Only if your a limited company though?

Joiner wrote on Nov 16^th, 2009, 9:00am:


My idea is to get listed building consent for the client. I fill out all the forms, do a design statement and a set of drawings plus site maps; all in triplicate. I liaise with the CO and act as agent until we have consent. Client pays me a fee and then he can take the drawings round to get other quotes if he wants. It doesn't really matter (too much) if I get to make and fit the window as I have been paid for my time thus far.

I wouldn't mind doing this full time, saves fitting windows in the rain

Just a slight digression but following the theft strand, on the website that shows crime by area, if you look around Worcester there is in the city a relatively high proportion of crime as you'd expect.  Looking further out into the surrounding countryside it all goes very quiet until you realise that there is a very large hotspot around Pirton. One guess as to what part of our community has a large number of residential sites there.  Could there be a connection?  Could there just perhaps be some truth in the commonly held believe that they are all thievin' barstewards?

The fact that you've had hits from so far afield is one of the problems of depending on the site to obtain work. I was getting enquiries from places (unlike yours they were all within the UK) that were well outside my radius of travel, which is 40 miles. It's one of the reasons I ditched the web site, servicing those enquiries was simply impossible, let alone impracticable. I never got one hit from within that working radius in over eighteen months, so in practical terms it might just as well not have been there.

I later learnt that, unless you're intending on mail order, it's possible to limit the coverage of your site to one with a less scattered profile. Cwatters will probably know how it's done because that advice was given on another forum we both frequent. Remember that Colin? (If I can find the relevent thread I'll post a link.)

And on the issue of LBC... Everything you mention were the "other issues" referred to in my earlier post. Good luck if you can get that kind of fee, but I (and others) do it as part of the service. The other consideration is that, in the competitive situation created by an associated application for grant funding, your involvement in the tendering process will create a conflict of interest. I HAVE had to decline requests to do ALL the work of obtaining LBC for the customer for this very reason, but agreeing to do the Design & Access Statement because that’s a ten minute job and can be emailed or faxed to the customer.

That's only a word to the wise. Where grants are concerned the funding will be based on the lowest quote. It's up to the customer who they appoint to the job because if that person isn't the cheapest the customer will still only receive funding based on the lowest quote. I've done a few grant-aided jobs where I've not been the cheapest, but the customer HAS been familiar with my work.

That's largely academic now, with the loss of so many grant schemes (Shropshire was one of the most generous), but there are still English Heritage match-funding schemes in the offing, in which case there needs to be three quotes if the job is over £5,000, two if under that. What often happens is the customer will have been given those figures by the CO and advised to get the quotes first before doing anything else. From the customer’s perspective the choice of tradesman will have been made at that point. If it’s you, then when they get back to you to confirm you as their choice is when they either ask you to handle the LBC or you make the offer, either way it makes your life easier to deal direct with the CO. You’ll be producing the detailed joinery drawings at this point anyway, the rest is just filling in forms.

woodsmith wrote on Nov 16^th, 2009, 7:24pm:
Re: WHOIS - Can you not suppress the address? I know you can if not using it for trade. It might also be possible to change the registered address to an accommodation address.

Net step is a google ranking.

Quote:


Thanks I'll have a look and see, although we are thinking of going limited so then we will have to put the address on anyway.

Yeah I've noticed that A LOT.

Nice website Keith, a good way to showcase your expertise and work .

One small pedantic thing   on the joinery page, the understair cupboard picture needs a pronoun ,"that" or "which" in the description.  Sorry but I tend to notice these things which makes me a sad git I know

As a side point, in the external joinery, the garden shed, what is "triple layer wall construction"?

Thanks