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How much do you charge for solar panels?

Jake

Well-known member
Messages
3,438
I'm charging £50 for these as its a little bit out my way, I told the customer that perhaps they will get it cheaper if they found someone more local,

(to be fair I'm only 10 miles away, but that's far for my round lol)

Anyway they were happy with the quote, to my surprise, so I'm going to do them on Saturday, I'll need to take my time as they take minutes to clean, it's embarrassing charging that much for a small easy job!? But I didn't think they'd except the quote! There not a customer of mine, but rung me purely to have this done, so maybe there desperate,

What would you guys charge for these to be cleaned? Normally I'd probably charge 30-40.. Perhaps £50 is fair enough? Just seems a lot of money for an easy job? I shouldn't complain, but I don't lole to rip people off! Maybe I'm being to kind, if there balky with the quote then I shouldn't feel bad...?!

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Why would you feel bad?

It costs you money in fuel & travel time to quote the job if you visited the site then again to do the job, costs you money in using purified water, your time in setting up, to do the job, pack away, then travel back home. Plus the extra risks involved so extra ppe should be used.

Add that all up and 50 squid sounds rather cheap to me and probably the customer thinks so too as his/her solar panels will work more efficiently afterwards.

Myself I would have charged at least 5 squid a panel = 80 plus travel costs as they are not windows but an electrical system that the customer benefits from to keep them clean.

But that is just my thoughts you understand. :rolleyes:

 
I also take it that you are covered by insurance for solar panel cleaning not just basic public liability but for property being work on if things should ever got tits up?

 
Thing is smirf it takes me about 10 minutes to clean them! A bit ambarresing to me!

I don't drive out to quote, I get customers to send me pictures (hence the pic I put up) so I don't have to pay diesel to quote,

But fair enough, £80? That's a lot! They take such little time, plus these ones are easy access low down, piece of cake!!

 
£50 minimum charge depending on ease of access etc. I try and quote £5 per panel if there are 10 or less of them & £4 per panel for roofs with 16+ panels on them.

Although I'm currently enjoying asking potential customers what they think is a fair price (windows & panels) and in most cases they might suggest £15 for a monthly window clean when I might've had it priced at a £10 per month job :whistle:

 
So it's going to take you a total of 10min to get out there do the job and drive back?

Myself I would have no problem wining work at 5 squid per panel even on a so say easy job like that.

It also baffles me why most window cleaners tend to charge so little to do these sorts of jobs when they don't have to as is a totally different ball game than just cleaning windows.

 
If you charged say 80 per clean I would only cost them approx 43p a day to have those panels cleaned twice a year. Which seems peanuts to me quite frankly for how much free energy and money they get back from the system in the year. Not only that you have invested in the right kit to do the job safely where as others inclunding the customer has not. Even if they wanted to do it themselves most don't have the time nor the expensive kit to do it properly or safely.

 
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It's so easy to win work on price alone as a lot of cleaners seem to be in this mindset. However some like to break the mould and work smarter not harder that can also justify there pricing for every job they do without the need to rip ppl off. At the end of the day it's all about how you want to operate your business but being cheap is not my way as I prefer to work smarter than harder as they say.

 
I'm sure @Solar Steve would agree as I'm sure he don't do it for the love of it /emoticons/biggrin.png

 
I don't win work smurf, people ring me for our services, we never go out and get it...

I would never pay someone 50 quid to clean solar panels that small and easy... But that's just me,

It really is a simple job, I've got the system anyway - for windows, so these sort of jobs are just a bonus really, the system wasn't bought for solar panels, it was bought for window cleaning, so I can't really say 'oh I've spent £££ on this system to justify it' - because solar panels wernt any thing to do with why I went wfp...

Yes the drive will be a few mins, but in my opinion, people who pay £50 for ten minutes work cleaning some solar panels is almost barking mad....

Oh well, can't complain, it's not my choice!

 
It's only 8 odd miles away, (that's far for me)

Will Only take 15 mins to get there, (google maps is adding traffic delay)

I'm gonna start charging more then, but I can't help but feel a bit bad when it's a really quick easy job...

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It's so easy to win work on price alone as a lot of cleaners seem to be in this mindset. However some like to break the mould and work smarter not harder that can also justify there pricing for every job they do without the need to rip ppl off. At the end of the day it's all about how you want to operate your business but being cheap is not my way as I prefer to work smarter than harder as they say.

£50 in 10 mins isn't cheap smurf!

Yes there's a half hour total journey time (there and back), but I defiantly don't quote low to win work, I've got too much work, so most of the time I quote high, but this just seemed so simple and easy, £50 seemed steep!

To me that's good money for me, I mean if I did 6 of them a day at £50 id be laughing, and laughing a lot!

 
You did win the work as you got that job regardless how it came about as they agreed for you to do it.

At the end of the day it's up to you how you run your business but you asked how much others would quote so I gave you my answer and justification as to why regardless how long the actual job would take.

If you ask any other tradesman like a gas fitter servicing say boilers how much they can earn I bet it's a darn sight more than a cleaner. Why is that I wonder as is nothing to do how long a job takes?

As for an example my mate walked into a house looked at a job sorted it out there and then for a landlord in less than 15min and got paid 250 squid for the pleasure. No parts needed just his time and experience and he does get jobs like that quite regular.

I think I'm in the wrong job /emoticons/biggrin.png

 
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Yeah, the thing is, pretty much any one can clean solar panels, that's why I think it's steep to pay £50 plus... It's not a qualified job (yet)

Was not expecting people suggesting they charge 80 odd quid!

As for wages, I'm pretty happy with the daily rate I get... Pretty much the best money I could earn given qualifications etc...

One things for sure, if anyone's able to get a 'solar pannel cleaning round' at 80 odd quid a job, they'd be driving a Ferrari that's for sure!

Anyway, I'll up the prices, but I'll test the water and see what other local windies are charging, it's easy money, so wouldn't wanna prive out the market!

 
I find it don't matter what others charge as it is all about selling yourself and the quality of service you can offer in this game.

Most like yourself seem to be hung up on not getting the job because they assume customers will not pay good money to get the job done properly & more importantly safely. However you will find this is not the case as many prefer to pay more for someone that has the experience and tools that they can trust to do a good job.

I was exactly the same when I started many moons ago but now it don't bother me if I win work or not as I'm worth every penny that I charge regardless how long a job takes.

 
£40

If you charge too much then cost of having them cleaned will be more than the increase in power produced, depending on how dirty they are and what feed in tarif they have.

And more variables innit.

 
I don't care about that to be honest as if they could not afford my price they can find someone else innit /emoticons/biggrin.png

 
I find it don't matter what others charge as it is all about selling yourself and the quality of service you can offer in this game.
Most like yourself seem to be hung up on not getting the job because they assume customers will not pay good money to get the job done properly & more importantly safely. However you will find this is not the case as many prefer to pay more for someone that has the experience and tools that they can trust to do a good job.
I quoted a gutter/fascia cleaning job recently at £200. The guy whistled through his teeth and joked, 'It's normal form to hold a gun when robbing people'. I laughed and told him I was very busy and had customers waiting. Got in the van and drove away.

A few days later he rang and accepted my price. In the conversation he said that he had two other prices, both less than mine, but I sounded like I knew what I was talking about.

It is all about presentation.

 
Agree with you there SPC, I picked up a job off a WFPer this week. The woman phoned and asked if I did cleaning off ladders at all. I said sometimes, but most of the time I pole the windows. Oh she says, the last guy keeps leaving dirty spots all over the glass and I'm fed up with calling him back to re-clean. I go round and sure as hell the glass is dreadful. I convince her to let me try WFP. I did them today and she called later to thank me for an excellent job. They will be recommending me to all their neighbours now.

If you know you can do a specific job be confident when quoting it. People need reassurance and not umm and ahhers.

 
I quoted a gutter/fascia cleaning job recently at £200. The guy whistled through his teeth and joked, 'It's normal form to hold a gun when robbing people'. I laughed and told him I was very busy and had customers waiting. Got in the van and drove away.
A few days later he rang and accepted my price. In the conversation he said that he had two other prices, both less than mine, but I sounded like I knew what I was talking about.

It is all about presentation.
Trust me when I say this - presentation is the least of our worries, we have very good equipmen, vans, website, uniform etc,

But some people are after a deal, and others are after a professional service, every customer is different, joe bloggs down the road probably wouldn't have rang you back, it's all customer dependant really...

 
£40
If you charge too much then cost of having them cleaned will be more than the increase in power produced, depending on how dirty they are and what feed in tarif they have.

And more variables innit.

The customers don't think of that do they, that's a good point though, I wouldn't let that get about, people will catch on!

 

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