Dealing with potential clients who want to dicker.

Ask them what part of the survey they would like you to eliminate to lower the fees. Them wanting to pay less for the same work received seems a little unbalance.

You could tell them you'd give them a great deal by eliminating the signature and title block. 😉

Seriously I am pretty rigid with clients. I can send them down the road if they want cheap, and I tell them as much. And as for doubting your ability to estimate...what makes you think they're better qualified than you to estimate your own time and fees?

Bow Tie Surveyor, post: 423903, member: 6939 wrote: Over the past couple of weeks, I have issued some proposals for various surveying services, only for the potential client to come back and try to dicker with me on the price. Do any of you guys dicker with your potential clients? Is there any upside doing this? I almost never back down off my initial estimate. I figure that survey estimates are pretty much educated guesses anyway, so why should I doubt my initial instincts of how much a project should cost.

depends on the job, if I want it enough

FYI - An old but maybe not so wise surveyor once said, "I never lost a penny on a job I didn't get."

Can they offer information that would show how the job was easier than you thought? Perhaps an old survey you didn't know about, or that they have cleared the probable lines of sight?

MightyMoe, post: 423906, member: 700 wrote: depends on the job, if I want it enough

If I want a job badly I may cut my proposed fee below my customary number, but I never tell the client that. And if that's not low enough for them, I pass on the job. I can't think of a situation in which I would reduce my fee in response to a client request unless there's a corresponding reduction in scope.

There is usually a negotiation phase of every business dealing.

When the client is not in a giving mood and only makes demands, there is no negotiation, they only want you to change your price.

Reminds me a little of the old joke,
'Would you sleep with me for a million dollars?'. '
'Maybe, for a million dollars' she replied.
'Well then, now that we've established what you are, let's negotiate on the price a little.'
It's a slippery slope with little upside.

paden cash, post: 423904, member: 20 wrote: Ask them what part of the survey they would like you to eliminate to lower the fees. Them wanting to pay less for the same work received seems a little unbalance.

You could tell them you'd give them a great deal by eliminating the signature and title block. 😉

Seriously I am pretty rigid with clients. I can send them down the road if they want cheap, and I tell them as much. And as for doubting your ability to estimate...what makes you think they're better qualified than you to estimate your own time and fees?

I am with you on this one. If they want to reduce the cost they must reduce the effort. My price is based on XYZ, if you want to reduce it down to XY then I can reduce my cost. Simply reducing cost because they want it cheaper makes us look bad. We never do this, ever.

A fellow surveyor described such a situation a couple weeks back. A potential client called for an estimate. They did what research they could from their office then called the guy back with a fairly narrow ballpark figure of from this to that. That was about double what the fellow had thought it might cost. He whined and hedged and whined and finally said he would keep calling around until he could find someone to do it for what he was willing to pay. A couple of weeks later the guy called back to see if they would drop their price by $500. Nope. He went away. There is no future in dealing with someone like that. The product will not meet their expectations for any one of fifty reasons and getting every dollar owed will probably be very difficult.

I've done a lot of it, as an example one client has a rule that over a certain number the work needs to go to the bidding process, if I'm at 52,000 and at 49,900 I get the job or it goes to bid, guess what I do..........

MightyMoe, post: 423924, member: 700 wrote: I've done a lot of it, as an example one client has a rule that over a certain number the work needs to go to the bidding process, if I'm at 52,000 and at 49,900 I get the job or it goes to bid, guess what I do..........

You give $2,100 away and feel like you came out a winner?

Scott Ellis, post: 423925, member: 7154 wrote: You give $2,100 away and feel like you came out a winner?

I would have spent that during the bidding process.

And yes, those jobs always worked out well with that client.

On smaller stuff I give them a high and low estimate. But that is after doing preliminary research, such as having them send me a copy of their deed and looking at the tax map information online. I also look at google earth to get a good sense of what I'm getting into.

On larger tracts I charge a per acre fee, but give them a high and low per acre. In WV acreage is almost never correct when it comes to what the deed says. Some surveyors might give a 'per foot' fee. I just surveyed 76 Acres that had the same perimeter as 107 Acres.

I know what I need to make a day to turn a profit. That is how I base my estimates. Basically a day rate. Half days don't count. If I estimate it will take 4.5 days I give the estimate for 5 days as the half day is shot on the property anyway and I can't recoup the half day anywhere else. It's about what the client agrees to.

Once in a while I'll do a job strictly based on an hourly rate. I seem to make the least on those jobs.

Holy Cow, post: 423922, member: 50 wrote: and getting every dollar owed will probably be very difficult.

When the alarm bells are ringing like this we ask for the money up front.

We can apply a 5% discount if payment is received in full at the time of delivery of the product.

MightyMoe, post: 423926, member: 700 wrote: I would have spent that during the bidding process.

So you can come up with a bid at no cost to you for $49,900 but it cost you $2,100 to come up with a bid of $52,000. What do you spend money on during the bid process to get the job?

Scott Ellis, post: 423932, member: 7154 wrote: So you can come up with a bid at no cost to you for $49,900 but it cost you $2,100 to come up with a bid of $52,000. What do you spend money on during the bid process to get the job?

It wasn't a bid, like I explained above

Will I dicker just because the potential client wants to pay less...no.

Will I go back and take a second look at my fee, get more details on the clients scope, or take a look at ways I can maybe do the work more efficiently for a good client...occasionally.