Backgate for Plumbers and Electricians

Six o'clock, and the day is only half done.

I'm the plumber, the office, the parts department and the one who chases the money.

I quoted that bathroom three weeks ago. I have no idea if they ever came back.

Someone rang about a boiler while I was under a sink. I never rang them back.

I price jobs at nine at night, when I'm too tired to price them properly.

There's eleven grand out there past thirty days and I keep meaning to sort it.

My Gas Safe renewal came round and I nearly missed it.

The lad wants a day rate. I don't actually know what a day costs me.

I started this to fix things, not to sit in a van doing emails.

None of this is a software problem. It is a time and attention problem, and it lands on the same one or two people every single day.

So ask Jimmy.

Jimmy is the part of Backgate you actually talk to. Tap a question. He answers, and then he waits for you.

Jimmy your back office

What's up boss.

Five jobs today. The first one is the Vaillant in Bishopston.

Three things need you before you set off. Tap one below, or just ask me.

Example answers, using a made up two van firm.

And this is what your customer gets.

Nine at night, someone's boiler has packed in and you are asleep. This is the whole conversation, start to finish.

9.04 PM

Hi, is anyone able to look at a boiler? No hot water since this morning.

Sorry, that's a rotten one on a night like this. Is the heating gone as well, or just the hot water?

Both gone. There's a code on the front, F28 I think.

That helps. Can you send me a photo of the front panel and one of the pipes underneath?

Thanks. That's a Vaillant ecoTEC and F28 is a failed ignition. Most of the time that is sorted in one visit, but I'm not going to promise you that off a photograph.

We can do half eight tomorrow morning, or one o'clock. Which is better for you?

Half eight please. Roughly what am I looking at?

I'm not going to guess at a price and get it wrong. You will be told what it is before anything is touched, and you can say no then.

Booked for half eight. We will ring when we are twenty minutes away. If you smell gas at any point tonight, do not wait for us, ring 0800 111 999.

Brilliant, thank you.

Waiting for you

You had the address, the model and the fault code on your phone before you had finished your tea. You were asleep for all of it. Nobody was quoted a price, because that is not a thing it is allowed to do.

Example conversation, using a made up two van firm.

Buy the bits you want. Nothing else.

No package, no bundle, no paying for six things to get the one you needed.

The phone that never stops ringing

Out of hours enquiries answered properly, jobs put in your diary, and everything the customer said waiting on your phone before you get there.

Per week, whatever the volume.

Quotes, written up

Send photos and a voice note from the van. Get a priced quote back in your words. Parts come off your merchant's list, not out of thin air.

Per quote prepared.

The ones that went quiet

Every quote that never got an answer, chased properly, and the replies read and sorted into yes, no and not until spring.

Per quote chased.

Getting paid

Invoices written off your notes, then chased as they age. It knows the difference between a customer and a builder you want more work from.

Per invoice chased.

Tickets and renewals

Gas Safe, NICEIC, liability, van MOT, calibration. It reads the certificate the day it lands and puts the date in itself.

Per item caught and prepared.

What a day actually costs

Travel, parts, the lad, the van and the hour you spent on the phone to the merchant. Put against what you charged.

It tells you which jobs make money, which ones only look like they do, and what your day rate would have to be to stand still.

Per costing run.

You set the limit in units you actually think in, not in pounds you have to guess at. It stops there and tells you it stopped.

20quotes a month

40chases

0surprise invoices

It's Tuesday, twenty past seven in the morning.

This is what was waiting when you picked your phone up in the van. Three things need you. The rest had already been dealt with.

Open the workstation The whole thing, working. Nothing to install.

Three need you.

Mrs Hartley, Redland

since 9.40 last night

The bathroom is priced and written. Four thousand two hundred. She asked twice, so it has been sat waiting a while.

21 Ashgrove, the Vaillant

booked for 8.30

F28, failed ignition, booked in overnight. She has asked whether you take card, and I have not answered that because I do not know.

Gas Safe renewal

33 days

The form is filled in from last year's answers. It needs you to sign it and it needs paying.

The rest it got on with.

Answered eleven people. Nine of them wanted to know whether you cover their postcode.
Booked three jobs into Thursday and left Friday afternoon alone, because it usually fills itself.
Chased four quotes that had gone quiet. Two came back. One is a yes for March.
Wrote up yesterday's three jobs and raised the invoices. One thousand nine hundred and eighty.
Read the certificate that came in from the calibration place and put the date in.
Turned down a job in Swindon. It is ninety miles and you said nothing past Chippenham.

Is it working?

Ninety days on a two van firm. Same jobs, same customers, same prices. Here is the honest version, including the bit that is not about us.

Ninety days, and what actually changedOpenClose

What people actually ring about

Every question anyone asked over three months. The dark bars are the ones a line on your website would have answered.

Do you cover us 148

What are your hours 96

No hot water 71

Do you do commercial 54

Can I get a price 47

Where's my engineer 22

Two thirds of everything anyone asked was whether you cover their postcode, when you are open, and whether you do commercial. All three are a line on your website, and then they stop being questions at all. That is a change to your website, not to your firm, and you do not need us for it.

Quotes that got an answer

Out of every hundred quotes sent, how many got any reply at all inside a fortnight. Before, and now they get chased.

Before 34

Now 61

The quotes were always fine. Nobody was chasing them. Twenty seven more in every hundred now come back with something, and roughly a third of those are a yes. On your average quote that is another nine jobs in every hundred you price.

Where the office hours went

Hours a week, before, on the things that are not fixing anything.

Writing quotes 7.5

Chasing money 3.0

Certificates and forms 1.0

Ringing people back 1.0

Twelve and a half hours a week. Three and a half of them are left, and they are the ones where somebody actually has to decide something. The other nine were typing.

It stops before it does anything in your name.

Three places it puts the work down and waits. This is the part everyone else is quietly hoping you will not ask about.

Before a price goes out

Every quote and every invoice waits until you have read it. It will work the number out. It will not be the one who says it.

When it isn't sure

On gas, and on anything live, it stops rather than guesses. It will tell a customer what a fault code means. It will not tell them it is a cheap fix.

When it reaches your cap

It puts the work down at the limit you set and tells you it has. No overrun, and no invoice at the end of the month you did not see coming.

Bring the quote you've been putting off.

Thirty minutes with a partner. Send us a job you priced last week, or one you never got round to pricing, and we will show you what it does with it. No sales pitch, and nothing to install to find out.

Talk to us Open the workstation

Backgate, by EAIC A shop, a kitchen and a back office

The van's back at six. The paperwork starts at eight.