Smartness of appearance - how important?

How important is it to have smart looking employees when visiting customers in their businesses or homes?
Surely in today's relaxed and informal world this is no longer as important as it might have been 10 or 15 years ago?
Well, we think it is vital to have very smart and clean looking handymen calling on customers. People may be dressing more casually in their private lives but they still want, and expect, that when they call someone to their home or place of work that they look professional. The other point here is that a uniform does also allow the customer to immediately identify who has arrived at their door, and to feel comfortable letting them into their home. This especially applies to the elderly and women on their own.
We spend a huge amount of time (and money) on keeping our guys looking the part, and it's definitely worth it from the feedback we receive from happy customers.

Look at our website!

All we say to anyone asking why 0800handyman is so much better than any other copycat service, is Simply look at our website and compare with others purporting to do a similar job, and you will see the difference in our professionalism, the smartness our handymen (who are all employed by us, not sub contractors) and the investment we make in our company.
It’s plain to see.
We are confident when you compare you will know why we were not only the first professional handyman service, we remain the best!
That’s why so many top companies (including the BBC) trust us on their premises.

Busy!

Maybe it's the warm weather, maybe it's those 'green shoots' politicians love to spot, but whatever it is the 0800handyman phone system has been working overtime these past few weeks as we book in more jobs for our dedicated team of handymen!
Talking of staff, we employ all of our guys, no sub contracting here. We just don't believe that sub contracting out work, and the subsequent loss of control this inevitably means, is the right way to go when you are sending people into private homes or business premises.
What about the public liability insurance aspects of this for a start?
Any comments?

New Website

We are constantly being complimented on our new website at www.0800handyman.co.uk
It is amazing, and very pleasing, how many people comment on it and say that they really like the new look site.

0800handyman - New office

We recently moved to new, much larger offices within Zockoll House, Maple Road Surbiton, the home of the Zockoll Group.

Tax discs

We have had a number of tax discs taken from our company scooters and motorbikes in the past, so have taken to keeping the disc in the employee's wallet. This has worked fine for some time but the Police seem to be much more inflexible lately, insisting that the disc must be on display. We can understand the reasoning for this, of course, but the theft of the disc can be a real pain and presumably means that someone is cloning similar vehicles, a much more serious issue than not displaying a tax disc. 0800handyman will always comply with the law naturally, so we have now made sure they are on display.

Sash windows

As we move in to spring and summer many people will be opening their sash windows for the first time in many months only to find that the sash cord has snapped or the window is jammed.

0800Handyman is London's leading professional handyman service and one of the many jobs we specialise in is the repairing of sash window cords.

Replacing a broken sash cord is actually a fairly simple process and should only take an hour to 1.5 hours at the most, per window. The exact time it takes depends largely on which cord is actually broken as accessing the cords attached to the outer sash means taking out the bottom sash.

To find out more about our London handyman service and sash cord repair in particular visit www.0800handyman.co.uk/what_we_do/replacing-sash-window-cords.shtml

Or give us a call on 0800handyman (0800 426 396) our freephone number.
0800handyman the professional handyman service.

Sink waste disposal units

Whether you call them waste disposals, garbage disposals or insinkerators the are the same thing and they do need repairing, servicing or even replacing after extended use.

0800handyman, London's first and best professional handyman service, can repair or replace your faulty waste disposal.

So if your waste disosal is making a strange noise, is blocked or is completely dead give us a call on 0800 426 396 for help.

You can also visit our website at www.0800handyman.co.uk

0800handyman will be able to help your waste disposal unit working.

Unusual jobs

Often we are asked what is the most unusual job we have been asked to do. We have many jobs that come under that category, but today’s call from a very well know company to 'construct a 6 mtr long whale' takes the prize for most unusual to date. Apparently it comes in many parts and needs to be put together 'like a giant jigsaw puzzle.’ The tail is 2 mtrs across, so you get an impression of just how large this is.
A small crane is then used to lift it into position.
They don't come much more unusual than that!

New uniforms and new bikes

At 0800handyman we believe that if you are going to allow workmen into your home or office you have a right to expect them to be clean, tidy and generally look the part of a professional handyman.
With this firmly in mind we have recently introduced all new items of clothing for our guys. Now they look even smarter than before, with bright red polo shirts, black cargo trousers and black blue tooth enabled helmets.
If you would like to see how this all looks go to our web site at www.0800handyman.co.uk/pattesting
Regarding the blue tooth helmets, we have introduced these because we want to be able to communicate with our handymen at all times, even when they are on their way to a job. This means that we can keep the customer fully informed about expected time of arrival (even on motorbikes and scooters it is possible to be held up by the traffic). We feel that this is just another way of keeping customers informed and fully in the picture.
In the next month we will be introducing a fleet of new Honda S-Wing scooters all painted in the 0800handyman colours of course.
These bikes are brand new and are in the paint shop as I write.
Pictures to follow.

Are the cowboys coming back?

Interesting articles are starting to appear in the press recently reporting an increase in the cowboy element resurfacing because of the recession. The thinking is that guys that have been made redundant recently are seeing handyman services as an easy option to make a living.
The reality, of course, is that doing handyman jobs for the home or office is just not the easy money that some think.
Our advice to anyone thinking of taking on a cut price operation is to ask the following questions.
How long have you been in the business?
Do you have a website where customer comments are listed?
Do you have full public liability insurance, and can I see a copy?
Are you and your workmen CRB checked? (We know of one company where at least one worker has a criminal record)
Are the people you use sub contractors, or 100% employees of the company? (Sub contractors tend to work to their own agenda, which may not fit in with what you want)!