March 18, 2025 • 26 mins
Episode 8: How to Quote an Electrical Job with Alex Hulme
Pricing electrical work isn’t just about throwing out a number—it’s about accuracy, profitability, and making sure you’re not selling yourself short. In this episode, host Alex Hulme gives a candid, no-nonsense take on how he approaches quoting, packed with practical advice you can put into action straight away.
What You’ll Learn :
⚡ What information you need
📋 Getting material pricing from the suppliers
💡 How to structure a quote
🔍 Tips and tricks so you don't make the same mistakes I have
This episode is full of gems that will help you refine your quoting process, charge what you're worth, and ultimately, grow your business.
About the Host:
With 20 years in the electrical industry, Alex Hulme has worked as an electrician, project manager, estimator, and even as the director of a successful electrical business. He knows first-hand the challenges of pricing jobs effectively and shares real-world strategies to help tradies quote smarter and win more work.
🎧 Tune in now and level up your quoting game!
#ThePuzzleFactory #NZElectrician #ElectricalQuotes #TradeBusiness #SparkyLife
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:11):
We are again though. I'm not doing it this like, no,
I tell you what. Yeah.
Welcome to the Puzzle Factory. You guys, Yeah.
He's been here before. Yeah.
Yeah, I know. Yeah.
We'll light you off this this week.
How's your week been mate? Pretty, pretty busy, yeah, yeah,
it's things are rolling at the minute.
It's really good, but yeah, there's shit coming in from
bloody all angles at. The left, right, centre and I,
(00:31):
it's an interesting one out there, just talking to loads of
loads of members, loads of sparkies and suppliers and the
industry is doing all kinds of weird things at the moment.
So some people are booming, someare battling, some are, you
know, somewhere in between and, and, but interesting.
There's no real sort of rhyme orreason at the moment.
Different things going on all over the show and as we always
(00:52):
do, we're just trying to help out as and where we're needed
and, and, and give these guys any step up we can, right?
One thing that we are getting isa lot of feedback on the potty.
Really stoked and thanks everyone that's either written
in or or send us a message or given us good support out there.
It's definitely doing its thing.So just in terms of content and,
(01:14):
and, and suggestions and people wanting to be part of it, really
positive and really encouraging well.
Let's be honest, we really appreciate it because if no
bugger was paying any attention to this or enjoying it, we
probably wouldn't be able to keep doing it.
No, that's the bottom line. It's touching a lot of people
(01:37):
around the place and, and it's not just targeted at Sparky's.
We're getting, you know, businesses, you know, other
business people that are trying to start their business or just,
it's just good stories. And, and all the trades
businesses, you know, they run reasonably similar.
They're facing the same issues. There's A and we, you know,
we're talking about the, the industry as a whole.
(01:59):
I tell you what hasn't been thatbusy for me this week.
Podcast guests. Yeah.
I've had a few, let's say drop off.
Drop off, yeah. So I had a couple of.
People I mean you're not bad intimidated I.
Know I know, but must be my height.
Something's going on, yeah. I don't know being discriminated
as. The height, they don't sit this
close to me, it makes them nervous.
Yeah, I don't know. But yeah, now in reality we've
(02:23):
had a couple of guests booked inthis week and for whatever
reason they've not been able to come.
Manly illness, to be honest, which is totally fair enough.
Fair. Cool.
Yep. So yeah, I've got no, I've got
no bloody mates this week so I'mgoing to treat them.
I'm going to treat them to. Just check.
Yeah, just me. So we'll see how that goes.
(02:46):
Just Bobby this week, but it's actually relevant.
Good timing. I think it's actually, you know,
and I think it's probably one ofa, you know, one of the first
times in in a series I think of sort of a specialist topic
around things that are really relevant to all tradies.
But obviously Sparky's totally specifically.
Totally. So I'm just going to do a short
(03:08):
one and yeah, some of this will be transferable into just
quoting in general, but that's what I'm going to talk about.
So something I get asked about more than anything else.
I'm always trying to help peopleout, teaching them how to quote.
And it's just how you approach it and the structure.
The pricing's up to you. Yeah, but they just don't know
(03:30):
where to start. Not everybody knows.
You know, there's certainly guysout there who know a hell of a
lot more about it than May. So I'm just going to go through
some practical tips that you canimplement and just basically a
step by step on how to approach these things.
Yeah, well, you've seen it from all angles and it's bloody good.
Obviously we've got systems in place to support that.
(03:53):
A lot of other companies out there don't have those those
systems in place. Yeah, well, let's be honest.
I mean, if you're not using Catapult, what are you?
Doing you're mad, but you know, but again, you know different
experience levels. You've, you've found your feet
doing it over a career of doing it, you know, and fortunate to
(04:13):
be in this sort of box seat to do it as a, as a role within
those companies that you've worked for specifically around
quoting and, and that as well. So looking forward to having a
listen. I'll probably learn a lot of
stuff for this as well, and it will certainly help a lot of the
troops out there. Beauty.
All right. Still, brother, I'll.
I'll see me in a minute. See.
You in a minute. All right.
Cheers. Right, we've all been there.
(04:39):
It's 2:00 in the morning. You wake up and absolutely shit
yourself because you realize that you've missed something out
of a quote, right? Or you've sent it, you've
knackered it up, whatever. What I'm getting at is one of
the biggest questions I get overand over again is for help on
(05:00):
quoting or guidance or how do I approach this or how do you do
it? OK, so today while we've got the
opportunity, I just wanted to hit this subject head on, not
talk alerted crap and woo woo about it.
But I'm just going to tell you how I approach it and, and, and
(05:20):
try and get this across to you in the most concise and
practical way I can without obviously boring the shit out of
you because it's just me. I'm actually not very funny at
all, particularly on my own. I just, you know, I can sort of
bounce off of the people and take the pest sometimes.
But yeah, you just got me today so I'll try and make it as
(05:44):
excuse me, I'm a bit thirsty. This is lovely.
Highly recommend. Anyway, that was a 7UP0 by the
way, for those who are just listening.
So yeah, let's get into it. So quoting we're going to start
(06:05):
with residential or quoting a house.
OK, So when you're quoting a house, very rare that you'll get
a set of electrical plans. You I'm talking about new build
here, just to clarify, you'll normally just get sent a crappy
set of architecturals and your builder or even the unusual just
(06:29):
be like, Oh yeah, yeah, you know, just just make it
function, you know, whatever suits talking about a regular
house there. If you go in high end, we'll
obviously have some more idea. But the first thing you need to
do when you quote in a house is ask all the questions, gather
all the information you're goingto need to put forward like a
(06:50):
fully comprehensive quote that'sgoing to meet the needs of the
customer, right. So that comes down to asking
questions. I've been tripped up with this
before, so I always start with trying to get an idea of what
the maximum demands going to be.So are you having on the floor
(07:10):
heating? What kind of HVAC system you're
having in there or air conditioning?
Are you going to have a pool with a hot water heat pump?
Are you going to have an induction hub?
All this kind of stuff. Obviously the size of the house,
right, because if you can nail that down early, you can go,
yeah, 63 amp single phase is sweet or not.
We're going to need Poly phase or three phase or 100 amp three
(07:31):
phase. As soon as we've figured that
out, obviously it's going to help us with our price, but we
can also get the customer to engage Vector early.
So you know, you've not won the job, you're getting into it.
And then you sort of mentioned Vector and they absolutely shit
a brick because they're in for another 60 grand to get a power
supply to the house. Once you've collated all this
(07:54):
information with a, with a Rezi quote, it should be reasonably
straight sailing. So you've kind of nailed them
down on the light fittings you want to use.
You don't need to worry too muchabout feature lighting at the
beginning. Are they put in LED strips?
And do they want sensors in the bathrooms?
Are they having tread lights, landscape lighting?
(08:15):
You've figured out the air con system, you've asked if they're
having a security alarm, CCTV, what's the data set up?
Are we just doing Wi-Fi? All these kind of things.
You know the deal, you've sold them on, on a switch gear
option, you know, all this stuff.
Once you've got that information, you know,
(08:37):
particularly if you're using catapult viz build, so you just,
you know, pulling symbols and kit sets onto plans and that's
building your price. You're away.
You think about the layout, you do a practical 1, you make sure
that you've included everything that you need.
You know, you've maybe gone to the suppliers for the best price
and you can get on on the best products that you can do for
(09:00):
their budget. And don't be scared about asking
for a budget either, because themore clarity you've got between
you and the client, the better. So then it's pretty straight
sailing and the way you're goingto lay out a house generally for
me is pretty simple. You're going to have ground
floor power, which is going to have your power plant on,
(09:20):
probably your kitchen power, allthat sort of stuff.
This is where you're going to want to put all the
miscellaneous costs, incoming mains and duct, CAT6 and conduit
for your incoming fiber, site visits, test and Coc inspection
charges, all this sort of stuff.That's where I generally put it.
(09:41):
Then, you know, I have maybe first floor power.
OK, that's just going to be a power plant for the first floor,
easy as then you're going to move on to your lighting plan.
Again, your power plan just going back slightly.
I would recommend that includes all your data and TV as well if
if they're having that and your switchboards on there, your
daddy cabinets on there, blah, blah, blah.
(10:03):
Once you get on to lighting, same thing again, ground floor
lighting, first floor lighting, maybe a landscape lighting, you
know, whatever they want. And then in this, you just got
to remember you, you know, you put in heated tower rails on
your power or your lighting, you've got all your extractor
fans, you have an LED strip in there, all the rest of it, all
(10:24):
your sensors. Do you need trade sales for your
outside lighting? Thinking about all this stuff
with a resi job. Once you've got the information,
presuming you've got some knowledge on quoting, which I'd
hope if not, get get in touch and we'll hopefully get you
started. Yeah, from that you just go in
through the process, don't just because it's a ready job.
(10:47):
Don't forget to put your inclusions and exclusions in
where you, you know, put in a clear picture of what you've
allowed for in writing so you can't come on stock.
You know, we've we've all had that one where they've missed,
you've missed an inclusion or anexclusion and it's cost you
another 10 grand. So you've worked for free, you
know, so we don't want that. I guess the, the bulk of this is
(11:10):
going to be more about the commercial and maybe tenders
stage of quoting electrical jobs.
Some of this will be transferable to other trades and
stuff, but I'm talking specifically electrical.
So a lot of the times when I getquestions, guys have kind of
fumble through, been taught or figured out how to quote a resi
(11:30):
job and they're getting through fine, the back costs in the jobs
and they're making money. And then, you know, inevitably
at some point they're going to get the chance to quote a
commercial job. And this is where people tend to
come on stock if they've never worked in that space because
they're big, they're engineered electrical drawings from an
(11:52):
electrical engineer and you get a heap of documentation and
information thrown at you. And I think it just scares the
pants off people and they don't know where to start.
So obviously I don't talk about pricing or what you should
charge with anybody. What I do talk about is how to
structure it, the stages you're going to go through and how to
(12:15):
make it more manageable. So kind of the same when you get
a invitation to quote a commercial job or, or, or tender
a commercial job, the first thing is the information.
So you're going to look at what they've sent you and does that
tick all the boxes for you to give them a thorough,
(12:37):
comprehensive quote? So first one is have you got
engineered electrical plans? Do you have an electrical
specification? Do you have a fire report?
So you know, if you put in fire rating requirements in there, do
you have an emergency lighting design report PS1?
(12:59):
All these are the things that you need to think about.
You're also probably going to want the mechanical plum pack
with spec and the hydraulic one because you're definitely going
to be providing power supplies and stuff for them guys.
And you got to sift through all this information to find out why
or or what you need to provide. So otherwise you come on stock,
it turns nasty and then you and the client have have a bad
(13:23):
experience, which is not the aimof the game, obviously.
Excuse me, I'm patched, right. So once you've got all this
information through, you know, have a quick sift through it,
say what's what, you know, save it all to your files in a real
clear and concise way so you canfind everything.
(13:46):
First thing you need to do then is all the bulk products that
you're going to supply and get aspecific quote for from
contracts pricing, you know whatever they call it, project
pricing at your supplier, hopefully using Jay Russell's
the the big red door. So you got to get this off for
(14:09):
pricing as soon as possible because a lot of these quotes or
tenders will have a real quick turn around.
And the last thing you want is you've done all your bet and
you're still waiting for productsupply pricing.
So first thing you're going to get your plans plans, you're
going to do take offs. So this is where you're counting
(14:29):
each different type of light fitting.
You're going to want to measure all your mains and sub mains
runs with a scale ruler off the plans.
Ductings worth measuring and getting a price on cable tray
well worth getting a price on, you know, from contracts because
they're all booked by items thatyou'll probably get a pretty
(14:50):
good discount on if you ask for it.
So and, and not to mention commercial jobs, normally a
custom built switchboard. So you're going to want your
distribution board schedule going off as well with, with the
spec as well and any schematics so the manufacturer can say what
the pricing to build. So get all that gone.
(15:11):
As soon as that's gone, you, youmay have to ring them every day
just to remind them that you're in a rush.
But I wouldn't just give them a deadline.
Send it off. Generally make the deadline, you
want the pricing back a few daysbefore you need to have it out.
So you've got time to check it and then put it and everything
that bit's done, right. So we've done information and
(15:32):
then we've done contracts pricing for you, for your
product. OK.
Next thing we're going to know is we're going to structure our
quote. The way we're going to do that
is the first thing you've got todo is go and have a look in the
electrical specification. The best friend in the spec is
(15:54):
control F on APDF and then you can search keywords in that.
All right, So you might be searching you, you might have a
look through it and you might besearching, what am I trying to
think of here? Scope.
So scope of works will give you a good indication of how they
(16:15):
want laying things out. Or you might have a schedule of
quantities in there where the QSis asking you to break the price
down in a really specific way. If you've got that information
then try and work to that as best you can because that's how
they're expecting to receive it and you'll get brownie points
with them. Feel free to give them a ring
(16:35):
and ask as well. If not, which is often times the
case or them not specified. The way I like to structure a
quote is almost like a tray. So you're going to start at the
roots, which is essentially the power supply on the road, and
you're going to work out to the leaves, which are the lights,
PowerPoint switches, whatever, right?
(16:58):
So for me, if I've got my choiceon structure, I'm going to be
doing basically incoming services.
Then I'm going to be doing main switchboard and distribution
boards. Then I'll be doing sub mains,
data runs, fiber, backbone, all that sort of stuff.
(17:19):
Then from there, let's just say for argument's sake it's a
apartment building. I'm probably going to go work
from the bottom up again. So I'm going to be going
basement, car park power, level 1, community power, level 2,
community power, Level 3, community power, whatever it is.
Same with lighting, basement carpark lighting, you know, level 1
(17:44):
lighting, etcetera. And then you're going to do the
same with the apartments. So with the apartments, the
normally in types, so A to a or one to 10 or whatever.
So you know, apartment type 1 price it lighting and power.
There's ten of them done apartment type 2 bang.
And and this is how you're goingto work through it in a
(18:06):
structure. And then it's really clear for
everyone involved and you can almost follow it through
chronologically as the job goes,right.
And then just the spec, the spec, the spec.
This is what kind of scares the shit out of people because
you've got, you know, 120 page specification and we can kind of
(18:28):
see that a lot of it's just copyand paste, but you don't know,
you know, you can't have to adhere to this to the letter.
And the way to do it is I've gotlike a whole library of keywords
that are search, which are basically all things that I've
been tripped up on in the past and messed.
So for example, you'll be searching, you know, you can
(18:51):
find out what switch gears spectin there generally, you know,
how many cables they're allowingon a catenary on that job.
What are they expecting for seismic rating?
You know, you might search lighting controls in there and
logo Oh, you need to contact intelligent environments or one
of these other guys. They're going to supply the gear
and do the programming for the BMS on the lighting control.
(19:16):
You know, search seismic rating,search fire rating, search PC.
Some, a lot of the time it'll say in that you must allow two
ground for the electrical engineers to come and inspect
your work. You miss it, out they go.
I don't give a fuck. You're still paying for it and
then you're in a shit sandwich. You know what else you're going
(19:40):
to look heavily into? Hydraulic services and
mechanical services because you're going to be doing some
work for them. You know what I mean?
Is, is the data fiber part of the main contract or is that a
separate plan with a separate spec?
Am I quoting, am I not what you know, search security, search
(20:02):
access control, what systems do they want, what guidelines are
there around it? So you'll kind of find your way
with this, but Control F is yourbest mate, either on a plan pack
or in the spec, because alongside the spec you're also
having to. Read every note on every plan as
(20:24):
well. In general is is a pretty good
idea because you'll find stuff in there and it's just randomly
there and it's nowhere else. Because for some reason they'd
like to make this as difficult as humanly possible for us.
So, you know, just trying to clear that up, right?
Another process that you'll go through with commercial tenders,
(20:47):
generally most of these medium to bigger size projects will go
out for tender like two or threetimes.
So they put out a work in progress design that and then
you're almost playing this game with them where you're trying to
build a price and you send in arrow fires and requests for
information, right? And they respond to you with
(21:10):
NTTS notice to tenderers answersbasically.
And this is the game that you plan to get information anyway.
Then first round of pricing, you'll normally put it in and
we'll go, it's all too expensive.
And then they'll come out for itagain and they want alternative
light fittings, etcetera, anywhere they can basically want
(21:31):
cost savings, right? So you might go through this two
or three times, but again, it, it, the guts of quoting comes
down to collating all the information.
Obviously you've then got to input it correctly, which is on
you, but it's the collection of all this information and don't
just go, oh, I don't know, bugger it.
You know, it's, it's good to keep that because part of the
(21:53):
sales side of this, as well as opening those conversations,
getting your head right in the job and, and, and, and kind of
building and building a relationship with the Q s s,
which is easier said than done because they're normally wet
wipes in my sorry, sorry if there are any Q s s listening.
Just just my experience normally, normally a dry lunch,
(22:15):
Yeah. And anyway, let's say you've got
all your information, you've putall your price together.
So we've now collated information we've sent off for
all our pricing from the wholesalers.
We've structured the quote, we've put all our plans in and
everything. We've actually populated the
(22:38):
quote using all the information that we've got and going through
the spec and everything. We're, we're pretty happy on the
price. We, we're kind of there.
The, the, this is a huge 1 inclusions and exclusions or
tags. This is our opportunity to in
(22:59):
writing normally in bullet points, you are going to outline
exactly what you've allowed for and exactly what you've not.
And this is, you know, you making it safe for yourself so
that you know, and you're just providing clarity.
But if they ever come and go, you should have allowed for
(23:21):
that. And you go, well, I've actually
excluded it there. You're pretty safe.
OK, so 1 tip I would give you with inclusions and exclusions
is try and be a lot more inclusion heavy than exclusion
heavy. So you know, there's kind of
(23:42):
tricks to this. So it's turning negatives into
positives. So instead of saying we have not
allowed to supply and install extract fans would go allowance
has been made for a power supplyonly for extraction fans and
(24:03):
then you flip it on its head. OK, so just a tip.
I think it comes across a bit more favourably with QSS, you
know, and you can take this as far as you want.
You can tell them how many PowerPoints you've allowed in
the whole building. You know, you can put specific,
you know, things you'd tag is notrenching and backfilling
because you're not going to be digging your own trenches.
(24:24):
You know, we've not allowed for cutting concrete, all these kind
of things. All right.
And then you'll probably have some really specific ones per
job. And a lot of the time some of
the exclusions will be stuff where you just don't have the
information on it yet, but you still want to take it out just
in case. Cover yourself.
(24:44):
All right, Again, on the more salesy relationship side of
things, you don't know. You quote, you've checked it.
Sleep on it before you send it. Check it over again the next day
and then send it off. Give it a few days and follow it
up. Ring the QS.
Have you received my price? How's it looking?
(25:08):
Oh, I've not looked at it yet. OK.
Do you mind if I give you a callback next week?
Yeah, no problem. Give them a call back next week.
How are we looking? Did my numbers fit your numbers?
Can ioffer you any cost savings or alternative products
anywhere? Start trying to work with them.
Build that trust with them that you're on their team, you know,
(25:29):
and just yet, you know. Don't send it off and then just
forget about it. So look, I'll, I'll probably do
some more of these down the lines on just different areas of
the kind of stuff we do every day.
Just just if I can help clear itup all at all.
But yeah, if if you have been listening to this just on a
(25:52):
personal level, I really appreciate it.
I kind of just decided to do this because I thought it was a
really good thing for us to do and I thought it might help
people and, and entertain you while you're on the tools and
stuff. But if, if, if you want to hear
any other stuff, if you've got feedback off what, on what we've
done or you just like it, leave us a comment, Give us a lie,
(26:16):
give us a follow. And it just means we can keep
doing this. We'll probably be able to keep
well, I hope we'll be getting better at it and stuff.
But yeah, let me know. Keep in touch.
Thanks for listening. And yeah, I think all that
remains to be said is stay safe out there, keep puzzling, and
(26:38):
we'll see you next week for another go.
We are again though. I'm not doing it this like, no,
I tell you what. Yeah.
Welcome to the Puzzle Factory. You guys, Yeah.
He's been here before. Yeah.
Yeah, I know. Yeah.
We'll light you off this this week.
How's your week been mate? Pretty, pretty busy, yeah, yeah,
it's things are rolling at the minute.
It's really good, but yeah, there's shit coming in from
bloody all angles at. The left, right, centre and I,
(00:31):
it's an interesting one out there, just talking to loads of
loads of members, loads of sparkies and suppliers and the
industry is doing all kinds of weird things at the moment.
So some people are booming, someare battling, some are, you
know, somewhere in between and, and, but interesting.
There's no real sort of rhyme orreason at the moment.
Different things going on all over the show and as we always
(00:52):
do, we're just trying to help out as and where we're needed
and, and, and give these guys any step up we can, right?
One thing that we are getting isa lot of feedback on the potty.
Really stoked and thanks everyone that's either written
in or or send us a message or given us good support out there.
It's definitely doing its thing.So just in terms of content and,
(01:14):
and, and suggestions and people wanting to be part of it, really
positive and really encouraging well.
Let's be honest, we really appreciate it because if no
bugger was paying any attention to this or enjoying it, we
probably wouldn't be able to keep doing it.
No, that's the bottom line. It's touching a lot of people
(01:37):
around the place and, and it's not just targeted at Sparky's.
We're getting, you know, businesses, you know, other
business people that are trying to start their business or just,
it's just good stories. And, and all the trades
businesses, you know, they run reasonably similar.
They're facing the same issues. There's A and we, you know,
we're talking about the, the industry as a whole.
(01:59):
I tell you what hasn't been thatbusy for me this week.
Podcast guests. Yeah.
I've had a few, let's say drop off.
Drop off, yeah. So I had a couple of.
People I mean you're not bad intimidated I.
Know I know, but must be my height.
Something's going on, yeah. I don't know being discriminated
as. The height, they don't sit this
close to me, it makes them nervous.
Yeah, I don't know. But yeah, now in reality we've
(02:23):
had a couple of guests booked inthis week and for whatever
reason they've not been able to come.
Manly illness, to be honest, which is totally fair enough.
Fair. Cool.
Yep. So yeah, I've got no, I've got
no bloody mates this week so I'mgoing to treat them.
I'm going to treat them to. Just check.
Yeah, just me. So we'll see how that goes.
(02:46):
Just Bobby this week, but it's actually relevant.
Good timing. I think it's actually, you know,
and I think it's probably one ofa, you know, one of the first
times in in a series I think of sort of a specialist topic
around things that are really relevant to all tradies.
But obviously Sparky's totally specifically.
Totally. So I'm just going to do a short
(03:08):
one and yeah, some of this will be transferable into just
quoting in general, but that's what I'm going to talk about.
So something I get asked about more than anything else.
I'm always trying to help peopleout, teaching them how to quote.
And it's just how you approach it and the structure.
The pricing's up to you. Yeah, but they just don't know
(03:30):
where to start. Not everybody knows.
You know, there's certainly guysout there who know a hell of a
lot more about it than May. So I'm just going to go through
some practical tips that you canimplement and just basically a
step by step on how to approach these things.
Yeah, well, you've seen it from all angles and it's bloody good.
Obviously we've got systems in place to support that.
(03:53):
A lot of other companies out there don't have those those
systems in place. Yeah, well, let's be honest.
I mean, if you're not using Catapult, what are you?
Doing you're mad, but you know, but again, you know different
experience levels. You've, you've found your feet
doing it over a career of doing it, you know, and fortunate to
(04:13):
be in this sort of box seat to do it as a, as a role within
those companies that you've worked for specifically around
quoting and, and that as well. So looking forward to having a
listen. I'll probably learn a lot of
stuff for this as well, and it will certainly help a lot of the
troops out there. Beauty.
All right. Still, brother, I'll.
I'll see me in a minute. See.
You in a minute. All right.
Cheers. Right, we've all been there.
(04:39):
It's 2:00 in the morning. You wake up and absolutely shit
yourself because you realize that you've missed something out
of a quote, right? Or you've sent it, you've
knackered it up, whatever. What I'm getting at is one of
the biggest questions I get overand over again is for help on
(05:00):
quoting or guidance or how do I approach this or how do you do
it? OK, so today while we've got the
opportunity, I just wanted to hit this subject head on, not
talk alerted crap and woo woo about it.
But I'm just going to tell you how I approach it and, and, and
(05:20):
try and get this across to you in the most concise and
practical way I can without obviously boring the shit out of
you because it's just me. I'm actually not very funny at
all, particularly on my own. I just, you know, I can sort of
bounce off of the people and take the pest sometimes.
But yeah, you just got me today so I'll try and make it as
(05:44):
excuse me, I'm a bit thirsty. This is lovely.
Highly recommend. Anyway, that was a 7UP0 by the
way, for those who are just listening.
So yeah, let's get into it. So quoting we're going to start
(06:05):
with residential or quoting a house.
OK, So when you're quoting a house, very rare that you'll get
a set of electrical plans. You I'm talking about new build
here, just to clarify, you'll normally just get sent a crappy
set of architecturals and your builder or even the unusual just
(06:29):
be like, Oh yeah, yeah, you know, just just make it
function, you know, whatever suits talking about a regular
house there. If you go in high end, we'll
obviously have some more idea. But the first thing you need to
do when you quote in a house is ask all the questions, gather
all the information you're goingto need to put forward like a
(06:50):
fully comprehensive quote that'sgoing to meet the needs of the
customer, right. So that comes down to asking
questions. I've been tripped up with this
before, so I always start with trying to get an idea of what
the maximum demands going to be.So are you having on the floor
(07:10):
heating? What kind of HVAC system you're
having in there or air conditioning?
Are you going to have a pool with a hot water heat pump?
Are you going to have an induction hub?
All this kind of stuff. Obviously the size of the house,
right, because if you can nail that down early, you can go,
yeah, 63 amp single phase is sweet or not.
We're going to need Poly phase or three phase or 100 amp three
(07:31):
phase. As soon as we've figured that
out, obviously it's going to help us with our price, but we
can also get the customer to engage Vector early.
So you know, you've not won the job, you're getting into it.
And then you sort of mentioned Vector and they absolutely shit
a brick because they're in for another 60 grand to get a power
supply to the house. Once you've collated all this
(07:54):
information with a, with a Rezi quote, it should be reasonably
straight sailing. So you've kind of nailed them
down on the light fittings you want to use.
You don't need to worry too muchabout feature lighting at the
beginning. Are they put in LED strips?
And do they want sensors in the bathrooms?
Are they having tread lights, landscape lighting?
(08:15):
You've figured out the air con system, you've asked if they're
having a security alarm, CCTV, what's the data set up?
Are we just doing Wi-Fi? All these kind of things.
You know the deal, you've sold them on, on a switch gear
option, you know, all this stuff.
Once you've got that information, you know,
(08:37):
particularly if you're using catapult viz build, so you just,
you know, pulling symbols and kit sets onto plans and that's
building your price. You're away.
You think about the layout, you do a practical 1, you make sure
that you've included everything that you need.
You know, you've maybe gone to the suppliers for the best price
and you can get on on the best products that you can do for
(09:00):
their budget. And don't be scared about asking
for a budget either, because themore clarity you've got between
you and the client, the better. So then it's pretty straight
sailing and the way you're goingto lay out a house generally for
me is pretty simple. You're going to have ground
floor power, which is going to have your power plant on,
(09:20):
probably your kitchen power, allthat sort of stuff.
This is where you're going to want to put all the
miscellaneous costs, incoming mains and duct, CAT6 and conduit
for your incoming fiber, site visits, test and Coc inspection
charges, all this sort of stuff.That's where I generally put it.
(09:41):
Then, you know, I have maybe first floor power.
OK, that's just going to be a power plant for the first floor,
easy as then you're going to move on to your lighting plan.
Again, your power plan just going back slightly.
I would recommend that includes all your data and TV as well if
if they're having that and your switchboards on there, your
daddy cabinets on there, blah, blah, blah.
(10:03):
Once you get on to lighting, same thing again, ground floor
lighting, first floor lighting, maybe a landscape lighting, you
know, whatever they want. And then in this, you just got
to remember you, you know, you put in heated tower rails on
your power or your lighting, you've got all your extractor
fans, you have an LED strip in there, all the rest of it, all
(10:24):
your sensors. Do you need trade sales for your
outside lighting? Thinking about all this stuff
with a resi job. Once you've got the information,
presuming you've got some knowledge on quoting, which I'd
hope if not, get get in touch and we'll hopefully get you
started. Yeah, from that you just go in
through the process, don't just because it's a ready job.
(10:47):
Don't forget to put your inclusions and exclusions in
where you, you know, put in a clear picture of what you've
allowed for in writing so you can't come on stock.
You know, we've we've all had that one where they've missed,
you've missed an inclusion or anexclusion and it's cost you
another 10 grand. So you've worked for free, you
know, so we don't want that. I guess the, the bulk of this is
(11:10):
going to be more about the commercial and maybe tenders
stage of quoting electrical jobs.
Some of this will be transferable to other trades and
stuff, but I'm talking specifically electrical.
So a lot of the times when I getquestions, guys have kind of
fumble through, been taught or figured out how to quote a resi
(11:30):
job and they're getting through fine, the back costs in the jobs
and they're making money. And then, you know, inevitably
at some point they're going to get the chance to quote a
commercial job. And this is where people tend to
come on stock if they've never worked in that space because
they're big, they're engineered electrical drawings from an
(11:52):
electrical engineer and you get a heap of documentation and
information thrown at you. And I think it just scares the
pants off people and they don't know where to start.
So obviously I don't talk about pricing or what you should
charge with anybody. What I do talk about is how to
structure it, the stages you're going to go through and how to
(12:15):
make it more manageable. So kind of the same when you get
a invitation to quote a commercial job or, or, or tender
a commercial job, the first thing is the information.
So you're going to look at what they've sent you and does that
tick all the boxes for you to give them a thorough,
(12:37):
comprehensive quote? So first one is have you got
engineered electrical plans? Do you have an electrical
specification? Do you have a fire report?
So you know, if you put in fire rating requirements in there, do
you have an emergency lighting design report PS1?
(12:59):
All these are the things that you need to think about.
You're also probably going to want the mechanical plum pack
with spec and the hydraulic one because you're definitely going
to be providing power supplies and stuff for them guys.
And you got to sift through all this information to find out why
or or what you need to provide. So otherwise you come on stock,
it turns nasty and then you and the client have have a bad
(13:23):
experience, which is not the aimof the game, obviously.
Excuse me, I'm patched, right. So once you've got all this
information through, you know, have a quick sift through it,
say what's what, you know, save it all to your files in a real
clear and concise way so you canfind everything.
(13:46):
First thing you need to do then is all the bulk products that
you're going to supply and get aspecific quote for from
contracts pricing, you know whatever they call it, project
pricing at your supplier, hopefully using Jay Russell's
the the big red door. So you got to get this off for
(14:09):
pricing as soon as possible because a lot of these quotes or
tenders will have a real quick turn around.
And the last thing you want is you've done all your bet and
you're still waiting for productsupply pricing.
So first thing you're going to get your plans plans, you're
going to do take offs. So this is where you're counting
(14:29):
each different type of light fitting.
You're going to want to measure all your mains and sub mains
runs with a scale ruler off the plans.
Ductings worth measuring and getting a price on cable tray
well worth getting a price on, you know, from contracts because
they're all booked by items thatyou'll probably get a pretty
(14:50):
good discount on if you ask for it.
So and, and not to mention commercial jobs, normally a
custom built switchboard. So you're going to want your
distribution board schedule going off as well with, with the
spec as well and any schematics so the manufacturer can say what
the pricing to build. So get all that gone.
(15:11):
As soon as that's gone, you, youmay have to ring them every day
just to remind them that you're in a rush.
But I wouldn't just give them a deadline.
Send it off. Generally make the deadline, you
want the pricing back a few daysbefore you need to have it out.
So you've got time to check it and then put it and everything
that bit's done, right. So we've done information and
(15:32):
then we've done contracts pricing for you, for your
product. OK.
Next thing we're going to know is we're going to structure our
quote. The way we're going to do that
is the first thing you've got todo is go and have a look in the
electrical specification. The best friend in the spec is
(15:54):
control F on APDF and then you can search keywords in that.
All right, So you might be searching you, you might have a
look through it and you might besearching, what am I trying to
think of here? Scope.
So scope of works will give you a good indication of how they
(16:15):
want laying things out. Or you might have a schedule of
quantities in there where the QSis asking you to break the price
down in a really specific way. If you've got that information
then try and work to that as best you can because that's how
they're expecting to receive it and you'll get brownie points
with them. Feel free to give them a ring
(16:35):
and ask as well. If not, which is often times the
case or them not specified. The way I like to structure a
quote is almost like a tray. So you're going to start at the
roots, which is essentially the power supply on the road, and
you're going to work out to the leaves, which are the lights,
PowerPoint switches, whatever, right?
(16:58):
So for me, if I've got my choiceon structure, I'm going to be
doing basically incoming services.
Then I'm going to be doing main switchboard and distribution
boards. Then I'll be doing sub mains,
data runs, fiber, backbone, all that sort of stuff.
(17:19):
Then from there, let's just say for argument's sake it's a
apartment building. I'm probably going to go work
from the bottom up again. So I'm going to be going
basement, car park power, level 1, community power, level 2,
community power, Level 3, community power, whatever it is.
Same with lighting, basement carpark lighting, you know, level 1
(17:44):
lighting, etcetera. And then you're going to do the
same with the apartments. So with the apartments, the
normally in types, so A to a or one to 10 or whatever.
So you know, apartment type 1 price it lighting and power.
There's ten of them done apartment type 2 bang.
And and this is how you're goingto work through it in a
(18:06):
structure. And then it's really clear for
everyone involved and you can almost follow it through
chronologically as the job goes,right.
And then just the spec, the spec, the spec.
This is what kind of scares the shit out of people because
you've got, you know, 120 page specification and we can kind of
(18:28):
see that a lot of it's just copyand paste, but you don't know,
you know, you can't have to adhere to this to the letter.
And the way to do it is I've gotlike a whole library of keywords
that are search, which are basically all things that I've
been tripped up on in the past and messed.
So for example, you'll be searching, you know, you can
(18:51):
find out what switch gears spectin there generally, you know,
how many cables they're allowingon a catenary on that job.
What are they expecting for seismic rating?
You know, you might search lighting controls in there and
logo Oh, you need to contact intelligent environments or one
of these other guys. They're going to supply the gear
and do the programming for the BMS on the lighting control.
(19:16):
You know, search seismic rating,search fire rating, search PC.
Some, a lot of the time it'll say in that you must allow two
ground for the electrical engineers to come and inspect
your work. You miss it, out they go.
I don't give a fuck. You're still paying for it and
then you're in a shit sandwich. You know what else you're going
(19:40):
to look heavily into? Hydraulic services and
mechanical services because you're going to be doing some
work for them. You know what I mean?
Is, is the data fiber part of the main contract or is that a
separate plan with a separate spec?
Am I quoting, am I not what you know, search security, search
(20:02):
access control, what systems do they want, what guidelines are
there around it? So you'll kind of find your way
with this, but Control F is yourbest mate, either on a plan pack
or in the spec, because alongside the spec you're also
having to. Read every note on every plan as
(20:24):
well. In general is is a pretty good
idea because you'll find stuff in there and it's just randomly
there and it's nowhere else. Because for some reason they'd
like to make this as difficult as humanly possible for us.
So, you know, just trying to clear that up, right?
Another process that you'll go through with commercial tenders,
(20:47):
generally most of these medium to bigger size projects will go
out for tender like two or threetimes.
So they put out a work in progress design that and then
you're almost playing this game with them where you're trying to
build a price and you send in arrow fires and requests for
information, right? And they respond to you with
(21:10):
NTTS notice to tenderers answersbasically.
And this is the game that you plan to get information anyway.
Then first round of pricing, you'll normally put it in and
we'll go, it's all too expensive.
And then they'll come out for itagain and they want alternative
light fittings, etcetera, anywhere they can basically want
(21:31):
cost savings, right? So you might go through this two
or three times, but again, it, it, the guts of quoting comes
down to collating all the information.
Obviously you've then got to input it correctly, which is on
you, but it's the collection of all this information and don't
just go, oh, I don't know, bugger it.
You know, it's, it's good to keep that because part of the
(21:53):
sales side of this, as well as opening those conversations,
getting your head right in the job and, and, and, and kind of
building and building a relationship with the Q s s,
which is easier said than done because they're normally wet
wipes in my sorry, sorry if there are any Q s s listening.
Just just my experience normally, normally a dry lunch,
(22:15):
Yeah. And anyway, let's say you've got
all your information, you've putall your price together.
So we've now collated information we've sent off for
all our pricing from the wholesalers.
We've structured the quote, we've put all our plans in and
everything. We've actually populated the
(22:38):
quote using all the information that we've got and going through
the spec and everything. We're, we're pretty happy on the
price. We, we're kind of there.
The, the, this is a huge 1 inclusions and exclusions or
tags. This is our opportunity to in
(22:59):
writing normally in bullet points, you are going to outline
exactly what you've allowed for and exactly what you've not.
And this is, you know, you making it safe for yourself so
that you know, and you're just providing clarity.
But if they ever come and go, you should have allowed for
(23:21):
that. And you go, well, I've actually
excluded it there. You're pretty safe.
OK, so 1 tip I would give you with inclusions and exclusions
is try and be a lot more inclusion heavy than exclusion
heavy. So you know, there's kind of
(23:42):
tricks to this. So it's turning negatives into
positives. So instead of saying we have not
allowed to supply and install extract fans would go allowance
has been made for a power supplyonly for extraction fans and
(24:03):
then you flip it on its head. OK, so just a tip.
I think it comes across a bit more favourably with QSS, you
know, and you can take this as far as you want.
You can tell them how many PowerPoints you've allowed in
the whole building. You know, you can put specific,
you know, things you'd tag is notrenching and backfilling
because you're not going to be digging your own trenches.
(24:24):
You know, we've not allowed for cutting concrete, all these kind
of things. All right.
And then you'll probably have some really specific ones per
job. And a lot of the time some of
the exclusions will be stuff where you just don't have the
information on it yet, but you still want to take it out just
in case. Cover yourself.
(24:44):
All right, Again, on the more salesy relationship side of
things, you don't know. You quote, you've checked it.
Sleep on it before you send it. Check it over again the next day
and then send it off. Give it a few days and follow it
up. Ring the QS.
Have you received my price? How's it looking?
(25:08):
Oh, I've not looked at it yet. OK.
Do you mind if I give you a callback next week?
Yeah, no problem. Give them a call back next week.
How are we looking? Did my numbers fit your numbers?
Can ioffer you any cost savings or alternative products
anywhere? Start trying to work with them.
Build that trust with them that you're on their team, you know,
(25:29):
and just yet, you know. Don't send it off and then just
forget about it. So look, I'll, I'll probably do
some more of these down the lines on just different areas of
the kind of stuff we do every day.
Just just if I can help clear itup all at all.
But yeah, if if you have been listening to this just on a
(25:52):
personal level, I really appreciate it.
I kind of just decided to do this because I thought it was a
really good thing for us to do and I thought it might help
people and, and entertain you while you're on the tools and
stuff. But if, if, if you want to hear
any other stuff, if you've got feedback off what, on what we've
done or you just like it, leave us a comment, Give us a lie,
(26:16):
give us a follow. And it just means we can keep
doing this. We'll probably be able to keep
well, I hope we'll be getting better at it and stuff.
But yeah, let me know. Keep in touch.
Thanks for listening. And yeah, I think all that
remains to be said is stay safe out there, keep puzzling, and
(26:38):
we'll see you next week for another go.
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