Going rate for a French Painter & Decorator

[Gluestick]

Interesting little tale on cowboy contractors in last night's Evening Standard.

 

See here:

 

[mint]

Ebaynut, I agree with a lot of what you say in your post.

I used to have an English neighbour who would tell me every time I employed a workman legally and legitimately to do anything around the house that I was being "robbed", the man was just "taking advantage", etc. etc.

Mind you, after he damned near died of heat exhaustion re-roofing his garage one summer, he suddenly got very interested in which workmen/artisans we used for our house.

Obviously, you can't compare the saving in costs when you do a job yourself and when you employ someone to do it.

I did all the painting of our house and yes, it took me ages, it was very hard work and all the costs involved were the price of the paint, brushes, etc.  But I was glad my OH didn't have to climb up on our roof, remove all the tiles, lay down insulation and then put all the tiles back.

As you have said, you either do the job yourself, not have it done, or pay someone a fair price to do what you'd rather not do yourself.

[nemltd]

Broy said......   I only charge 150 a day but I dont start before 11, I'm unregistered. unreliable and sloppy.

 

 

 

 

 

I could do worse!

It least you're not 225 a day, don't start til 11, unregistered............................................

[nemltd]

Crazyfrog said..............

I think it was the painter Whistler who when confronted by a women who said "$10 for an hour!!!" he said, " no ma'm $10 for a life times experience"

An artist is not paid for his labor but for his vision

 

Lucky for me this guy isn't in his 60's, and only 26! Anymore experience and I would need a new mortgage!

[nemltd]

Nick Trollope said.......................

Don't understand any of this "estimated time" ***. Either he is compentant and knows how long a job will take and will give you a fixed-price devis (including materials), or he isn't and can't. There is no such (legal) entity as an "estimate".

If you don't like a devis, then you are always at liberty to get more, from someone else.

That is how it works, here.

 

Good advice, I've given this guy the go ahead based on the recommendation from the builder I've been using, he lives next door to me. He's probably painting his house as well!  HaHa

 

 

 

[nemltd]

Gluestick

Welcome to the real world. He could work 48 weeks at 5.5 days per week = £19800, have 4 bank holidays c£280 less, that gives a similar figure to your £19500. Although an office worker probably couldn't contimplate this.

Is the median weekly wage (male) gross or net? That would bring it down to c£400 per week, of course you would maybe have to fund transport to and from work, and the associated costs that go with it, insurance etc. Using your figures this would be c£80 per week, leaving us around £320.

I guess he could go to his local tax office with his tax return, saving on accountancy fees which are probably unecessary for a painter with this level of turnover.

Pensions, life insurance, all 'nice to haves' if he can afford it, wonder what percentage of people can? Everyone has access to welfare, self-employed or not. Not everybody has access to the pensions they've been paying into all their lives! Not sure what capital investment is required for a few brushes, £10?, not all that risky.

If he is benefit dependant and self-employed, is the welfare system doing its job? Is he doing his job, or is he doing it well enough? As for a disfunctional economy........I was always taught not to spend more than I earn, perhaps this Labour government could learn from these wise words.

We seem to have come away from the original point...............Is 225 euros a day a fair rate? It would seem opinion is divided. I guess this is the point of these forums, to get opinions and take on board what you can. We are never too old to learn.

I am a used car dealer, ok stop the booing now......................If I was selling a car for top price, then you would expect a 'top' car. The difference is you can see the car before you part with your money. I will have to wait and see if I get my 'top' car. I am not looking to 'cut' anyones throat here, or pay 'peanuts', as you so eloquently put it, just recieve some fairness.

When asking a valid question, if you are faced with defensiveness and not answers, then beware.

Good forum, and I thank you all sincerely for putting your time to replying.

Tony

nemltd

 

 

 

 

[BIG MAC]

I guess an impressionist may be a bit cheaper......not like they need the Monet

[La Guerriere]

Not Manet of them do ....

[broy]

You know what they say, "if you can piss, you can paint."

[NickP]

[quote user="broy"]You know what they say, "if you can piss, you can paint."
[/quote] Yes that's what they say, but not everybody can piss properly either. [:P]

[Etoile]

Why do people ask about room sizes and materials? You're asking for advice on a daily rate! I don't know why some people bother answering questions on here when their replies are lame and useless. Perhaps they are just bored.

[La Guerriere]

Last time we criticised a painter, he invaded Poland

[BIG MAC]

Last time I criticised a painter he was from Poland

[Gluestick]

[quote user="nemltd"]

Gluestick

Welcome to the real world.[/quote]

Thank you: that's where I tend to dwell, on a daily basis.

[quote] He could work 48 weeks at 5.5 days per week[/quote]

Indeed: he could work 7 days per week: few do in the real world I live in.

[quote]Is the median weekly wage (male) gross or net? [/quote]

Well; you seem to know everything; perhaps you ought to be the one to answer your own question!

[quote]I am a used car dealer,[/quote]

Ah; the truth will out.

Having operated my own automotive engineering business for many years in another life, we avoided car traders like the plague: since these were the chaps whom when informed the repair to their sales car would cost £x, they invariably responded, "Not enough profit in this one: What can you do for £ divided by 2?

To which our standard reponse was always "Invite you to seek assistance elsewhere!"

I suspect you are relatively new to la belle France.

You will find the costs faced by all artisans are significantly high: additionally, if properly registered and insured they will always (And should upon requuest) produce a Devis: which is far from an estimate. It's a legal contract to deliver the result carefully outlined within: and for the price stated.

And thereafter, once completed and paid for, you are insured against faulty workmanship.

In theory.

In practice one is sadly compelled to accept the shortage of skilled and reliable artisans in France: and the further fact that they suffer huge social tax burdens: which they themselves pass on, naturally, to their customers.

Sought after artisans are very busy: because they are good.

Seems you have two further choices: buy a ladder and some brushes: or look for a passing Pole, Rumanian, or dodgy brit and pass over a bundle of used Euro notes: if they fall off the ladder, however, then you are in deep problems. As you are if employing people "On The Old Black", since you could well enjoy the local Gendarmerie knocking on your door in the wee small hours.

BTW: You enjoy seriously misplaced faith in those kind people who work at HMRC's offices, I fear.

 

[Chancer]

In the scenario above the Gendarmerie knocking on your door (which is an unlikely possibility) will be of little consequence and small beer compared to the financial ramiifications that will become apparent to you when being interrogated first by the ambulance men, then by the admissions and nursing/operating staff at the hospital.

I know this from experience having been carted away by ambulance after a ladder accident.

If you are are going to employ friends or even accept un coup de main occasionally then I advise you to ask your existing insurer to include assurance benevoles, if they wont play ball then join a self build associations like Les Castors.

[Lehaut]

[quote user="Chancer"]

In the scenario above the Gendarmerie knocking on your door (which is an unlikely possibility) will be of little consequence and small beer compared to the financial ramiifications that will become apparent to you when being interrogated first by the ambulance men, then by the admissions and nursing/operating staff at the hospital.

I know this from experience having been carted away by ambulance after a ladder accident.

If you are are going to employ friends or even accept un coup de main occasionally then I advise you to ask your existing insurer to include assurance benevoles, if they wont play ball then join a self build associations like Les Castors.

[/quote]

Going wildly off topic, but following this comment, what did you do to deserve this "inquisition"? I too had a ladder accident, last year, not at my house.  There was no ambulance as my wife took me to A+E and apart from a 3 hr wait walking round the waiting room clutching my cracked ribs and a finger my wedding ring had peeled the flesh/muscle off (yes I know I should have taken it off!!), the staff (when I got to see them) were more than helpful and only interested in fixing me up.  I did ask if they understood English profanities before they started cutting the ring off  -  a wise question as they cut more of the finger than the ring.  They were not really interested in the accident (I was up a tree with a chain saw).  Ir was cherry picking season so I shared a room with a French man who had also lost an argument with gravity because of a rotten branch in a cherry tree.

That was the Tuesday, I had the bill on the Saturday morning,  2 nurses, an intern, surgeon and 4 operating staff came to 1200, cheaper than the painter possibly!!  (Oh and dinner was included as I said I was hungry after the op!!)

[Chancer]

Lucky (or not so!) you re getting the bill so promptly, I am still getting dribs and drabs trickling through over 2 years after a series of operations.

Re the interrogation, from the paperwork that the paramedics carry right through the the hospital staff there are boxes to tick for accident de travail or tiers responsable and they have significant pressure from above to tick them as the whole bill then becomes payable by someone else.

In your case LeHaut you presented yourself at casualty with I presume an acceptable explanation of how the injury was sustained, in my case I was stabilised at the accident scene by the paramedics before beingtaken to hospital, they could clearly see that I was in the middle of a significant chantier with 5 levels of scaffolding albeit home made,  initially they wanted  the name and preferably insurance details of either my patron or the householder, when I explained that I was the householder they correctly put it down as a domestic accident

If they cant lay it off onto someone elses responsibility then for a plain and simple accident almost everything is 100% prise en charge by assurance maladie. You will pay €18 towards the daily frais de sejour which was €871 in my case and a participation forfaiture of €22 towards the first but not subsequent operations, even a 20 minute operating theatre procedure under local anaesthetic and sedation costs  €950.

If however you are a foreign visitor using an EHIC then you become liable for 20% of everything, so much for treating you the same as a French citezen, one of my operations was factured this way in error despite it being a repeat of the one they did incorrectly 2 days earlier that was 100% prise en charge, I never did manage to convince the surgeon to correct her error on the paperwork (the stumbling block was her inability to lose face and accept that she had made a error) and had to shell out.

I will start a thread soon re "is it really worth paying for a mutuelle?" as having gone through all my medical expenses for the last 5 years I am well ahead of the game despite having several accidents through the hazards of what I do, bad luck and foolishness.

[Gluestick]

[quote user="Chancer"]

In the scenario above the Gendarmerie knocking on your door (which is an unlikely possibility) will be of little consequence and small beer [/quote]

Unless I have this wrong, JRC, you are suggesting that employing workers on the black is virtually risk free?

Even when disgruntled local artisans are often keen to shop non-qualified workers?

Understandably...............

 

[Chancer]

Unlikely, virtually risk free, call it what you will, yes I suppose you can conclude that.

It is URSSAF that do the controls, the G-men will only get involved to secure/keep the peace on a raid on a big site where it is suspected that sans papiers are employed. Even that is a joke in itself as the chantier at Bouyges Telecom in La Defense ground to a halt when all the sans papiers went on strike, it spread to a nationwide day of action, they want the rights to social security beneifits and health insurance that they are paying for through their dedcuctions of cotisations, unless they are granted cartes de sejours then they wont get them.

Back to URSSAF like most fonctionnaires they want an easy life tend to concentrate on the big sites and they never ever work weekends or during les vacances (dont forget they get up to 9 weeks holiday) which means that most working people dont need to look over their shoulder.

They only have the right to control sites that have a permis de construire panneaux and they are not allowed to enter private property without permission, they were interviewed outside an apartment block in Paris where one of the flats was being retapé by sans papiers where they admitted that they were powerless to act, the owner a property developer had happily allowed the cameras in to see the work that he was getting done 3 times quicker and half the price of French artisans (his words).

Nowadays you cannot actually find a real black worker (apart from my mate Winston) in my area as they have all gone straight via Auto-entrepeneur, naturally they only declare a fraction of their income (most of these guys have a full time job where they cotise) but now dont have to be circumspect about being seen working, beforehand they limited themselves to fermettes where the gates could be closed.

[Lehaut]

 "with 5 levels of scaffolding albeit home made", 

Impressed, only ever seen that in Hong Kong, and that was out of bamboo!

 

 

[Chancer]

If only I could have found some bamboo, I had to make do with fabricating large scale wooden shelf brackets from the French excuse for three by two (chevrons) and fixing them with chemical anchors.

[Gluestick]

Just to update this thread; I bumped into a nice chap in my local post office this PM.

Was complaining about "The Poles stealing all our jobs!".

So, as I would I had a chat with him: turned out to be a professional painter and decorator (Self Employed Subby working under CIS: labour only), mainly working in London areas on major contracts.

He used to charge upwards of £150/day: now happy to get £100. Maintained the Poles are working for just £50/day.

So, theres you have it: straight from the Gee Gee's mouth.

 

 

[velcorin]

He should count himself lucky, he could have been offered EUR137 per month in Tunisia

http://www.ouest-france.fr/actu/actuDet_-Continental-propose-des-postes-en-Tunisie-pour-137%E2%82%AC-par-mois_39382-1315930_actu.Htm

 

[Swissie]

Here in Switzerland the hourly rate is about CHF90 for all tradesmen, carpenters, plumbers, etc. Our local plumber asked if I could help his daughter with her English Bac. I said I needed some work doing and we could do a swap, 1 hour for 1 hour. He said he couldn't do that, as he is a qualified craftsman. The fact I have 30 years experience and UK Honours Degree did seem to matter much to him. He truly did not mean to offend.

[BIG MAC]

UK Honours degree......There's loads of painters out there with UK Honours degrees!