# Chain restaurant service question!



## Shoot'N'Plumber (Apr 27, 2013)

Howdy PZ'ers! Got a service auestion for you commercual service companies. So I've been doing quite a bit of septic system work for a national chain restaurant, ive also been maintianing/treating their facility's where potable water is supplied by well. Recently the office manager at the headquarters (I deal with her all the time) discovered that I do "regular" plumbing work and only thought I did big projects. So she was quick to ask me what my service range is etc. right now I already travel as much as 150 miles to take samples and regular system monitoring at their restairants with advanced wastewater treatment plants. 
Basically they've been looking for a plumber who can handle as many as 23 restaurants all within 45 miles of my house/shop. They've had bad experiences with the larger franchise type companies and that most other smaller shops wont travel out of their cities, but they really would like to consolidate all their plumbing needs to one company. So she wants me to send her some general pricing for things such as snaking/jetting. So do any you commercial service guys have any similar service accounts and how do you price for whether you get called out to a restaurant around the corner from the shop vs a handful within 25 miles and then some additional ones another 15 miles out? 
I'm trying to avoid creating a price point based on groups within a particular cities area vs one generic price for all their facilities. But this may be wrong which is why I'm asking. Thanks


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## Redwood (Sep 8, 2008)

Best bet is take the travel out of the bill as a line item and flat rate the work...
Some jobs you make a killing, and some jobs will be ah shiot i'm driving a lot...
But they all will profit....

And you won't have anyone thinking you came from close by so it should be less when you have back to back jobs further out...

Generally speaking the more lines on you bill the more a customer wants to debate...
Remove the option...


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## hedrickplumbing (Dec 1, 2013)

All of my work is commercial and their is a truck charge and all work is time and material and they pay travel and I am in the same boat my customers did not like the larger company's .


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## mtfallsmikey (Jan 11, 2010)

Of course, when they say jump, you'll ask how high, regardless of what else you may be doing...


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## Shoot'N'Plumber (Apr 27, 2013)

mtfallsmikey said:


> Of course, when they say jump, you'll ask how high, regardless of what else you may be doing...


Absolutely! I'm trying to steer my business towards the commercial side anyway. I'm hoping to land some p & m work but the emergencies is where it's at.


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## 422 plumber (Jul 31, 2008)

I used to do a lot of Darden Group work through a GC friend. We have lost a lot of the remodels to out of state straight up clowns, but we end doing all the emergency work, because the clowns won't come back to the state to warranty it, and they call us because they know we are "good, but too expensive." So they get charged travel both ways and all time is rounded up to the nearest hour.


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## Shoot'N'Plumber (Apr 27, 2013)

422 plumber said:


> I used to do a lot of Darden Group work through a GC friend. We have lost a lot of the remodels to out of state straight up clowns, but we end doing all the emergency work, because the clowns won't come back to the state to warranty it, and they call us because they know we are "good, but too expensive." So they get charged travel both ways and all time is rounded up to the nearest hour.


So how far and/or long of a drive with traffic do you do service for them?


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## Shoot'N'Plumber (Apr 27, 2013)

Redwood said:


> Best bet is take the travel out of the bill as a line item and flat rate the work...
> Some jobs you make a killing, and some jobs will be ah shiot i'm driving a lot...
> But they all will profit....
> 
> ...


Yea I'd almost had to do it this way as there are only 3 restaurants in my neighborhood and the rest are 35-40 mins out, so pretty much most service calls will be drivin time. I know my price is my price but I can't help but wonder what other local shops are charging that are within 10-15 mins out. It's gotta be profitable for me but I don't want to be out of the price point. What I do know is I've done a few calls that another plumber snaked (the main grease line) and the restaurant will be backed up next day and I follow up wit the jetter and pull back log after log, so they've seen the difference in service.


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## 422 plumber (Jul 31, 2008)

Shoot'N'Plumber said:


> So how far and/or long of a drive with traffic do you do service for them?


Hour and a half is about the max.


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## 422 plumber (Jul 31, 2008)

That is what you are selling. Not the going rate, or crappy service, but premium service at a "reasonable" rate. If your reasonable rate is higher than the stiffs and yahoos, so be it, your product can command a higher price, just like their menu. Steaks and seafood are more expensive than hamburgers and hot dogs!


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## Shoot'N'Plumber (Apr 27, 2013)

422 plumber said:


> That is what you are selling. Not the going rate, or crappy service, but premium service at a "reasonable" rate. If your reasonable rate is higher than the stiffs and yahoos, so be it, your product can command a higher price, just like their menu. Steaks and seafood are more expensive than hamburgers and hot dogs!


I hear ya! The funny thing is just this morning the service center call me and tells me that a special Work Order has been created for two restaurants that need some work. So I asked what they meant by special, they said because I haven't been made an official vendor it requires authorization from a regional manager to authorize having a non vendor do work. So needless to say, the regional managers secretary ( who I deal with a lot) called me and stressed how she needs my insurance paperwork n stuff so they can make me a vendor, and that their other plumber can't figure out what's going on.


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## Redwood (Sep 8, 2008)

Shoot'N'Plumber said:


> I hear ya! The funny thing is just this morning *the service center call me and tells me that a special Work Order has been created for two restaurants that need some work. *So I asked what they meant by special, they said because *I haven't been made an official vendor it requires authorization from a regional manager to authorize having a non vendor do work.* So needless to say, *the regional managers secretary ( who I deal with a lot) called me and stressed how she needs my insurance paperwork n stuff so they can make me a vendor, and that their other plumber can't figure out what's going on.*


Pretty much standard BS Lines from a maintenance management company...:laughing:

They are all the same...
The lines they use sucking you in...
Stiffing you on bills...
And one day you'll be the guy they are claiming doesn't know what is going on...:laughing:

The reality is he's looking at his accounts receivable balance and knows exactly what is going on....

Ride the wave while it's a good one...:thumbup:


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## mtfallsmikey (Jan 11, 2010)

Redwood said:


> Pretty much standard BS Lines from a maintenance management company...:laughing:
> 
> They are all the same...
> The lines they use sucking you in...
> ...


Very similar to the BS we have to go thru to hire a vendor, no intent to stiff contractors on bills tho, at least from my end. The property owner our company works for requires a COI from all contractors/vendors, with specifics as to the additional insureds are listed, then set up as a vendor, etc. Now, a vendor who is set up in our company database has less hoops to go thru, they just have to have an accout set up for this property. A bit frustrating, but everyone needs to CYA/CTA. I still get invoices from contractors, but I don't have the checkbook.


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## Cajunhiker (Dec 14, 2009)

To the OP, and anyone else, you should take into consideration the terms of payment as most maintenance management companies pay on a 30-90 day cycle after receiving your invoice.

Where I'm at most shops refuse to do 30-90 days payment terms. I, for one, require a credit card upon completion of the job, which this payment term must be specified in the work order emailed to me. Otherwise, call someone else who wants to wait to get paid. I'm not a big enough company to NOT stress about cash flow.

Btw, if you can't easily turn in the paperwork (insurance, W-9 etc) to become a vendor then I doubt you can be disciplined enough to create and send out invoices on time to get paid 30-60 days later.


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## Redwood (Sep 8, 2008)

Cajunhiker said:


> Most maintenance management companies pay on a 30-90 day cycle after receiving your invoice.


Eggzackly so playing banker for them and the risk of having 90 days of receivables on the books when things go south is a limit that you need to consider with your price point...

The skinny is that many of these maintenance management companies are just small boiler room companies and they routinely do stiff vendors then disappear and seem to pop up again as another outfit with the same game...

As I said... Ride the wave while you can, but know it will crash against the shore....


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## Shoot'N'Plumber (Apr 27, 2013)

Thanks for all the input fellas. The unique thing about this account is that 1). I don't deal with a property management company, the actual franchise company handles everything in house. 2) I've actually been doing work for them on the water/wastewater treatment and backflow testing side for the past 8 years (my father in law owns a contract water operations consulting co and I've worked for him as a part time contract water operator for the last 12 years, but it's just always been under his business. 3). I've already bailed them out of problems this year with the Health Dept. and have already completed a $68,000.00, $23,000.00 and $8,000.00 septic/wastewater treatment plant projects and recently submitted a $120,000.00 bid that's in the final stages of hopefully getting approved. But again, I typically get subbed out by my father in law on these bigger projects as up until 8 months ago I was working full time for a plumbing co. 4). Payment has never been an issue period. Even on the big projects my father in law recieved prompt payment. They even offer a check pickup at their office within a week of receiving invoices.
So through casual conversation with the service manager regarding e-mails, she discovered that I am an actual lic. Plumbing contractor (I've only been in business for 8 months so still growing). It was this conversation where she told me shed like to make me a vendor, basically meaning not go through my father in laws business (which if course he's ok with as he doesn't do plumbing).

BTW, Thanks for your concern on my paper work Cajunhiker, yes paperwork is a biotch as I handle all the paperwork for my business as my wife works full time and them some, so she doesn't have much time to help out right now. It can be overwhelming, however, I have intentionally withheld my insurance and W-9 solely because I am still determining what kind of volume I can expect as well as the actual restaurants I will be covering. This is a strategic decision to not allow myself to become overloaded and before I know it I'm actually providing bad service. I'm not ready to get all excited, jump all in and hire somebody just to find out its not what I was expecting. Plus I've manged to get my business off the ground and load up my service trailer with a jetter and drain equipment, power tools and stock all without incurring any debt. I've already got a ridgid monitor and navitrak reciever, I only need a camera, but if I jump into this account I may find out I need to buy a propress for those emergency leaks, and leak detection equipment yada yada yada. But perhaps I just stick to having them call me for their more difficult projects until I'm ready to go all in. 
But I do appreciate the input as always gents.


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## Plumber (Jan 18, 2009)

Ask your father-in-law about it, too. You're connected to him and if you do something to screw up, he may lose business.

The corporate service and repair contracts are nice to have, but don't give too much away. You are overhead to them.


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## Cajunhiker (Dec 14, 2009)

Shoot, that's a great job.


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## sparky (Jan 8, 2014)

Shoot'N'Plumber said:


> Howdy PZ'ers! Got a service auestion for you commercual service companies. So I've been doing quite a bit of septic system work for a national chain restaurant, ive also been maintianing/treating their facility's where potable water is supplied by well. Recently the office manager at the headquarters (I deal with her all the time) discovered that I do "regular" plumbing work and only thought I did big projects. So she was quick to ask me what my service range is etc. right now I already travel as much as 150 miles to take samples and regular system monitoring at their restairants with advanced wastewater treatment plants.
> Basically they've been looking for a plumber who can handle as many as 23 restaurants all within 45 miles of my house/shop. They've had bad experiences with the larger franchise type companies and that most other smaller shops wont travel out of their cities, but they really would like to consolidate all their plumbing needs to one company. So she wants me to send her some general pricing for things such as snaking/jetting. So do any you commercial service guys have any similar service accounts and how do you price for whether you get called out to a restaurant around the corner from the shop vs a handful within 25 miles and then some additional ones another 15 miles out?
> I'm trying to avoid creating a price point based on groups within a particular cities area vs one generic price for all their facilities. But this may be wrong which is why I'm asking. Thanks


Just remember that if u get these restaurants that you have to go when they call and most calls will be after 10:00pm at night.and it sucks big time.do not under price yourself for this work


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## sparky (Jan 8, 2014)

Redwood said:


> Pretty much standard BS Lines from a maintenance management company...:laughing:
> 
> They are all the same...
> The lines they use sucking you in...
> ...


No truer words have ever been spoken than redwoods here above,what he said is so true and right on the money


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## mtfallsmikey (Jan 11, 2010)

Redwood said:


> Eggzackly so playing banker for them and the risk of having 90 days of receivables on the books when things go south is a limit that you need to consider with your price point...
> 
> The skinny is that many of these maintenance management companies are just small boiler room companies and they routinely do stiff vendors then disappear and seem to pop up again as another outfit with the same game...
> 
> As I said... Ride the wave while you can, but know it will crash against the shore....


Not playing devil's advocate here, but I have been the chief engineer at these buildings for almost 9 yrs., worked for 3 different companies doing the same job, none of which are boiler room companies, one was a Fortune 500 company, but it is a 30-60 day lead on billings, most all commercial outfits are like that... and any contractor should factor that in for pricing...but in addition to the COI's, W-9's etc., you have to be a U.S. citizen to come in here, as well as give up a lot of personal information... In Redwood's case, they may do a cavity search...


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