macxsanity
Well-Known Member
I have been going through gum tree and am sad to see some free lance IT guys charging as low as 120 rand an hour for thier services ....these people are killing our trade .......
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Low hourly charging "IT Consultants"
- Thread starter macxsanity
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Mike Hoxbig
Honorary Master
I wouldn't worry, you get what you pay for.
Or you are charging too much. Two sides to the coin. He's probably booked out way more, adding up to a decent salary in the month. Would be interesting to see where the curve of elasticity lies on this one.
On the flip side: they might be crap and desperate for business
On the flip side: they might be crap and desperate for business
IT is always the last on the budget list, and therefore companies DO go for the cheapest,
But then again you get what you paid for
deweyzeph
Honorary Master
I don't understand your argument. People can charge whatever they want to charge. It's a free market. If someone is foolish enough to think that R120 an hour is going to get them a quality freelancer, then let them learn the hard way.
InterGalacticSpook
Well-Known Member
Yo,
for what for, support or dev ?
Igs
for what for, support or dev ?
Igs
I'm sure that guy is aiming at "I can't get my printer to work", "my laptop can't connect wirelessly to my adsl router", "no sound comes out my speakers", etc. In which case his services and pricing are probably fine.
A business is not going to let him touch their servers and if they do it will probably end up creating more work for somebody that knows what they are doing.
Thats it.
I used to work full time and was charged out at between R550 - R700 p/h by the company. Clients had to pay the rate from the time that I left the office even if I got stuck in traffic. Was always busy with happy clients.
Recently I left the company and went on my own targeting SME's charging R300 p/h with no callout fee. I figured its a good rate as I can have a decent life with some flexibility and clients will benefit due to getting an experienced geek that can handle their IT needs without any BS.
It's not very successful as there is always someone cheaper.
What happens is the SME would get the cheapo to do a chunk of whatever work needs to get done and then get me to fix it up. So the cheapo gets say 40 hours of work that I then sort out in 2 hours. In the meantime I could have done all the work in about 8 hours which would have saved the SME a bunch of cash. This is just one example of the many.
I might return to full-time employment in 2012 if things do not pick up but I'm trying to make it on my own first!
deweyzeph
Honorary Master
I can't believe you guys are complaining about competition. You sound like Telkom. Competition is part of running your own business or working for yourself. It's a dog-eat-dog world out there and you need to be the best at what you do at all times if you want to make it out there on your own. If you can't handle it then perhaps freelancing or working for yourself isn't for you.
When you first start out and you have no clients, of course you're going to have to compromise on your rate. As you get more clients, and the quality of your work becomes known, you should have no problem increasing your rate with your regular clients, and as your reputation in the industry grows you will be able to command a higher and higher rate with your new clients. Your rate needs to be earned with hard work, you're not going to command a good rate immediately when you start out.
When you first start out and you have no clients, of course you're going to have to compromise on your rate. As you get more clients, and the quality of your work becomes known, you should have no problem increasing your rate with your regular clients, and as your reputation in the industry grows you will be able to command a higher and higher rate with your new clients. Your rate needs to be earned with hard work, you're not going to command a good rate immediately when you start out.
@deweyzeph I hear you, but...
The issue is NOT "IT Consultant" for R120. The issue is that there is no common, accepted and well recognized IT professional institute in SA.
The VAST majority of kids who study IT do it through short courses and private colleges, rather than university (i.e. most of them don't know squat about the physics behind wireless or fibre optic networks).
Now, that would be fine by itself, but then you get the same kids claiming to have A+ & Network+ certificates on their CVs when they never bothered to write (and pass) the international exams.
Good IT skills is a combination of Attitude, Experience _and_ Training. In SA, and even on these forums, there seems to be the retarded idea that experience counts for everything and a solid theoretical knowledge is unnecessary.
And if you believe this, ask yourself this: Would you go to a "self-taught" brain surgeon with 20 years experience?
So yes, IF someone charges R120 an hour, that's absolutely okay. But for the customer's sake, it might be useful to know what (if any) recognized qualifications the consultant has.
The issue is NOT "IT Consultant" for R120. The issue is that there is no common, accepted and well recognized IT professional institute in SA.
The VAST majority of kids who study IT do it through short courses and private colleges, rather than university (i.e. most of them don't know squat about the physics behind wireless or fibre optic networks).
Now, that would be fine by itself, but then you get the same kids claiming to have A+ & Network+ certificates on their CVs when they never bothered to write (and pass) the international exams.
Good IT skills is a combination of Attitude, Experience _and_ Training. In SA, and even on these forums, there seems to be the retarded idea that experience counts for everything and a solid theoretical knowledge is unnecessary.
And if you believe this, ask yourself this: Would you go to a "self-taught" brain surgeon with 20 years experience?
So yes, IF someone charges R120 an hour, that's absolutely okay. But for the customer's sake, it might be useful to know what (if any) recognized qualifications the consultant has.
UnUnOctium
Expert Member
+ e^22
well if that "self-taught" brain surgeon has 20 years of good experience where nobody dies then yes why not lol, that comparison is flawed.
You must remember experience is there for a reason. I rather hire a IT consultant if he has good experience then someone that just came out of university with all the degrees and exams passed.
But the thing is that you must look at what type of experience also. Not all type of experience is equal. Its like a RPG if someone takes down a big boss successfully then he gets 1000 experience if he kills some small creep he gets 10 exp. Now in the IT world if this guy has successfully run a network and troubleshooted IT problems for big corporates and worked with all different type of software/hardware i bet he will be better then some guy who worked as tech support and nothing else.
Please ppl.. compare apples. "IT consultant" (in this case most likely fixing pcs and network issues) does not brain surgery equate (grammatical license for effect). Don't even try to make that comparison.
You also don't know what marketing strategy the guy / gal (lets face it... probably guy) is using. Perhaps he makes cash from hardware he sells on call outs as well?
People can charge what they like. If you don't like it, toughies... start a trade union and demand higher wages. Free market FTW.
You also don't know what marketing strategy the guy / gal (lets face it... probably guy) is using. Perhaps he makes cash from hardware he sells on call outs as well?
People can charge what they like. If you don't like it, toughies... start a trade union and demand higher wages. Free market FTW.
It's called a free market! People can charge what they like, what you get on the other hand is your problem.