Hi, I’m looking for some advice on charging rates. I drive a 26 tonner. At the moment I have a contract with one company, who are giving me 5/6 days a week, mostly days but some nights out. Recently I did a job which involved a night out, £600 for 562 miles (1 drop) - fuel costs being £256. Do you think their price is competitive or do I need to ask for more?
sampopmat:
Do you think their price is competitive or do I need to ask for more?
Sounds a bit low to me - it’s only £1.07/mile after all. IMO if it’s 2 days work you want to be working on the basis of £200 for your wages which means after wages and fuel that only leaves about £150 to pay for 2 days standing and running costs and your profit which to me doesn’t sound like enough.
Paul
Thanks for that, as a relatively new o/d that’s really helpful. If £1.07 is low what sort of mileage rate is reasonable these days? I don’t want to take the mickey, just earn the going rate and stay in business!
Only you can work out what rate you need to cover your costs, your wages and your desired profit level. There are too many variables for there to be a general rate, including things like the weight carried, the type of roads (affecting mpg), the type of vehicle, number of drops, nights out, and the list goes on and on.
Paul
£2.50 per mile for an artic. so i suppose you could charge around £2.00 per mile. if your truck was off the road for a while you may have to sub some loads out to keep your customer. the subby would want more than £1.07 therefore you’d be looseing money.
sounds a bit low to me,but it depends on how the job went. this is the problem when you look just at the mileage rate.If you fitted in a couple of local jobs in the same 2 day period,you may well have done pretty well overall.Or if you’ve only got the one Customer,sometimes you might have to take a bit of a hit on a job,as long as they look after you for the rest of the week.You don’t want to upset him just because one job didnt look too good,do you?
Try to look at the big picture:analyze things after a week/month/on a regular basis.Don’t leave it too long to change things if the picture doesn’t look too good though.
And by the way:I don’t know anyone who gets £2.50/£2.00 a mile for an Artic/rigid on a regular basis.That would mean an artic doing a full 10 hour driving shift @ 50mph,(500 miles x £2.50) costing £1250 + VAT for ONE DAYS WORK?.That ain’t gonna happen,friends,at least,not in my world… 
.but if it as happening in yours.let me know and I’ll be straight round…
I would think the words
I have a contract with one company, who are giving me 5/6 days a week,
and the fact that
I drive a 26 tonner
are very important facts in this question.
Its not always so cut and dried to just talk about pence per mile when looking at a job