ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade General Discussion Area Stripped or damaged plastic wall boxes

I can't say for areas too far outside of the Chico area as I rarely work too far from home.
In town resi service seems to average 65 or 70. I don't know for sure cause I haven't had to call for any electrical service lately
In the larger cities I'd bet it's higher. Same for emergency or night work.
I believe some companies use a slightly higher show up fee with a reduced hourly after that.
I keep it simple with a standard hourly and usually a one hour minimum. If I show up and don't accually do anything. (reset GFI, breaker tripped by user overload, etc..) I might reduce it to a half hour or even comp it. It depends on how far out of my way I went to stop by.
My rate is considerably lower than what I hear others are charging for two reasons.
1 I like to sleep at night.
2 The resi market is getting tighter due to less work and a flood of newer C10s (myself included) probably generated by the new certification law in CA. If others start dropping service rates I'm hoping people will remember that I was reasonable all along.

I'm pretty sure both not knowing for sure my competitor's rates and my policies make me a poor businessman by most standards and if the economy doesn't totally tank as I suspect it will I may raise my rates a bit. Time will tell.
Vince

... I love when you need to change out a box, and it's wired top and bottom..and the romex wires are meticulously stapled within 3 inches of the box.. most often it's a 14/3 and a 14/2 in the top set of clamps, and a 14/2 coming out the bottom...

... Sometimes I "luck-out" and have to replace a single gang with a 2-gang..I just trace out the 2-gang, cut the wall board, and finesse the single gang out like an impacted wisdom tooth!!

I know my boss 4 years ago in CT was charging $100 for the first hour, and then $70 per hour per man after that. Ironically, we always travelled together, so after the first hour, the price actually jumped up $40 per hour. I was making $12 per hour at the time, but you can't put a price on experience.