems to me to be a waste. 

 

[BigFoot]

This is a fantastic idea thank you, sorry to be a pain but once I have the SumUp reader, do I need to subscribe to any services? 

Nice one on the ladder mat! Could work out a lot cheaper than the purpose built bits online and who doesn't like a bit of DIY? haha

Legend, great points, I think with all the videos I've been watching I just got sucked in to GreenProClean saying it's the bible of payments lol! 

One more question guys is I see a lot of you saying that you're texting customer a lot the day before to remind them to leave the gates open/ that you're coming to do the windows. 

How are you organising this? Just texting each person the day before from your phone? Sounds like it could get confusing. I was thinking of just telling them when I'm next coming in person and then showing up. Is this a bad way of doing it? texting is more professional I agree. 

Am I right in thinking GC charges are a buisness cost and are tax deductible?

if so the charge is not a big deal.

 

[Part Timer]

Am I right in thinking GC charges are a buisness cost and are tax deductible?

if so the charge is not a big deal.

Yes but 80% of that charge comes out of your pocket as you only get 20% as a tax allowance, unless you're on of the lucky ones making £300 a day then you'll get 40% allowance.