Accepted greed from certain groups

Ray Palmer

Looking through comments sections on news involving landlords and they are always comments about how they are greedy and no person should live off others in such a way etc... Yet other groups are not demonized for their practices in a shortage situation. The one that always amazes me is tradesmen putting up their prices and doing cash in hand jobs. Firstly every trade is charging more for their work as demand is high but no mention of them gouging customers. My mother was charged €500 to put the pipes on one radiator under the floor before she got new flooring put in. He was there for 2 hours. Most he spent on materials was €50 so he charged €225 an hour. He did not give her a tax receipt. So that was tax free.

Local shop put up their prices during the pandemic. Hailed as a hero for being open by locals. He was smart enough about it by not upping all prices but as the old labels were replaced it was possible to see the prices had been changed as the labels were newer and not yellowed. Things like light bulbs all went up as they were occasional items people don't pay attention to.

What other groups do you think people ignore that are upping their prices? If the defense is supply and demand then it should apply to all businesses or workers.

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058211954/accepted-greed-from-certain-groups

some air b&s seriously ripped off customers this summer. Not all of them but some did, staycations were the only option for most people.

I wouldn't be too hard on that shop keeper, sometimes businesses have to raise their prices, that is just business. That really hot summer here 2 or 3 years ago, potatoes went up a lot in price because of the lack of water, a local shop were selling them for 40 euro a bag, he said he was buying them for 30 euro so had to make something on them.

Pauliedragon

There are a lot of gougers out there but I'll bet most of here would charge what we think we could get if we were self employed/running a business.

NSAman

If you think you can run a business (and this is what we are talking about) better and live from it, give it a go....

Gouging is one mans word for someone else taking a risk....

Not everyone works in a 9 to 5 with a wage coming in at the end of the day, someone has to make money to pay for that wage.

PhilOssophy

Did you mother ask him how much he was going to charge?

BobHopeless

If people are stupid enough to pay those prices then let them on. I wouldn't for instance spend 4 euro on a cup of coffee or 6 euro for a pint.

PhilOssophy

The worst gouging of all in Irish society is what "consultants" charge the public sector. Any time I hear of an "independent report" being published, I always wince at what bunch of charlatans in KPMG/PWC/EY/Deloitte/etc got paid 2k a day per person for writing the report which was often merely to appease the opposition parties and nobody cared about in the first place. I would love if the cost of the report was a mandatory part of the report, it might make people question the value. People would be more shocked at how much the report cost than the contents of the report.

But you'll not hear a word about it - way easier to complain about the plumber who did a bit of cash work than Rupert who swans around living the high life after ripping off the tax payer.

corner of hells

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058211954/accepted-greed-from-certain-groups

Half inch copper pipe ? As little 10 euros a length .

He probably didn't buy it, probably had it left over from another job.

There is an argument that you are paying for his experience, him being a tradesman and all that.You could always get a bloke from the local to do it for 30 quid.

I'm the other trade , the brain damaged one.. electrician and I would rob the eye teeth out of your head to stop ol' wans asking me to nixers. "Hang a light " , yes ma'am , that'll be 900 euros.

Mad_maxx

We have a culture of accepting over charging in this country.

We don't demand value for money

Tradesmen are mercenaries in terms of attitude

Andrea B.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058211954/accepted-greed-from-certain-groups

I have heard of and experienced some exhorbidant fees.

However, wrt the specific plumber one you cite:

Had he ever visited to appraise the job before?

Meaning that although a job may appear to be a 2 hour one, there may have been many more absorbed in appraisal and travel either side of these.

Bad form if this is not itemised and explained to customers. I always did.

Some also quote it a "cash job" to satisfy the client request (and assumption of better deal), but declare it.

AckwelFoley

Anyone that issues this statement "no person should live off others in such a way" in relation to people that rent property are braindead.

Housing is as basic a need as food and water. It has to be supplied somehow. Is a farmer a bastard charging for the food he produces?

Ray Palmer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117984819#Comment_117984819

Kind of funny. I am one of those consultants you talk about. People have no idea what we actually do and think as above. It has a lot more to do with the civil servants actions than the consultants. While examining why certain reports never matched up and calculations were way off with huge budget issues we found the mistake. For 10 years a number of staff had systematically changed calculation sheets to make their lives easier essentially have a circular reference rather than a comparative calculation. This meant the reports they gave always appeared to balance at their level but should be caught at a the next level. Guess what was happening at that level, the same thing. By not being civil servants meant we could question the calculations and by not being a particular grade we could examine all levels. We were able to track down the person that started it and track how they spread the information corrupting all the reporting. They had spent 10 years trying to fix the reporting we found the problem within 3 months and recalculated 10 years worth of accounts and point out the exact amount that was wrong. The difference was about 1000% more than what we charged and we put in safe guards to prevent it from being possible in the future. That is good value.

None of the civil servants had the knowledge to figure out the issue. The person that started it was a low grade civil servant but their supervisor should have noticed that their figure went from never balancing to being perfect. The whole point of the report was to fix mistakes early and the report highlight where there needed to be investigation. The regional manger should have noticed too. Each area should have noticed as it spread.

When it comes to developing software the civil service simply doesn't pay enough for IT staff so they have to hie consultants and have to pay the same as any private business. There is a whole tendering process that is very transparent yet people will claim it is all done through brown envelopes which is impossible. You would have to bribe a lot of low level civil servants and many feel consultants are overpaid like you do and certainly wouldn't take a bribe if the consultants firms knew who they were anyway. The dogs on the street only know what other dogs asses smell like nothing more.

Ray Palmer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117986626#Comment_117986626

He lived less than a mile away and viewed the radiator on his way home. He just said he could do it the next morning never giving her a quote.

Any tradesman is meant to give a written quote and agree a price beforehand, I wasn't there and my mother is 80 so she was taken advantage of. In dublin you can't really charge for travel time

mariaalice

The shop was s chancer, the tradesman no its supply and demand the way of the world.

The one that amuses me, some poster foaming a the mouth about welfare but willing to pay cash in hand to get a patio laid and don't see the connection or realise that if every job had vat and tax added their patio would be double the price.

It's a case of making others virtuous but don't let it cost me anything

mariaalice

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117987042#Comment_117987042

That particular situation is taking advantage and you should tackle the person but you mother should have got a quote first.

Housefree

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117986851#Comment_117986851

If big conglomerates came in and took over most of the land, making the food expensive for the farmer, who used to be able to grow it for himself, would you think them bastards? If a private company took over all the water and started charging exorbitant amounts for it, would you think them bastards?

dudley72

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117984819#Comment_117984819

I hear you, do you know what the biggest issue I find with this, if you look at these reports in the majority they are just duplicates of previous versions of something they done with a customer. So you are paying 2k a day for 200 days but in reality the person will lash through it in 20 days and fire it out....

PhilOssophy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117986976#Comment_117986976

I have worked in that industry myself - so I'm not just bluffing from the outside. You know as well as I do for every "good value" story like you quote, there is any amount of gouging that goes on. Such as the over deployment of people to some of these projects, i.e. a team of 10 sent to the project where there is 1-2 geniuses, 2-3 middle of the road and 5-6 wasters who are on the project because the tax payer is footing the bill. Or the "dig out the old report, update the cover, change what needs to be changed" mantra.

We all know the "tricks of the trade".

AckwelFoley

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117987111#Comment_117987111

That's not who these people are referring to. I agree with you, but the small time landlord is running out of the market by government policy and will be made worse when the IRA are in power next term

The people that utter the line I mentioned are those that have a fundamental issue with any type of property rental for the private housing need. The same as the gobshite in leinster house that wants to nationalise Facebook and twitter

These big private equity firms are only here because there is money to be made. They don't give a toss about the property or the people in them.

There is a simple solution and that's increasing the supply.

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117987111#Comment_117987111

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdYLaIzzU_I

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117985233#Comment_117985233

Buying a house and renting it out is just the same as buying a pub/shop etc and starting a business. Nothing wrong with it at all. The landlord takes a chance he/she will have good tenants and will make a profit from renting out the house/houses. The law is all in the favor of the tenant, sometimes a landlords gets scumbag tenants who stop paying rent and wreck the house. These people should be dragged out of the house if they dont pay rent for 2 months.

Ray Palmer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117987131#Comment_117987131

I have never ever seen what you are talking about in 10 years working with civil services. How anybody could get away with "dusting off" an old report for current information. Individual consultants getting €2k a day is very suspect. Saw a news report claim that on a project I was working on and there were 4 people working on it but the new report claimed a single consultant. Don't know all cases but the articles was wrong and just lazy journalists writting a story that the public believed. Are you actually involved in billing and time sheets? I am and I can tell you that I have seen many exaggerations, lies and distorted explanations in the media about consultants.

The thing is if I saw what you claim I wouldn't do the work nor let it go. If you are party to such things as you claim you are the bad guy taking part in the gouging. How can you complain if you are profiting from it personally? I am paid well and happen to work with the civil service but I could get paid equally well working on a private client's site, probably could get more in fact.

Andrea B.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117987042#Comment_117987042

Agreed. I was just trying to share some hidden backgrounds, but even at 5 hrs, i agree it would still have been steep.

I had not known some finer detail you just shared at time of my post.

I agree with other poster that you should call for a frank discussion to get a breakdown of costs and see where it leads.

Ray Palmer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117987099#Comment_117987099

That is victim blaming. An 80 year old blind women does not know the rules but the tradesman knows they are meant to give a written quote and agree before starting. I actually had a guy try to charge me €4750 for a job we agreed for €475 which I foolishly didn't get written. Load of hassle and threats with the gardai being called. They maybe other tradesmen that people would expect to try this but my mistake as I saw it as handy as they had their digger on the road and were working on other gardens and seemed legitimate but the accent changed when they were doing the work and I realised my mistake. I am still the victim even if I made a mistake

Sky King

"My mother was charged €500 to put the pipes on one radiator under the floor before she got new flooring put in. He was there for 2 hours. Most he spent on materials was €50 so he charged €225 an hour. He did not give her a tax receipt. So that was tax free."

All the doting mothers sending little Johnny off to uni do some bullsh1t arts degree so he has get a job in Facebook paying barely above minimum wage because she turns her nose up at the trades should be reminded of this next time some tradesman trousers 500 of her cash for two hours work.

Anyway you're not paying for two hours work, you're paying for the years he spent freezing his t*ts off on building sites learning his trade. If it was so easy, we'd all do it

Jequ0n

Excellent, another whinge thread to bemoan that someone took advantage of a gullible person.

If people are stupid enough to be ripped off then they deserve no better.

sydthebeat

simple economics... supply and demand

low demand : high supply = low price

high demand : low price = high price

how does that simple economic policy even deserve a thread? do some people not understand it?

mariaalice

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117987284#Comment_117987284

I am not victim-blaming are you going to have a chat with the guy who did the job? Your mother sounds vulnerable.

Wombatman

Head of Hospital Consultants Union whinging on Pat Kenny for the last half hour about how hard life is for them.

I guess every interest group has the same mentality. We need to be prioritized for better treatment at the expense of others. Once you enter a group you become an advocate for that group getting more. It's like when you don't own a house you want house prices to fall. As soon sign a contract to buy a house you want property values to rise.

The greed real. You are always going to come up against the pay peanuts get monkeys argument, but we end up paying for geniuses and getting average fallible humans. Nobody paid by the state should earn over 200k.

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117987284#Comment_117987284

what did you pay him in the end?

Ray Palmer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117987329#Comment_117987329

It seems you don't understand. I mentioned supply and demand and how people don't accept that on rent but will want to apply it to other services. You can't have it both ways. The government stepped in and said rent cannot be done this way when it comes to rent. So it is about what is accepted by society. The public pay cash in hand letting tradesmen avoid tax. A person already stated that the job would be double the price if they had to pay tax. Strange how that doesn't match the tax and vat that would have to be paid by the tradesman. How much a day do you think a tradesman should be paid a day before tax? I accept they have overheads that need to be included. What amount are we talking here €300,€400,€500 etc...?

I was quoted €6k-€12k to redo a bathroom 12 years ago. I bought everything myself including tools it took me 2 days on my own and cost €2k in materials and tools. Each quote had materials at least double the actual costs. That is not supply and demand. Or the few times tradesmen asked for money to buy materials before they start and then refused to show the invoice of materials. Some of it I just laugh at but other times I get pretty annoyed at the constant lying.

The electrian that said the cost to move the sockets was going to be so expensive because he had to chase the wall and rip up the entire floor. Didn't chase the wall and lifted one floor board. Asked how much was that now and he said the same price as before. That is not supply and demand

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117987083#Comment_117987083

Why was the shop keeper a chancer? maybe he is paying his suppliers more now and so had to raise his prices. prices go up, its just the way things are. I used to be able to buy a packet of tayto for 16p, how much is a packet of tayto now? 1 euro? more?