Having the knowledge of electrician is one thing. I know some electricians that are fantastic at their job, probably better than me. But I still work for somebody else. It's the business side of things that puts people off running their own business. And it shouldn't be like that. Because it can, it can be easy. And in some instances, it can be easier than actually working for somebody else. In this podcast, I'm going to venture into the world of running your own business, and being your own boss. Tool Box Talks for electricians, helping electricians reduce stress, gained back time, and earn more money. Hello, and welcome back. Once again, my name is Ben Poulter, your host of tool box talks for electricians, and you're either two types of people right now, you're your own boss, considering if you should go get a job working for somebody else, would life be that little bit easier, or you're working with somebody else, and you want to take the step to being your own boss, but you're a bit scared and thinking, maybe I won't have any work or all these things running through your head. And you're not sure whether to take that leap or not. And this goes through every self employed electricians head all the time. So I'm here to weigh up to list the pros and the cons, to see whether becoming your own boss as electrician will be a good move or not. But be warned, if you do venture into the world of being your own boss. But don't think there's any turning back, you sort of become unemployable. And you get used to the ways of maybe working for yourself and being your own boss, because in my opinion, is a lot better. I'm not sure if I'm just maybe a stubborn get, or just too opinionated. But the last company I worked for, as self employed, that I subcontract to for a few years, I didn't get on with them too well. But I'll tell you more about that in a bit.

So let's start with being employed. And I'll admit, yeah, has got his benefits. And it's a great way to start out. Because you gain the knowledge and experience from obviously working with other electricians, and you get the qualifications, you'll get put through college, you'll get put through maybe an apprenticeship, and being employed for a company, they will help you do that. And they'll maybe pay for that. Because obviously, the cost of the electrician training, it can be quite expensive, I think you'll pay up to seven grand to become a qualified electrician. That's just the qualification to get you to a standard to where you're actually certified on paper. As a qualified electrician. There's obviously more the two through nine months inspection and testing and evey charges, there's a lot more you can go into as well. And then also being employed, you sort of just turn up, that's all you got to do, you've got to turn up to the office in the morning, they give you your materials, they give you the van, they've got it all insured for you, all you need to do is get in that van, and go and do the work, what they asked you to do, they've went out and found you the work, they've got a whole list of work that you need to do maybe that day or that week. So they give you the list, then you go out and do it and get paid. So in effect being employed is sort of a simple life, I'd say. And another advantage to that would be your van. Because the van can cause problems. Sometimes if it's an older van, because you could afford maybe a new one, then if that breaks down or anything goes wrong, it's not necessarily your problem as a problem with the company. You can say to them, right, I've got a flat tire, right, the engine lights come on, you give them the van back, and it's down to them to sort out. So that's another benefit of being employed. And then also working for a company employed. If the work dies down, say they haven't gotten much work on over a certain period. But that's not really your problem, you still get paid that certain wage, they want to keep you on their books as an electrician like employed, then they've still got to pay your set wage, you might not get extra overtime, you might not get a little bit more of a bonus in your wage for certain jobs. But you still know exactly where you're gonna get paid that month or that week. And then even if you decide to take a holiday, you have a couple of weeks off, you're still getting paid. Sure employed, you're entitled to a few weeks off so that person who employs you, that company that employs you don't have to pay for them few weeks off, and you'll still get your set wage or your set hourly rate or wherever you wherever you agreed with that company. You'll still get that whatever happened. So it is a pretty easy life as an employed electrician. But a lot of electricians that are employed they moan about the hourly rate thing, 20 pound an hour, that's a jouer b Right? That's rubbish. But if you look into maybe how much they pay out for your insurance, for your public liability, you'd have to pay thou if you're employed for your van and the maintenance. They've got a lot of overheads to cover as a business owner. So being self employed electrician. Yeah, you can't pretty good deal.

sometimes. So as you can see, there's quite a few pros to being employed employed as an electrician, then there's probably a few more like you get the pension, maybe a lot of companies now they've had to give you sort of a pension to save it for when you obviously retire. But there's a lot of other things that could be added to it to maybe their pay for your tools, it depends, every company is different, you might not get a total allowance, you might not get to be able to use that van in the evenings, because I've got a tracker on where you tracker on where you can only use it for business. But there is quite a few benefits to be an employed electrician. But it's not all sunshine and roses. In my opinion, I've worked for a lot of companies back in the day when I first got qualified or was I was an apprentice, basically, I worked for a company through my apprenticeship. And there's a few cons to being employed as well. Because when you work for a company, maybe you have to put in the hours to get paid, even if you're good at your job. And you can tell you can this be up and given all day to do this job. And you could bang it out in a couple of hours? Well, you still get that certain amount paid, you still get paid the same amount, whether you work fast or slow. There's no incentive in effect, to get do a better job to get it done quicker. You're paid for the hours of the ITV working for that company. So say it's a JRB, right around 2020 to 25. I'm not sure what it is. But say it's around 20 pound an hour. So whatever you do, if you can earn that company, that they've put in a price for maybe 500 pound, you'll still get your two hours wage, which you'll still get your two hours wage. But what if that was your own job? Well, if you were the boss, you'd be making quite good money. Another disadvantage I found to work for working as an employed electrician, that when you're working for a different company, you're working for them, you're building their reputation, you're building their customer lists, saying you're doing a great job and the customers 12 Fantastically happy with what you've done. They're gonna call that company again to get the work done. They'll never say, right, I want Ben, I want Ben to come and do it, they will just say, right, I want that Ben electrical or whoever you're working for, they'll want them to come and do the job. So you're building up their company to be bigger and better in the long run, which in effect, you've got no loyalty to that customer. Because as electrician, you might know, you work for, oh, I worked for about five or six different companies as an employed electrician back in the day. And I didn't have a customer base, those customers that I did the work for, they will the company's customers, these are the people that are worked for their customers. They're the ones that sort of held that details. So in effect, I was building someone else's business, someone else's dreams. And to me that felt like well, I could do this for myself. Another thing that I found being employed as electrician, that it doesn't matter how good of a spark you are, you could be the best spark in the world. But if you're employed and their management team, or the management side of the company, is rubbish, you've got a bit of a bad reputation. And that company maybe goes under where you're left with no job is you're working as a team to sort of build out that company in there's a few people, there's always there's always a few people in the office that you think is an idiot is rude to the customers. Maybe the customer doesn't like that manager person, that person in the manager role that went out and quoted. But they're like you. So you've got to rely on other people maybe bringing the work and building the reputation of the business as well. Which in my eyes was a little bit of a con because this has happened to me before. When I was an apprentice. I went to Nottingham to do my aim to and the day I got qualified. That company went into liquidation. I didn't have enough a pass my aim to or not. I got a call from the company to say Ben right. When you get back from Nottingham, can you drop your van and the tools back on back off in the office?

We didn't have a clue what I was going to do. I wasn't qualified at the time. So I didn't know what I could do or where I could go. So the best idea I come up with was go to Ibiza for two weeks. I was quite young, I enjoyed a PE so I thought well, I'll just figure it all out when I get back. But luckily when I got back obviously I found out that I passed them too. And I was actually qualified electrician

and that was when I started subbing for different companies. I didn't go to get employed again. A fault, right? Yes, a bit. A lot of people sub they get paid good wages. And that's what a lot of the other lads did that got well we got laid off, we got stopped. We didn't have a job anymore. So a lot of the other lads they went to subcontract him for other companies. So that's exactly what I did as well. And I would say that yeah, it was fun. It was fun subcontracting, because me and my brother, we got a car and we just subcontracted all over the country. We're lodging

out.

But the tough part for me was through my apprenticeship. All I've done is sort of DC power, and a bit of AC work with a maybe armoured cable. But the first subcontracting job I did was building a hotel, Warren out a whole a whole hotel. You know what in, in steel conduit, I had to jump on it a lot as I went along. And this is what I think maybe a lot of guys do when they go to college, or they get a qualification on a bit of paper. And yeah, that may be threaded a bit a rod, or they've been a bit of conduit to a 90 degree angle in college. on sight, it seems is completely different. It's a lot harder, especially when you've got no fault, but no room for fault, sorry. And you don't want to put sliders in everywhere. You've got to make it perfectly nice. You've got to get it to marry straight up to that metal drunken, it's a little bit more difficult. But as it was me and my brother and we knew each other quite well, we just jumped in and sort of got used to it. We trial and error. And we we did our best and we got away with it. Because I didn't quite know just then that you can get away with murder on site.

And I don't know if he's still like it now. But half the people our age are sort of taking a little nap in the material containers because of the skinful that they had the night before. A lot of large lads, even a scaffolders and electricians, the plumbers, the joiners, everyone was sort of lodging out. We're all booked up there to work on that project. And we're all staying in the home to hotel. So in the evenings, it was quite a bit of a pie. I didn't realise that maybe on a Friday. You just show up for possibly an hour. You show up for an hour, you pack your tools away and get on the road to travel back home. Not a lot of people worked maybe on a Friday. Yeah, you got up at four o'clock on the Monday to get there at a decent time. But Friday was sort of home time or you did you had a skinful Thursday night. And you signed the van with a hangover and drove home on the Friday.

I don't know what it's like on site these days. I'm hoping it's a lot different and a lot more strict with the health and safety and maybe the test to see if you whether you had a skin for the night before. Because I don't really remember getting a lot done on site. We just got paid to turn up. And we were sitting around in that electrical cupboard. With obviously our hard hand will our PPE we add on with my brother throw in some bolts at me down the lift shaft. It was just a bit of a

bit of a jolly, I'd say hanging around on site being a subby and there's no incentive to really get much done. Because you got employed, whatever, whatever you got to pay to be there. So yeah, subcontracted for me wasn't it was a bit of a learning curve to get into industrial and commercial. But there was no incentive to get that job done perfectly because you got paid whether you there or not, sometimes, all you had to do as a subcontractor was filling your timesheet, you gave the site manager your timesheet, and you got paid. So sub him was quite an easy one for me as well.

And then after becoming fully qualified, that will give me 16 pounds an hour, which was a great amount of money back in, maybe the year 2000 2003 2002, something like that, quite a few years ago, I'm assuming things have changed. It wasn't until my daughter arrived on 2004 that I decided to start up on my own, I wanted a bit more time at home, I wanted to be around a little bit more. So that's what I thought, what I'm gonna stop on my own and do my own business. And yet, I admit it was scary at first, that is obviously why I continue to subcontract for other local companies for maybe a couple of days a week, where the other three days I'd concentrate on finding my own work. And because I was young, I was never interested in sort of working the weekends. I liked my weekend, the weekends with a party and so I was quite young. So all I did was maybe work, what 100% full pelt in the week. But after I got into the swing of things, I found out that there's a lot of benefits to being your own boss, you get paid so much more. So when you crack the job out and get it done a lot quicker, you get paid even more to

and when you're working for yourself, there's a bit more of an incentive to get the job done. Because being your own boss, you sort of work harder, because you know, if there's anything that goes wrong, you're the one that's going to have to explain to the customer.

what's gone wrong, or maybe why they mean maybe you get charged more. It's all sort of falls down on you. being your own boss. I found this a lot more laid back. You can choose whether you want to lodge out or not. Or whether you want

to actually do the job sometimes, and you don't have to go to your boss and say, Please may I have these two weeks off because I want to go on holiday with my family, you don't have to do that, you can just take the day off, or even the week off, or you can even skip off travelling for a year. And then like some guys, they might go off travelling to Australia. And think about anchor bow, I like it Australia, no, stay there, don't even come back. So it's a lot more sort of laid back vibe to being your own boss, you can do what you want, when you want. And then when you're your own boss, building your own business, you're building your own reputation, you're building your own customer, it's all down to you. So the bigger and better you become, the more work you get. And this can build up and build up and get bigger and better over the years, just like it has with me.

When you make a good impression on a customer, they always remember. And however many years later down the line, they need electrician, they'll always remember you, and maybe you might go to a job with us are so and so recommended me, you might not seen that guy for maybe five or six years, but they still remembered the great job you did, and pass your number on to maybe a factory that needs a load of LED lights changing what a lovely easy job, I've done that before I did a factory to add.

I can't remember how many, but I knew how much the job cost it was a 15 grand job. And it was nice and easy to change these factory fittings over. And that was again, because I was recommended through somebody I did a job for years ago.

And thinking about the van as your own boss, you'd get to keep the van all the time, it's the same van you have you can sit in your van, you can do it nice and neat and tidy and have everything set out exactly where you want it. Because when I was employed as electrician, we used to have to chop and change vans all the time, and half the time you'd get someone else's van. And they wouldn't keep it tidy. Or they wouldn't have the certain kit that you use all the time, they'd let it run out. So it'd be a mess. So that's, to me, maybe an OCD thing. But I like things being just so. So I like turned up to the job knowing exactly what I've got in the van. And what kit I'm going to use. And I've got maybe got two or three spare, because you need that kit, do you need the job to get the job done that day. And I just I enjoy having my own van that I keep nice and tidy and clean. And I look after it

is just being your own boss. It does, it gives you a lot more freedom in your life. And I'm a massive fan of that. And and one of the huge benefits to being your own boss is you can't basically get the sack because you're not exactly going to sack yourself higher. And it might be a little frustrating at first, because you've got serve your own insurance, your own public liability insurance, your van insurance, and you've got to get past by puppy control. But these will initial things you need to set up. Once you've got all them set up. It's sort of easy running. And there is a few more responsibilities you need to consider from being your own boss. Because you need to do the books you need to do the accounts and keep them in order. But you can just be the conductor of the orchestra in effect, you can get an accountant to do that for you.

Another responsibility would be the maintenance of the van, or recommend getting that van serviced once a year and keep our record it ends up making it worth a lot more when you do eventually go to sell it as well. And plus, they always say look after your van and the van oh look after you stick it in the garage every now and again. Get it serviced, because then it will keep you rolling because without a van, you ain't gonna get to the job buyer.

Another thing what a lot of self employed electrician struggle with is finding customers. Because if you haven't got any customers, you basically don't get paid, you don't make any money. But as we all know, you're an electrician, you like a challenge.

And every electrician I know, they've all tried to be their own boss have all tried to be self employed and run their own business. And it may be is for some electricians or it isn't for others. But if you don't give it a go, you will never know.

Because some people they thrive off the challenge about being their own boss and enjoy the challenges that they're faced with every day. But others, they sort of like the easy life. And I'll be honest, both are perfectly good ways of being electrician in today's society. But being your own boss, it just makes you that much more money.

And then let's be honest, if you've become a fully qualified electrician, you've done it for maybe a couple of reasons. Because you enjoy working with electrics and fixing people's houses and fixing people's problems. Or you know that you can earn good money as

electrician, because if you didn't, you'd just be working in a charity shop in town for free. So if you're still on the fence about maybe being your own boss and giving it a go, you've got basically got nothing to lose in my opinion, give it a go be your own boss, start your own business. It could be beneficial to you and maybe just in your life as an electrician. And you could do yourself a benefit by checking out this podcast, how to start your own electrical business properly. With great advice in there on how to start up to be your own boss as an electrician, some great tips and some great tricks on what the lessons that I learned along the way. So I will leave a link to that podcast in the show notes below. So you can easily find it and check it out. So until next time, good luck