>
The leads we have been going on have all been quite large, one is so large and complicated (consisting of 88 frames, all of which are going to be black or cream woodgrain, and a lot of them circular and oddly shaped) in fact that it’s going to take 2 weeks just to prepare. The rest have been full houses and just today a primary school has just gone ahead with me. It really does seem that the weather kept people indoors till the thaw came.
I want to share a bit of news with you all regarding pensions. We spoke to our accountants today and they informed us of desired changes the government want to make within three years. If they were to get their way they want to make it so that every business, in every industry, has an employee pension set up. This would consist of a portion of the employee wage, with the rest topped up by the company. This change could cause some serious repercussions. RCG informed us of the plan for the government to make it so that fitters were ‘on the books’, meaning weekly wages, holiday pay, the buying of tool etc. So couple that with the potential changes to expand company pensions to everybody, and you have yourself a great big pile of trading difficulties!
It does seem that the government is out to get from our industry as much as it can. We’ve had no relief, unlike other home improvement industries. So all we need now is the glass cartel to raise prices, and for Pilkington to shut down a couple of plants to create an artificial glass shortage to raise prices even further. They may as well, everybody else shit’s on our industry!
>Just a few points:
1. This government isn't going to be in power in 3 years.
2. Fitters being 'on the books' is for tax payment purposes only. I don't believe they will have any employment rights
3. 88 frames is not a complex job. Our new estimator started on Monday and was given a 'small' 81 frame job with shaped units to cut his teeth on. He finished it in 2 days. You need to get some decent software!
>Hi John
1. That may not be strictly true. A hung parliament may put a spanner in the works.
2. That's not guaranteed and it wouldn't surprise me if they went the whole hog and gave them full rights. Personally I think they would if they managed to get them on the books.
3. 88 frames for us is a big job when you bear in mind 98% of our work is residential. This is for a church and the shaped frames aren't standard. Plus, we are a small company in comparison to yourselves, software would be wasted on us.