TV repair shops

[Nickthedentist]

Originally Posted by dave walsh

Here in the South East I've found a traditional repairer outlet near Hasting but I won't identify him as he is often very crowded with work as it is and I wait for the limited times that he is open before going round [eg he tends to close from Xmas to March re the back log]

There was one in Ore when I lived in Rye 20 years ago. Really nice friendly chap with a shopful of old "treasure" which he'd happily let me rummage through and make an offer for anything I fancied. Lugging it back on the train wasn't fun though.

Still there amazingly, according to Google Street View!

[dave walsh]

He fits your description Nick but for security reasons I couldn't possibly say
I did mean to say it's no accident that those RF Boosters originated in Rammy with the Winter Hill TX located behind Holcombe Hill, which forms the western side of a deep Valley. They were very well made and sold quite widely [through PW] as the brothers told me at the time!

Dave

[HamishBoxer]

Interesting on the news today that stuff should be made to last longer and spares available to all.

Think I have just seen a pig flying overhead.

[HamishBoxer]

Looks like I have been beaten to it on another thread.

[martin.m]

I'm sure that anyone advertising a repair service for sound and vision equipment would be inundated with enquiries. Whether the goods were actually repairable and how much customers were prepared to pay for repairs would be a different story.

[evingar]

Originally Posted by martin.m

I'm sure that anyone advertising a repair service for sound and vision equipment would be inundated with enquiries. Whether the goods were actually repairable and how much customers were prepared to pay for repairs would be a different story.

Indeed !
I do part time power supply repair work for a company I used to work for full time. Our target clients are industrial and scientific equipment owners but we get a steady stream of enquires from people who want their PC power supply repaired. It is though impossible to offer a service for this equipment as you would barely be able to cover the cost of your parts and carriage, let alone labour.

The general public often seems completely detached from economic reality when it comes to the cost of repair services and expect people to work for an hourly rate that is a fraction of the rate they themselves would be willing to set their alarm clock for !

[G6Tanuki]

As Evingar says, the killer is the running-costs - mainly the 'people' ones.. To run a decent business you'd need to charge at *least* £50/hour.

Out of this you first have to pay your VAT, then the rent/business-rates/insurance/heating/lighting/phone/internet for your premises. Then your professional/public-liability insurance.

And pay bank-interest/accountant-fees.

Then you need to equip the premises with test-gear. Only after that can you start taking-on work.

Depending on how you then choose to pay yourself, you should expect to pay workers (including yourself) £25/hour (out of which they then have to pay income-tax/employees-national-insurance and make employee-contributions to a pension-scheme so they probably end up with about £15/hour in their bank-accounts).

As an employer remember _you_ also have to make Employer's national-insurance contributions and pension contributions for anyone you employ (including yourself!).

Want to have a van to collect/deliver stuff? That'll be £250/month to lease, plus the tax/insurance/fuel.

You may want to add something in to actually advertise your business... Only when you've covered these costs does your business start to turn a profit!

It gets expensive! Customers with a dead telly are likely to baulk at the idea of "£25 for me just to come out and look at it", if you then tell them it's probably likely to need a new set of backlights and an inverter - £50-plus-fitting minimum (assuming you can still get the parts from the manufacturer) they'll undoubtedly give a sharp intake of breath and put the phone down, then head to the nearest Currys/PC-World and spend £250 on a new one which comes with a 3-year-guarantee.

[Ted Kendall]

Originally Posted by evingar

The general public often seems completely detached from economic reality when it comes to the cost of repair services and expect people to work for an hourly rate that is a fraction of the rate they themselves would be willing to set their alarm clock for !

True, too true. Hence the repair caffs, which I fear will slump in popularity once a volunteer out of his depth or a customer gets hurt or killed through ignorance or unsafe practices.

[Welsh Anorak]

We always used to work on the principle of: one-third the cost of a new one - repair it; up to two-thirds - ask the customer; above that forget it. Of course that was when things cost a reasonable amount. Now things are so cheap, credit is so easy to obtain that more skill is needed in twisting the customer's arm than fixing the thing!
You can imagine how dispiriting it is to diagnose a fault, price the part, fit it and get the set working to be told - 'Oh, we didn't want to spend £x on it - you can get a new one for £n(x) where n>2. Pointless explaining that n(x) >> x!
Then to add insult to injury they want the thing back, so you have to unfix it then explain why you aren't going to tell them in detail what the matter is so they can buy a used panel on eBay. And woe betide you if the set isn't EXACTLY as it was when they brought it in!

[G6Tanuki]

And always remember that customers will automatically expect some sort of support or guarantee on your work.

Which doesn't come 'free' either!

"This is a new, different fault that's nothing to do with the repair I did for you two years ago" is frequently a difficult concept to get across to an irate customer with a dead telly.

Time spent explaining this (whether face-to-face or on the phone) is time-you're-not-earning. I always found the elderly were the worst at this - and also the worst at paying!

[Which is why I stopped doing two-way-radio repairs for the local taxi-company which had a lot of self-employed over-60s doing a few trips a day for pin-money to supplement their pension]

[SiriusHardware]

You dare not show them the failed part, either - impossible to explain to them how the DIL chip which you maybe took an hour or so to diagnose (as thermally intermittent), and then had to spend time ordering and fitting - can possibly be worth £80. You might have got away with it in the valve days - valves looked scientific and delicate and interesting - but - that little black thing? Surely not?

[evingar]

Originally Posted by SiriusHardware

You dare not show them the failed part, either - impossible to explain to them how the DIL chip which you maybe took an hour or so to diagnose (as thermally intermittent), and then had to spend time ordering and fitting - can possibly be worth £80. You might have got away with it in the valve days - valves looked scientific and delicate and interesting - but - that little black thing? Surely not?

Yep, its all "easy peasey" this stuff. Some clients even tell you what's wrong with the equipment to save you the bother of all that tricky and expensive fault finding. Had one the other day saying "it's only a dead capacitor, should only cost a few pence" .
One has to wonder why these experts don't fix their own stuff

I suppose it's always happened though i.e "it's the sound / picture" valve !

[AC/HL]

Originally Posted by G6Tanuki

Time spent explaining this (whether face-to-face or on the phone) is time-you're-not-earning. I always found the elderly were the worst at this - and also the worst at paying!

The older end used to be prompt payers, even to the extent of leaving themselves short. Of course today's older end are yesteryears yoof, and may not have such a sense of honour. Long may we survive, tinkering for friends and relatives (and ourselves), and the few remaining professionals with set-up costs well covered and a determination to carry on, come what may, until they fall off the perch.

[The Philpott]

Near to me is Gwynne TV in Braintree- appliance repairs including TV sets.

[Catkins]

The fact there's still some TV repair shops around is very interesting. My personal experience is that they disappeared from my area in the late 80s/early 90s (Forest of Dean). I knew the local TV/Radio repairman in Cinderford in the early 80s when I was 16 and thinking about what to do for a job, and I thought it would make a good career, as I already knew how to fix radios. My twin and I advertised in the local paper for valve radio repairs over the summer after leaving school, and made a bit of money doing that (in hindsight we charged stupidly low prices), and he used to refer people to us if it was an "old" set which he didn't know how to deal with.

But ultimately he advised us not to go into TV/Radio repairs as it was dying, and that was one of the reasons we ultimately went into computer programming instead (as we were also good at that, having learnt Basic and then machine code on the ZX Spectrum).

He was probably right, but computer programming has also been in the doldrums for near on 20 years. The sad thing is whatever is the "next thing" at 16, is now yesterday's industry when you're in your 30s, let alone older.

Anyway, one thing which I noticed about the reports of still existing TV repair shops is the lack of demographic information. Are all the existing TV repair shops being run by people in their 50s/60s and "hanging" on, or has the industry had new blood, i.e. is there people in their 20s/30s who still know how to do this, and are doing it. I'm willing to bet most are late 50s plus. I'm 50 now and I didn't go into it, as I understood it to be dead when I was 16.

[Radio Wrangler]

Originally Posted by G6Tanuki

you should expect to pay workers (including yourself) £25/hour (out of which they then have to pay income-tax/employees-national-insurance and make employee-contributions to a pension-scheme so they probably end up with about £15/hour in their bank-accounts).

£25/ hour times a 40 hour week = £1000/week.

Assuming paid holidays, that's £52,000 per annum before Tax/NI

Gosh!

David

[Radio Wrangler]

My cordless drill went on the blink. The pot in the trigger had simply worn out over a few years of intensive use. Wear and tear. There's a main dealer for DeWalt at the other side of Dunfermline (very highly recommended)

Took it in to drop it off for repair. Part comes as a full trigger module. did I want to wait?

5 minutes and £17 later, all was well.

Some industries do do repair. Some things are affordable to repair and not all parts need ordering to get inventory-mad accountants off the back.

They're called 'Engineering Agencies' by the way and also do Makita, Bosch, Festool, but don't do consumer grade tools. Their prices are a little higher than screwfix, but not much. Every 6 months they have all the manufacturers show trucks in and everything being demonstrated.... good deals to be had.

David

[Restoration73]

There is now no vocational training scheme leading to qualified repairers.

The last effective qualification City & Guilds 2240 ended in 2003, and the lead body Electronics Examination Board closed in 2004. Skills were assessed by practical course work, written exams, and time constrained practical tests.

[G6Tanuki]

Originally Posted by Radio Wrangler

£25/ hour times a 40 hour week = £1000/week.

Assuming paid holidays, that's £52,000 per annum before Tax/NI

Gosh!

David

I quoted the gross £25/hour as an example because that's what the technicians at a friend's garage get. They do 35 hours a week - one Saturday in every four and one 'late night' shift per week (until 11PM) for people who need their cars/vans during the day. They have to provide all their own tools and pay for regular (at least 7 days a year) training on things like health & safety, legislative changes, first-aid-certification etc.

Like I said, take-home pay of £15/hour after deductions is about typical for 'skilled technicians' with a bit of experience. If you're a skilled electronics technician and you make much less than this, you're probably underselling yourself!

[martin.m]

The problem with the repair trade is that the prices of new electronic goods haven't increased in half a century. When I started work in 1973 the price of a new Philips 22 inch TV (G8 chassis) was around £230, about the same as a basic TV would cost in a supermarket today. According to the Bank of England's online calculator, inflation has increased the cost of living by 11.5 times since then. In real terms electronic goods get cheaper every year.