boatyard rates

[doc g]

Do boatyard rates work like a car dealer where they bill out based on some hour or fraction of an hour depending on what was done? Or is it based on how long the mechanic actually worked on it? I am looking at a yard bill and trying to figure out how it could have possibly taken so long to do some of these line items................Pat

 

[magnawake]

Every yard I have ever talked to has a basic hourly rate. Haul out, pressure washing, painting is all done $/ft. If any blisters are found, the hourly rate kicks in. Getting a honest boat yard that charges fair is the problem. 3 hours to change zinks (for example) would be stretching it and I would need to throw the BS flag.

 

[Pascal]

All the yards I ve dealt with quote a per foot rate for haul out, pressure wash, block, paint and launch. In Miami, the one I use charges $38 a ft

Any extra work is charged by the hour, some yard charge a lower rate for unskilled labor like scrubbing, etc... It depends.

Whenever I get yard work done, I try to be there most of the time and I keep track of the hours and the work done. I find that if you are there, the yard is less likely to "make billing mistakes" and if they do you have your notes to fall back on and discuss the matter.

Obviously, you get billed while the guy go get a part in the shop, or clean up or ... But that shouldn't amount to much... Problem is that hat it is very hard to know exactly how much time something will take... Pulling a prop for instance, can take 20' or 4 hours...

 

[doc g]

how about 22.75 hours to pull a stub shaft and prop and reinstall ? The prop was put on freshly 2 weeks prior also..........Pat

 

[bigbill]

doc, that sounds like a major "billing mistake" to me.

 

[GJH]

how about 22.75 hours to pull a stub shaft and prop and reinstall ? The prop was put on freshly 2 weeks prior also..........Pat

Personally i wouldn't know; I wasn't there. What issues there may have been with the muff coupling and getting the shaft aligned properly, don't know that. That's why like Pascal, I like to be there for major operations. Not just to "supervise", but also to learn. A really good yard will give a detailed estimate per task with the hourly rate of the trade involved (electrical, paint, common labor, etc) and call you if they run into an unexpected issue... no surprises. That's one of the reasons I tried to get as much work done as possible by Thunderbolt Marine, plus that they really stood behind their work with great integrity (and plus we could enjoy Savannah while we were there). And one of the reasons why, now that we are just local boaters in NC, I have withdrawn a fair amount of work from Jarrett Bay and gone to good independents like Bruce Morrison.

 

[rsmith]

How many men were on the job? It's a 2 man job with probably a couple hours for the third thrown in for good measure.

 

[Boatsb]

How many men were on the job? It's a 2 man job with probably a couple hours for the third thrown in for good measure.

Had to winch out a shaft on a 52 that took 4 people about 3 hours after unbolting everything. Sometimes things dont go as planned.

 

[rwappleton]

That is still 10 hours less than he was billed.....just saying.

I have had the yard I work with quote everything they do. Sure jobs do not always go as planned and when they do not there are adjustments made (in both directions). I ask them to tell me how long a job is going to take based on their experience after looking at the job. I have to add here if you did not ask for a quote then you left the door open. Always ask IMHO and get it in writing. Save bunches of heartburn later.

FWIW I also do this when I take my car or truck to the dealer and use the same process.

Before Scott jumps me here I expect anyone in the repair business to make a profit. That is not a dirty word. I am very happy with the yard I work with (Pierside Boat Works in Charleston, SC)and they are happy to have me as a customer.

 

[luckydave215]

EVERY trip top the yard costs more than you expected. It says so right in the owner's manual, maybe you didn't read that page.
If the yard you use is honest (props here to the yard I use, Shelter Island Boat Yard in San Diego), the higher-than-expected cost is due to the "surprise!" you always find when the travel lift revs up.
It may be blisters, it may be a loose cutlass bearing(s), it may be pink bronze, it may be corroding swim step bolts or a strainer that vanished "back there somewhere". There's always going to be something you don't expect. Get used to it.
If you don't like it, take up golf.

 

[Paul Gwiz]

The Yard we were @ in Rhode Island charged 95.00/hr for major mechanical & everything elede was by Just hasdft. 32.00/ft to haul clean bottom & store / included spring splash... Just had a transducer installed , props reconditioned & sea strainer for air cond. rebuilt total 2800.00

It's a boat , they snack on money....& stay fat.....

 

[doc g]

the removal of said stub shaft and prop took very little time . The boat was hauled, washed, blocked and the stubshaft and prop were at the shop to be repaired the same day. I have no problem with profit , charge me 150 / hour but bill me the GD hours it really takes, don't pad the hours to make your profit margin........ Pat

 

[Boatsb]

Same day does not address man hours. Ive seen crews of 5 or more on a boat more than once. Did you ask them to show you the man hours worked?

 

[saltshaker]

Hard to say without all the details but it does seem ridiculously high unless they ran into some significant problems. We're talking about the stub shaft only right? Removing the main shaft can be a bit more a pain particularly when dealing with 2 struts. If they had to drop a strut in the processs, that will add significantly to the bill. Why was the shaft pulled? If it was bent, that too can add to the difficulty of getting things apart. I split the muff couplings and pulled both stubs on my 46C in about 2 or 3 hours. My props and shafts came off without issue. Biggest pain was cleaning up the muff couplings to remove the bolts. My shafts were not painted and very clean when I hauled the boat so I didn't have that to deal with either.

 

[doc g]

one guy under the boat. I was there. Stub shaft was bent ; it was out 150 thousands and slid right out of the aft strut , Jack,that's what I was figuring 5- 6 man hours to the job not 22.5.....................

 

[Genesis]

Robbery is robbery no matter how it is committed and it's not a mistake, it's a crime.

 

[saltshaker]

one guy under the boat. I was there. Stub shaft was bent ; it was out 150 thousands and slid right out of the aft strut , Jack,that's what I was figuring 5- 6 man hours to the job not 22.5.....................

What's the yards justification for the billed hours? It should have gone back together easier than it cam apart. Something isn't adding up.

 

[dsharp]

Robbery is robbery no matter how it is committed and it's not a mistake, it's a crime.

A little dramatic, don't ya think? Why don't you call the yard and ask them. Maybe somebody made a mistake on the time sheet.

 

[lumina]

Hi All,

Can only speak from my own experiences......

Up here in Mass, you definitely pay a premium at quality reputable yards. Things like bottom blasting, a fiberglass repair, or winterizing are usually billed out on a per job basis. Pretty much everything else is by the hour. However before I authorize an hourly job I insist on an estimate in good faith and I insist that as the project moves along I'm updated on any over runs etc

Its also my opinion that if possible you should try to be on site as much as possible and subsequently do your due diligence buy reviewing every line item on the bill, and speak up when you see inconsistencies, odd charges, and excessive hours billed.

If it's a quality reputable yard, they're going to listen to you and justify it or make it right.

I've seen other folks items/hours on my bill, I've seen double charges, I've been charged for diesel parts on a VHF antenna replacement.

Some yards contract out specialized work so any errors they make in managing their jobs can end up on your bill.

I recently asked my yard to remove my transome door. It is just to big and heavy for this old geezer to lift and balance on the swim platform. Normally I'd review their approach but for some reason I was distracted and figured common sense would be used. The yard guy tried to remove the big slotted hinge machine screws that have welded themselves to the aluminum plate over 30+ years. Almost 4 hours and 300+ dollars later he removed the hinge pin in about 10 minutes.

I made my case to the yard owner and my bill was adjusted.

In Doc's case what comes to mind relative to the bill is, "if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck it must be a duck" ie persistently pursue an explanation.

 

[Genesis]

A little dramatic, don't ya think? Why don't you call the yard and ask them. Maybe somebody made a mistake on the time sheet.

Uh huh.

I got four guys working for me and they time-sheeted 160 hours last week (from which I pay them, 4 x 40 hours.)

I bill time to customers, and it goes in the computer to to generate the invoices.

Guess how hard it is for anyone with the minimum level of acceptable competence required to run a business to know whether or not the labor time sheets in are less than or equal to the time sheets out from which paychecks are cut?

Incidentally, this is basic accounting control, and if you're not doing it then you're a fraudster and in the real world the place where you should be is called a prison, because either you or your employees -- with your permission -- are robbing people. The simple business argument for it is determining employee efficiency; if you're paying for 160 hours of labor but can only bill out 80 in a week then you clearly have at least one and probably two people on staff you don't need. By the same token the first time you bill out 180 hours someone robbed a customer and that isn't a mistake, it's theft.

Robbery is a crime no matter the means by which it occurs. Your argument is the same one that was used after the 2007/08 blowup in "subprime" mortgage securitizations.

The so-called "mistake" or "sloppiness" argument is often made but statistically quickly transitions from improbable to impossible as the number of incidents grows. You see, such "mistakes" are not made in the other direction (the customer's favor) but statistically an actual error has no bias either for or against the customer and the magnitude of an actual error in each direction also has no bias. What's going on is thus easily discerned; if you have a cashier that is incompetent their drawer will be off but not consistently in one direction or another, and by varying amounts, most of them small. If the drawer is off only one way in more than a non-trivial number of occurrences it's not an error or incompetence -- statistically it becomes better than 99% certain that it is theft.