will i wont i???

Re: will i wont i???

hi,
i have worked on my own for 18 years and every day i regret doing it, i work longer hours and make less money than any of my friends you get no paid holidays, no pension unless you pay for it, no guaranteed wage at the end of the month, no sick pay.
i am working longer hours, covering a bigger area, doing more types of appliances and still making the same money i did 10 years ago.
i am under constant stress mountains of paperwork, the mobile phone rings from 8 in the morning to 11 at night including weekends.
i wish i could find a job with a wage that when you clock off you are finished not constantly thinking of ordering parts, making phone calls etc.
i wish i had a wage coming in instead of getting caught out with nonpayers,bounced cheques paying income tax twice a year.

i was going to finish with a positive “sometimes people are in when they say they will be in, and sometimes they have money”

Re: will i wont i???

I have worked on my own for almost 30 years. There are odd occasions when I regret it, but not that many. I don’t work any longer hours than when I was at Hotpoint except for working Saturday mornings every week. We used to do Saturday morning calls every third or fourth week at Hotpoint.

I earn more money than some of my friends and much less than others who possibly don’t work as hard for it, thats just the way it is, some of them hate every minute of their time at work, I certainly do not. I find that doing a variety of different machines a challenge to the old grey matter which at my age is fading fast and needs to be stimulated. 😉 it helps to keep me on my toes and the bottom line is that as I am self employed I can actually choose what I do or do not repair. I do make a decent living, not exceptional but comfortable.

I will admit that I do not take anything like enough holidays but that is entirely due to personal reasons and nothing at all to do with the job.

Pensions, sick pay, holiday pay etc do have to be considered but everyone has to pay for them in one way or another. 😉

I am not under constant stress,I have no mountains of paperwork, I do not give my mobile number to any customers and keep them at arms length in the evenings/weekends via my answerphone. Non payers are a PITA but in all honesty I have had less than 15 or 20 in thirty years and I have every one of them locked away in my memory bank. 😉

Even though I go out to my first call before 7.30 am every morning it is my choice to do so, I am not compelled by anyone other than myself. I know that if I wanted to take a day off or start an hour later I can do so without having to ask anyone else for permission, ( the fact that I never do is another matter altogether 🙂 )

Believe it or not I still enjoy driving, I like ‘fixing’ things, meeting loads of different people, some complete ass holes, some dirty & smelly but the vast majority, nice decent folk just trying to get along.

Being self employed is not an easy option, far from it but if you do make a success of it, even in a small way like I have you can look in the mirror and say “I bloody well did this, no one else”. 8)

Jim.

Re: will i wont i???

I’vebeen self employed for around 20 yrs, & i must admit i would find it seriously difficult to work for someone else now. The freedom to plan my own life is the biggest attraction, no question.

Sure, if you let people contact you 24hrs a day you WILL quickly go insane, if i’ve had a heavy day i think nothing of switching the phone off at 6pm, if i miss a few calls i’ll know nothing about it so who cares..

I think the one thing you never get used to is not knowing what youre gonna earn from one week to the other, a really quiet week does still get me down & anxious, though it always picks up again…..so far.. 😯

Basically Kevin, if you like a steady wage & have serious commitments then a fledgling appliance repair business may not be for you in the current economic climate, but if you can survive on a patchy income for a while & like a personal challenge….. go for it. :eeek: 😆

Re: will i wont i???

Hi Kevin.

Business was a bit slow for me too and when a firm I did a bit of sub contracting for asked me to come on board full time I took the job and now three months on I wish I’d done it years ago.

As there is no conflict of interest I still do some white goods work in my own time but I can afford to be a bit choosey 😉

They will start recruiting in Scotland in the coming weeks for an engineer in your area and although it is not white goods or domestic the experience you have should get you an interview.

Drop me a pm if you are interested and I will give you the contact details

Steve

Re: will i wont i???

i have been self-employed for around 3yrs
used to work for comet and national homecare b4 that
i now earn more do less hours and have no stress to speak of
can`t see myself ever working for someone again
if you advertise correctly
you should do fine (imho) 😀 😉 😀

Re: will i wont i???

I never cease to be amazed at how different people have different experiences. I have worked for myself since 1979, with about 15 years in white goods. Most of the time I am as happy as the day is long. I probably work abot 35 to 40 hors a week. My overheads are very low as I work from home. I paid for my house donkeys years ago when I was lorry driving. I rarely do more than 5 calls a day. I do the odd evening or weekend job if it suits me. I make a fair living. Get the odd rare non payer. Get the odd moaning customer [like the one today who complaind because I charge her £35 to extract coins from her pump. She said I was only in the house 10 minutes and was therefore on about £150/hour]
I would not dream of working for someone else, even if anybody would enploy me. Life`s real tradgedy is that when you are 18 you want everything and can afford nothing. When you can finally afford things, you no longer want them.

Re: will i wont i???

I think it would take someone very brave or with low commitments to start out now, I did 2 years ago and like expertcat am on the verge of jacking it in, really struggling & making far less than when i was employed, tough decisions ahead this year, i may well be out of it in the near future, really soul destroying after 14years of hard work!