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Pit Creature said:
Lost half a dozen customers in the last couple of weeks because of the cost of living crisis. Anyone started noticing this?

With my own bills going up I can't really afford to lose too many customers and it's a worry that people are going to have to find more and more money to keep up with energy bills over the next year unless the government do something. Is anyone else getting worried about this?
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Lost four today one GoCardles customer I haven’t seen to talk with in two years cancelled and then three £20 houses in a row, so no doubt they had been talking. when I say lost they have halved their frequency, I’m usually rock solid 4 weeks only I relented and allowed the change of frequenc. I think the constant media attention to the energy situation gets people into an frenzy. I’m playing it by ear, I feel once our hopeless government pull their finger out and support the nation the narrative will change and it’ll calm people down. who knows everything is cyclical.
 
Busy as ever. Fortunately most of my round is domestic older well heeled retirees. I don't have a website, don't advertise and I'm still getting enquiries. I really thought this set of events - War in Ukraine, inflation and soaring energy and diesel costs - would clip a few off my round but it hasn't so far.

I'm sure that the government help (like they did in Covid) will reduce the impact on most of us.
 
I lost two in a day, never had that happen before! both very apologetic and said they need to cut back due to cost of living.
And that's without a price rise, I expect quite a few to go when I give them the bad news
We'll all be working part time soon!
 
DaveSalford said:
You will all get them back next week when the energy gets capped. As usual just a load of media scare mongering....
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I agree with you but there is a real issue, behind the scare mongering the cost just doesn't disappear even with a price cap. The cost will be on the tax payers and we will all have to pay it back in some way. It's right to not destroy the economy but the fix isn't a simple fix, there will be a cost.

Another thing, if they cap it at the current rate, well that doesn't do anything about inflation. Inflation was one of the winners of the energy costs, high energy costs was guaranteed to stop inflation. Now inflation will continue to rocket.
 
They will cap it as it is now and people will be happy about it even though all these massive profits the oil&gas companies have gained were based upon what the charges are now and have been the last twelve months....

its the same with fuel, people think £1.80 for a litre of diesel is a bargain now...

Yeah kick the can further down the alley - but it will halt mass no compliance which is whats on the horizon...

Not sure if many of you are aware but so many people have had meters replaced in the last six months (Not with a silly smart meter) and are now officially their own supplier and pay ZERO...

Not something the government will want happening on a mass scale...
 
Daftoldgit said:
I lost two in a day, never had that happen before! both very apologetic and said they need to cut back due to cost of living.
And that's without a price rise, I expect quite a few to go when I give them the bad news
We'll all be working part time soon!
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From the posts I read on here I was under the impression all domestic were part time anyway and on £400 a day.
 
DaveSalford said:
You will all get them back next week when the energy gets capped. As usual just a load of media scare mongering....
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I think you are correct because I just got asked to clean an old customers windows because they panicked from the cost of living rises. I'm happy to return because they are next to my other customers. The UK Gov is going to print £100 Billion so energy prices should be stable. ?
 
TBH any customers you lose at the moment you know that even if they come back to you next week and ask to resume the service, they are on the bread line and to me I don't really want that kind of customer...
 
Our business model is based on servicing customers towards the mid/high range of the market. People where there is no issue with paying the window cleaner..
 
DaveSalford said:
Our business model is based on servicing customers towards the mid/high range of the market. People where there is no issue with paying the window cleaner..
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No one knows the future and there has been alot of media hype regarding energy bills. Another thing is we all make mistakes. If they have been good payers then I want them back or I will just lose them to the other windy cleaner. No point cutting my nose off to spite my face. I don't do a third clean if they haven't paid the last two so I text them or put a card through the letterbox. I put this down to the cost of running my business. This works for me and I have never been busier now the gutter clears are coming in due to the heavy rain.
 
DaveSalford said:
Our business model is based on servicing customers towards the mid/high range of the market. People where there is no issue with paying the window cleaner..
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To be fair, you may be cutting your nose off to spite your face there. These are unprecedented times where people have been told there household bills will go up hundreds of pounds a month, I imagine that effects most people unless they're millionaires and live in mansions. My dad's electric bill just rose from £180 a month to £390 and there's talks of it rising again, I don't think you necessarily have to be living on the bread line to be making cuts at the moment.
 
JohnDoeWindows said:
To be fair, you may be cutting your nose off to spite your face there. These are unprecedented times where people have been told there household bills will go up hundreds of pounds a month, I imagine that effects most people unless they're millionaires and live in mansions. My dad's electric bill just rose from £180 a month to £390 and there's talks of it rising again, I don't think you necessarily have to be living on the bread line to be making cuts at the moment.
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Even wealthy people have cash flow problems
 
DaveSalford said:
You will all get them back next week when the energy gets capped. As usual just a load of media scare mongering....
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Maybe you should watch the news and read a bit more about the economy on the whole a £90 billion bill isn't scaremongering we ideally need energy prices down so the economy doesn't collapse but they also need a plan to curb inflation fast otherwise the cost of goods will rocket along with inflation, the inflation will hit people hard the cost of food in some cases has doubled already and it will keep on going unless something is done.
 
I don't follow politics too closely, is there a likely plan of action for the new PM? I've read that there's talk of freezing the energy bills, but from what I've read it will all have to be paid back in tax anyway? Isn't that as broad as it is long?
 
Iron Giant said:
Maybe you should watch the news and read a bit more about the economy on the whole a £90 billion bill isn't scaremongering we ideally need energy prices down so the economy doesn't collapse but they also need a plan to curb inflation fast otherwise the cost of goods will rocket along with inflation, the inflation will hit people hard the cost of food in some cases has doubled already and it will keep on going unless something is done.
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You can't get inflation down. The reason the world has so much inflation is because of the amount of extra money it has printed to cover covid. Raising rates will accelerate the economy diving. In life we have always had recessions every 10 years its a fact of life but Governments usually allow them to take place. The problem arises when they refuse to allow a recession and pump more money into circulation and allow the party to continue. Eventually this leads to a depression which will begin in 2024 is what I'm predicting. fwiw
 
JohnDoeWindows said:
I don't follow politics too closely, is there a likely plan of action for the new PM? I've read that there's talk of freezing the energy bills, but from what I've read it will all have to be paid back in tax anyway? Isn't that as broad as it is long?
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I don't think the UK, EU, USA, Japan and all the rest will ever pay back their debt. Its bad enough trying to balance the deficits which seem to rise each month. All we do is kick the can down the road until ww3.
 
JohnDoeWindows said:
I don't follow politics too closely, is there a likely plan of action for the new PM? I've read that there's talk of freezing the energy bills, but from what I've read it will all have to be paid back in tax anyway? Isn't that as broad as it is long?
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I think they are talking about freezing the prices to about £2500 as an average bill, so lower than the October £3500 that was/is coming. Basically it seems like the energy supply companies will be allowed to 'borrow' the difference between the cap and the market rates for energy (the energy supply companies are actually legally capped to make 1.8% profit on energy!!!!, it's the energy producers that are making huge profits, although some producers are also suppliers!!!).

This borrowing will have to be paid back by either through general taxation (Liz seems to like low tax), or by increasing energy bills once the prices come back down (if they don't no idea what happens) but the payback maybe over 10 years!!! They believe these huge prices are a relatively short term problem (1 to 2 years) and within that timescale alternative energy sources for gas will be sorted - maybe Russia will be back in favour in a couple of years!!

They are also taking about an energy cap for smaller businesses and tax relief for large businesses.

I believe that there should be an announcement on Thursday as to what the gov intend to do......

Bottom line is if gov don't do anything many many businesses will go under = high unemployment + benefits bill will go up due to inflation + lower tax income (for Gov) due to less people able to spend money (Vat income, food generally is exempt from Vat - although cakes 0% Vat biscuits 20% Vat - hence Jaffa CAKES!! ). Not to mention national strikes and lost production.
 
scottish cleaning service said:
You can't get inflation down. The reason the world has so much inflation is because of the amount of extra money it has printed to cover covid. Raising rates will accelerate the economy diving. In life we have always had recessions every 10 years its a fact of life but Governments usually allow them to take place. The problem arises when they refuse to allow a recession and pump more money into circulation and allow the party to continue. Eventually this leads to a depression which will begin in 2024 is what I'm predicting. fwiw
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There was talk that hopefully getting energy prices under control would help stop inflation from rising to 22% next year the best option wouldn't have been this covid style package but the new pm has no option, The best option I read was to somehow change how gas and electricity are sold on the market it's so outdated and isn't helping the way it's traded so somehow get market prices under control by updating the rules but that's a much more complex deal to be done with potential backlash.

We need a depression or something to curb inflation that may come a tad sooner the help to buy scheme has been scrapped which accounted for 36% of new house purchases and the housing market and new builds will slow down spending, on the whole, spending has already dropped so hopefully people will be a lot more cautious as we ride out the winter of discontent because this energy price freeze isn't the resolve we need to sort out everything.
 

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