Cash Crises

This is a very interesting article that affects many subcontractors in the building industry here in Australia.

 http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-07-08/construction-subcontractors-facing-cash-flow-crisis/4117078

Due to the Globalisation of employee relationships and the new Industrial relations laws now operating by Fair Trade Australia, many families will be 'doing it hard' as we say here in Australia.

For more employment opportunities go to constructing profits for builders and other trades or go to Plumbers marketing if you are a plumber affected by these latest corporate collapses. 

Solar Market

Solar power in Australia is an up and coming legitimate green energy source of power that is now seen as a threat to all those overseas energy giants who have been ripping off Australian electricity users for the past decade.

But the rebates for feeding excess power generated from your solar panels and being fed back into the electricity grid is now having the rebate slashed under the new Liberal Government in Queensland. See more information here on ways to get in before the deadline and earn those extra dollars. Solar Market 

To have these rebates slashed so severely just goes to show how much electricity can be generated by using rooftops and common sense ways to get renewable energy at a cost efficient price tag. It seems to me that this readily available and free energy source is now being perceived by multinational conglomerates as a threat to their manipulative mechanisms for screwing users to pay extraordinary bonuses to their shareholders and CEO's.

Solar power is the cheapest and most available energy source in Australia seeing as we are blessed with so much sunshine. It is not the total answer to all our energy needs but it is a major step in the right direction.

Australia instigated a tax on carbon on the 1 July 2012 and the debate on the benefits has got lost in the political rhetoric caused by a hung Parliament. Australian politics today is in a shambles and exacerbated by vested interests.

Solar power will be good for struggling families wanting ways to cut their power bills but they will now need to act quickly. 

Building Contractors are Missing a Great Opportunity

Building contractors today are missing a great opportunity because they are not thinking laterally. People will always need homes. The problem in Australia though is that the homes have been built to ‘mansion’ standards’ rather than a comfortable home standard. Due to this fact, last month building approvals were down again. The approval request for new homes fell by 7% in March 2012.

When so many people want to buy their own homes but don’t want to be stuck for the next 20+ years with a quarter million dollar plus debt to be repaid, many have now chosen to rent rather than buy. This makes excellent sense in today’s uncertain world. 

There are already far too many home owners in Australia who are now stuck with a “Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac” type deal where they owe the banks and other financial institutions more than their homes are worth.  Frankly, this is a disgusting and grossly unfair state of personal financing that Australia managed to avoid during the Global Financial Crises (GFC) of 2008.  So where have we since gone so wrong?

Builders need to build homes for people and not the Banks

Bank shareholders have been led to expect a very, very high return on their shares. In short, our Australian banks have become so greedy now that the Australian Government is there to protect their depositors that they are snubbing their noses at their customers knowing full well they have blanket coverage by the Government. This is unconscionable behaviour. 

The outcome for this wrong-doing to be rectified seems a long way off yet but people still need a home to live in and Builders need to work.  And as the old saying goes “there is more than one way to skin a cat” and so there is more than one way to get financing for people who want to take out a ‘fair’ sized loan repayment plan to buy a ‘fair’ built home. 

Build homes for people and Families

If you were to offer someone the choice of a mansion or a cottage, which would you expect them to prefer? Now if you make that offer to people and offer them a choice of a place to live costing $200,000 that they can see themselves paying off in ten years or the mansion at half a million they can never see themselves owning fully, what would you expect them to prefer?

People have to live a lifestyle too and if the only lifestyle choice is restricted through lack of money due to a high mortgage repayment, most people will reject the idea. But if they were offered a comfortable home, a lower mortgage and a lifestyle that they could afford to have with a bit of disposable cash with which to do something they liked to do, therein lies the missing opportunity for the savvy building contractor today

All Plundering Plumbing Businesses will plummet

Plumbing businesses today are well known for their high call-out fees and expensive charges. 

Any Plumbing business that charges excessive fees will soon become known in their locality and their plundering ways will attract such bad word of mouth (WOM) advertising from unhappy customers that their plundering ways to their clients will soon cause their plumbing business to plummet beyond salvaging.

So if you have in the past been accused of plundering by excessive charging on your call out fee to people in urgent need of your services, you will be well on the way to causing your small plumbing business to plummet. A plummeting plumbing business is not a profitable business to be in!

Word of Mouth Plundering of Clients is Bad

If you are guilty of charging excessive fees to a once-only client that has found themselves in a health-and-safety situation like a leaking or over-flowing toilet and you charge them excessively because you think you can get away with it this time, the repercussions can come back and “bite-you-on-the-nether end” and cause your small business to plummet to depths you won’t previously have experienced.  Or ever want to again. 

That seemingly innocent and unimportant-looking client can cause your business to go bankrupt.  

What is Plundering? 

The Oxford English Dictionary (circa 1964) describes plundering as:

Plunder: vt &n. 1. Rob (place, person) forcibly of good, esp. as in war; rob systematically; steal, embezzle, (goods, or abs.).

2. N. Violent or dishonest acquisition of property; property so acquired: (sl) profit, gain. Hence ~ ern. {circa 1630, F G plunder, lit.rob of household effects }

So as you can see, plundering is not a nice thing to do and is definitely not socially acceptable. 

Three ways to be fully compensated without being labeled a plundering plumber:

It is only fair and right that any plumber advertising as a 24 hour service receives fair and reasonable compensation for being hauled out of bed at 2am to stop a toilet from dripping. They deserve to be compensated for their inconvenience.  Especially when so many of these problems could have been fixed during normal business hours. 

1. If you advertise your plumbing business as a 24/7 business then it is only fair to say in the advert that there is an after hour’s call fee that applies. 

2. When you take the phone call you need to tell them that a callout fee of however-many-dollars you charge applies. They will then have the option of accepting or declining your services. Once they have accepted this fee, they are then not at liberty to bad-mouth your services and usually don’t. 

3. Always give the client an invoice stating what you have done including the time you have spent on their job. If you require parts to complete the repair or installation, traveling time needs to be included.  If the invoice is paid in cash, then mark on the invoice that it is paid with thanks. 

By protecting your business reputation by not becoming known as a plundering plumber your business will not plummet.Construct profits wisely for long-term plumbing success.

Building Apprenticeships and why they are needed

I was listening to the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) early this morning and was horrified to learn what the speaker/interviewee (sorry...can't remember his name. Hey, it was just after 4am!) and they were discussing the state of skilled workers in Australia.


Did you know, that the ABS (Australian Bureau of Statistics) classify anyone who works for 1 hour per week (yes, 1 hour...that's not a typo!) is classified as employed? Isn't that disgusting! One hour...

Based on this knowledge, can you even guess at how many Australians should probably be on the unemployed list because they sure as heck aren't earning enough money to live on no matter how hard they try!

In fairness to Australia and the ABS, this is now the world standard for measuring economic unemployment figures around the world. This is how the financial analysts and financial controllers classify populations and economic data. Beggars the question really doesn't it, just how many people in our western societies are really gainfully employed? No wonder our credit debts are so high and out of control!

The one thing he did say would be a good idea to manage the 'supposed' skill shortage here in Australia that I agreed with him on was to re-instate apprenticeships back into our public works offices. 

Apprenticeships are best served by a young population who don't yet have the responsibilities and costs of providing for a family. But as things stand right now, many of the apprenticeships are going to older recipients because they are seen as being more stable and have acquired life skills. As an employer, if you are going to train someone from the get-go and have a choice of no knowledge or some knowledge, I know which one I would prefer. And I'm sure I'm not alone in that choice.

Building apprenticeships are needed right across the country and it makes more sense for more dollars if they can access the training early.

Construction Contractors and Financial Crises Don’t Play Well Together

When a financial crisis hits the country it doesn’t play well with the building industry. Already in 2011 we see the statistics are down and the future isn’t looking too bright for everyone and not just the building industry. So how can a contractor protect their small business from this disaster brought about by lack of Government oversight and financial mismanagement?

Things You Can Do:

I have been spruiking on for some time now about diversification. If you put all your eggs into one basket and fall over, then all those eggs are either broken or cracked. Everyone knows that cracked eggs don’t last and if they are broken, well, good luck on trying to put something back into something that has already broken.

Once something has broken, it is never the same again. Sure, you can mend and reuse, but it still has a built in weakness.

The same goes for small contracting businesses that get damaged during financial crises. Once they have broken the business system they are never quite the same again.  Project builders go broke, Architects leave town and there is simply no money made available for new homes. People can’t get financing any more to build new homes.

So, its way past time to start diversification of ways to find work before the brown stuff really hits the fan.

One of the first things a contracting business can do is to keep in touch with all existing work orders and previous clients who may still be able to offer them some work. This work is likely to be more ‘little jobs’ than bigger jobs but they are money and pay the rent.

As hard as it will be staff needs to be downsized. Subbies have to be paid off and bills paid as soon as possible.  Once the bills and debts are brought up to date, there will be less pressure brought to bear by creditors all wanting their money at the same time and you will be able to see what money you have left over for some small ads in your local paper.  Don’t be misled by a sales rep trying to talk you into a bigger ad by saying that the bigger ads work better. This is not the time to be branding your business because what you are really after now is work.

Construction contractors and financial crises don’t play well together so it is time to go from base-to-base rather than try to hit a home run. By taking more care of your small contracting business will get you to home base by being prepared to run one base at a time.

OH&S Issues for all Contractors

There have been some really stupid construction jobs done recently as seen in this photo. Unfortunately, there are several others that have been forwarded on to us here to highlight the OH&S danger posed to these contractors through silly work practices.

Unsafe OH&S work practices 

For more information about better job safety go to constructing profits so that your business may benefit without any safety issues causing loss of profits.

Licenses

Recently in Australia there state Govts have been cracking down on building sites and demanding to see builders licences. This has caused an uproar among many builders and other contractors who have quoted and won work for which they don't have licences to do.

This has caused a lot of financial hardship to many subbies and it is all so unnecessary. Everyone knows what they are licensed to do and what they are not covered to do. When the building inspectors call in to your building site, there is no acceptable excuse for not having your building licence on you or for carrying out jobs that you are not licenced to do.

This is, has, cost some building contractors who have taken on flood damage work that they are not licenced to do. Apart from the financial hardship to the Tradies and their families, the inconvenience to the householder and the bad name it gets our industry for being fullk of shonky operators ~ PLEASE ~ just don't do it!

Have you checked your licences lately to make sure that they are all up to date and paid up? If not, now would be a very good time to do so before one of the Building Inspectors finds out for you.

Constructing profits in the building industry doesn't mean that you need to take on every thing. Just stick with what you are licensed to do and you will stay profitable.

 

Business Profit in the Construction Industry

Businesses working in the construction industry vary from the small trade contractors to the corporate and publicly listed material supply Hardware stores. Some of the smaller construction contractors are finding life more difficult today because they have had their credit rating downgraded. 

The larger publicly listed corporations are still announcing some more-than-healthy profits which is leaving them with a public relations problem among many of their trade contractor customer base. So the question remains one of striving and achieving balance between the Hardware company shareholders and their customer base of small individual contractors that are adding those healthy profits to the company bottom line.

In Australia, the larger- medium sized construction contracting businesses are also finding life more difficult because they are having trouble finding enough qualified trades people to fill their contracts. Finding qualified trades people in some smaller towns is near impossible because there is just so much work around after the catastrophic floods in Queensland, NSW and Victoria. 

With so much work that needs to be done here in Australia, the banks and other financial lending institutions need to free-up more credit to the trade contractors so that they can purchase the materials that they need to do their job.

Large tracts of Australia need to be re-built and everyone can’t wait for the big construction firms to send out qualified tradesmen to do the work. We need qualified individual trade contractors who have the means to rebuild our homes, towns and city.  Not to mention all the rebuilding that needs to be done out on the remote mining sites and the infrastructure needed to get the mines operational again. 

Roads, bridges and rail lines have to be rebuilt to get to the wharves that have to be repaired or in some instances, rebuilt. 

Business profits in the construction industry are at an all-time high in Australia today for qualified and capable trade contractors.

Neon Signs aren't suitable for Construction Businesses

If you are a small construction business and you are looking for ways to advertise your business during the hours when you aren't available, don't even consider installing neon signs. They will put you into debt so fast your bank manager is likely to add your name to the local football team!

Neon signs around a construction yard are a sure recipe for disaster. Just think of all that materials that gets loaded into trucks and the back of your Ute and how often you have to swing it around to make it fit in.

BTW, for all those non-Aussies, among us (welcome :-) ) but I had better explain what a ute is. It is short for Utility and it is a vehicle like the picture below:

These are very versatile vehicles both for work and for joy riding. They are number 1 choice for many people living and working in the rural areas and for construction workers who often have to carry awkward loads.

Overseas workers targeted for Queensland flood rebuilding program

Overseas workers targeted for Queensland flood rebuilding program: "- Sent using Google Toolbar"

The rebuilding of Queensland Australia is an enormous job. There is so much work to be done here to repair the catastrophic flood damage caused by the one in 200 year floods that inundated 75% of Queensland.

Houses, Mines, Industrial estates, roads, railway lines, port facilities all have to be rebuilt ASAP.

Queensland URGENTLY needs as many qualified tradespeople as we can get hold of!

As if the floods didn't do enough damage, the category 5 tropical cyclone Yasi came along and had a go at finishing off the rest. Our "beautiful one day, perfect the next" climate decided to make us pay for the privilege of living in such a beautiful environment. So we are paying and if you want a job, why don't you come and earn some of the proceeds? You may as well benefit too while rebuilding our beautiful state?

Besides, once you get here, you may decide never to go home again. Bring the family with you and stay awhile....you won't regret it, guaranteed :-)

Advertising Mix - Things to Consider When Choosing a Radio Format to Advertise On

If your small business is in the construction industry, the best advertising mix for you to consider when choosing a radio format to advertise with will be the one that the people you want to reach actually listen to.

There is one thing about most small construction businesses and that is that many of them spend a lot of time listening to a radio. 

If not actively listening to a radio over the noise of electric drills and the general banging going on around a construction site, there is often a radio on somewhere. Tilers and Painters in particular, like to have a radio playing in their workplace but how much they actually concentrate on what the announcer is saying, could be another matter. Unless, of course, it’s the latest sports results and then they seem to actively listen. 

Whether this is because sport is a big conversation topic among them and their mates and everyone likes to be able to take part in the conversations around them, or is it because they are genuinely interested?  Either way, the important part to remember here is that many construction contractors do actively listen to these sports news items. 

So if you are a construction contractor working in the building industry and you are thinking of doing some radio advertising to project managers or builders because you want more sub-contract work, then the best time for your radio ad to be the most effective for you will be to make sure that your ad is read or heard as close as possible to the time slot of these sports broadcasts. Either just before or just after is the best time.

You can place your radio ad to be heard at your nominated times but sometimes, you may have to pay a premium to get your wanted ad-time. Most radio sales reps have packages of time slots that their station want to fill and these will often consist of a mixture of random times. 

When buying radio ads, you are actually buying air-time. This is the product these sales reps are selling and if they sell you a radio package where many of the time slots may be cheaper to buy (while still being very expensive!) your radio ad will simply not be heard by those you are wanting to reach. This is as useless to your small business as fly-screens on a submarine!

Radio air time is very expensive and today doesn’t have the same audiences as it had twenty years ago. Even with a radio switched on, it has simply become a background noise that unless someone is actively listening for something, your ad simply won’t get noticed. 

So if you decide to try radio advertising, make sure your ad begins with a noise that gets their attention. But be careful when doing this because some noises are so ‘real’ today they can cause distress or give someone such a fright their first response is anger. This is not a good introduction for your business. 

If you do decide to give radio advertising a go, make sure the time slot you choose to use matches the audience you want to reach in the format that you are comfortable using to introduce your small construction business to your targeted listeners.