How Much Do I Charge Per Hour Or Whatever

[MrControversial]

What started off as a few people at work asking me to fix their PC's has turned into friends and family dumping their PC's on me. I do the first job free, but when they start rolling in, it costs me time so I want to start charging them. How much do I charge? What's the normal fee for repairing a PC? Is their a flat charge or an hourly charge?

 

[shoRunner]

go your local best buy,fry's, compusa, etc and pick up a price sheet

 

[Aisengard]

I'd do a flat fee, hourly charges can be tricky.

 

[beany323]

yea i stopped by bestbuy to return a bad ipod and some guy at the geek squad was charging a customer like 50 bucks to do a restore... lol.. all you need is to do it overnite.. hehe..

oh and extra to back up some photos and such...

 

[John]

Best Buy uses the Geek Squad right? Their labor rates are very high and a la carte.

For PC's I charge $45 hr. for in-store and $75 hr. for on-site labor. Spyware, viruses, networking, installations, etc.

When it comes to family I do my best to take care of them. However when the problems are frequent and excessive I cringe and give them an ear full.

 

[slightlyhuman]

reinstalls with xp- $50
reinstalls with 98- $75


win98 is a pain in the ass with drivers and plus most of the time the owner doesn't have the driver disk that came with his pc.

spyware usually 35-50 bucks.

 

[l Xes l]

haha... overcharge em!!!
tho i feel bad how idiotic people can be toward computers..

 

[Broadkipa]

I have found that if you fix someones computer , everything that goes wrong with it after that point is your fault. Thats why I have allways kept it as a hobby and never charge to fix peoples computers. I quite often get brought beer or stuff as a thankyou but once you charge it changes things.

 

[MrControversial]

The sh*t you guys listed is high! So I'll charge like $25/h bucks less for onsite and $15/h if they bring it to me. Secondly, the majority of my customers are older people. I don't want them eating dog food, you know with their fixed income and all.

 

[shoRunner]

yeah thats why you have so many ppl coming, charge them and they'll stop annoying you unless its important.

 

[John]

Originally posted by: MrControversial
The sh*t you guys listed is high! So I'll charge like $25/h bucks less for onsite and $15/h if they bring it to me.

Wow, I may have to sub-contract you out!

 

[MrControversial]

Originally posted by: shoRunner
yeah thats why you have so many ppl coming, charge them and they'll stop annoying you unless its important.

Can't do it...the Lord blessed me with a good heart. I can't be mean to people. But then again, maybe they're just taking advantage of me...

I usually charge them real good if I have to buy parts. You know slap on a fat extra charge when I have to buy a hard drive. They have no idea what a hard drive cost. I'd buy an OEM version and charge them for what they would spend at Best Buy. But for like Spyware removal (took me two hours one time), I can't charge. I see part of it as charity work. Especially for old people.

 

[thirdlegstump]

ditto that...

 

[imported_Kensai]

Originally posted by: John

Originally posted by: MrControversial
The sh*t you guys listed is high! So I'll charge like $25/h bucks less for onsite and $15/h if they bring it to me.

Wow, I may have to sub-contract you out!

Nuh-Uh!
Me first!

 

[Zolty]

you pay 50-100/hr for a plumer or an electrician

 

[MrControversial]

Originally posted by: Zolty
you pay 50-100/hr for a plumer or an electrician

You got a point. And I don't know why they charge that and I don't care. But it feels so wrong...cuz it's so easy. You mean all I have to do is run Adaware for two hours while I'm sleeping and I make $100 bucks?

 

[John]

Originally posted by: MrControversial

Originally posted by: Zolty
you pay 50-100/hr for a plumer or an electrician

You got a point. And I don't know why they charge that and I don't care. But it feels so wrong...cuz it's so easy. You mean all I have to do is run Adaware for two hours while I'm sleeping and I make $100 bucks?

If Ad-Aware is all you run to clean up a system it's no wonder your labor rates are so inexpensive. I run Ad-Aware, Spybot, Spy Sweeper, CWShredder, HiJack This, scan w/ Trend and Panda online virus scans and still have to do a few manual file/regedits to get some system 100% clean.

 

[MrControversial]

No really, I run Adaware, Spybot, Hijackthis, and Microsoft Antispyware. It's just that Adaware takes the longest. A deep scan on a fat hard drive will take overnight.

 

[Keyvan]

Originally posted by: Broadkipa
I have found that if you fix someones computer , everything that goes wrong with it after that point is your fault. Thats why I have allways kept it as a hobby and never charge to fix peoples computers. I quite often get brought beer or stuff as a thankyou but once you charge it changes things.

i agree with that 100%!
I mean if I was starting a PC repair business (which I'm not), then this would be part of my job, but it's not my job.

 

[RaiderJ]

Family or close friends - trade for food/beer/fishing trips/etc
Others - minimum $50

I tell everyone up front I'm not responsible for what happens AFTER I leave. I hate hearing how "Now my computer does _____".

 

[Jojo1971]

Originally posted by: Broadkipa
I have found that if you fix someones computer , everything that goes wrong with it after that point is your fault. Thats why I have allways kept it as a hobby and never charge to fix peoples computers. I quite often get brought beer or stuff as a thankyou but once you charge it changes things.

very true- thats why i started redirecting my friend to best buy and other computer shops...

 

[imported_whatever]

I base my rates largely on how much money the people have... recently, I ended up working for someone with 2 Mercedes, one of which was new, and a brand new Audi. Needless to say, they get charged more than someone who cannot afford it. However, just because they have $$$ doesn't mean they don't get good advice - like "Buy a new computer (or have me build you one) instead of upgrading your son's machine to 2GB of RDRAM"... that was going to be just WAY too expensive for a 1.7GHz Williamette.

 

[Overkiller]

Originally posted by: Broadkipa
I have found that if you fix someones computer , everything that goes wrong with it after that point is your fault. Thats why I have allways kept it as a hobby and never charge to fix peoples computers. I quite often get brought beer or stuff as a thankyou but once you charge it changes things.

take this into account. i recently had my old boss' WIFE call me after 2 years when i upgraded/fixed their pc wanting help and just expecting it to be done. i told her that her measly 8$/h (nice when i was young and dumb) way back when was nice but this was over 2 years ago and i really didn't care. I told her i dont carry a warranty, i do it out of goodwill.

And its stayed that way. Eventually i just completely dropped it unless its for my parents or my sister. it is not worth the hassle you find out after a while.

 

[josedawg]

I used to do it now and again for $15/hr. This was a few years ago. After a few clients, I stopped doing $15/hr unless it was at least 2-3+ hours worth of work. It really sucks doing 1 hr's work, travelling to the location (lose money in transportation), and only making $15. People would call me for retarded stuff I could fix in 5-10min, and I'd feel bad charging them a full hour, or sometimes they'd make me stay another 50min and find other stuff that was wrong which I didnt want to do. I dont have any clients anymore, but if they would come, I'd charge $20-25/hr minimum, with at least 2hrs worth of work (which is a pretty good deal if you know your stuff and can do it quickly). If some good, old clients came back, or a client who could bring me 3-4+ referrals, I'd let them slide with the old $15/hr price, but I'd let them know that the referrals would get charged the $25/hr. Trust me, if you price too low, they'll call you every day, expect free phone support (omg i hated this), and pretty much just annoy you to no end. Keep it moderate, but not too expensive where they wont come back.

 

[imported_whatever]

Originally posted by: josedawg
I used to do it now and again for $15/hr. This was a few years ago. After a few clients, I stopped doing $15/hr unless it was at least 2-3+ hours worth of work. It really sucks doing 1 hr's work, travelling to the location (lose money in transportation), and only making $15. People would call me for retarded stuff I could fix in 5-10min, and I'd feel bad charging them a full hour, or sometimes they'd make me stay another 50min and find other stuff that was wrong which I didnt want to do. I dont have any clients anymore, but if they would come, I'd charge $20-25/hr minimum, with at least 2hrs worth of work (which is a pretty good deal if you know your stuff and can do it quickly). If some good, old clients came back, or a client who could bring me 3-4+ referrals, I'd let them slide with the old $15/hr price, but I'd let them know that the referrals would get charged the $25/hr. Trust me, if you price too low, they'll call you every day, expect free phone support (omg i hated this), and pretty much just annoy you to no end. Keep it moderate, but not too expensive where they wont come back.

I agree somewhat, but I think a certain level of phone support makes sense - it just gets added on to their next bill if I go there again
For example, someone wanted me to (after figuring out that their 1.3 year old Maxtor 200GB SATA drived died ) install a copy of Office 2003 that they had recently got from their employer. I did so, and it was a fairly easy install. However, they ended up not liking Outlook and wanting to use Outlook Express instead (which they had been using before). The problem was that Outlook didn't copy their address book from Outlook Express, it just moved it! The address book was no longer there in Outlook Express, and as it was an issue created by something I did (although really just because Microsoft doesn't have the best code), I was fine with doing some phone support.