Well There's only one way to start this podcast.

MERRY CHRISTMAS. I hope you have woken up with plenty of presents and a good appetite for christmas dinner!

That's my favourite part of christmas - The food.

At this time of year, its where you have a little time to yourself to sit and relax.

Turn your phone OFF and hope there are no call outs that are just too good to pass up.

Trust me it happens - people have everything running in the kitchen and fuse trips!

Normally a family member who puts it on, think about the kids going hungry and Christmas being ruined.

What can you do but save the day for £500.

Tool Box Talk For Electricians Helping electricians reduce stress, gain back time and earn more money. Merry christmas

Welcome to the last podcast of 2023 - of course I will be back in 2024 on the 1st of Jan, which is also a monday.

It's that time of year you get a chance to sit back and relax.

Nobody is at work really, if they are there earning double bubble, or even triple.

You can almost put money on someone giving you a call because something has gone wrong with their electrics.

More than likely the customer who didn't go ahead with your quote because you were too expensive.

You quoted to run a new circuit to the kitchen when they found out that the building could put in 20 spurs and it is all working for £100.

If you haven't had a drink already - Have one! That's the best excuse to not be able to leave the house.

This is why electricians do what they do. I always do a job to work at full capacity.

Ovens on their own supply, and the kitchen sockets on their own circuit.

If it's been bodged it is going to go off at Christmas when every single item is used to get the dinner ready.

That's when your phone starts to ring.

If you have been in business for a good amount of time, it must have happened to you.

Its always a family member or a close friend.

They pull on your heart strings and say Christmas will be ruined if they can't cook dinner.

Now this is all well and good, but you need to mention that you are getting pulled away from YOUR family Christmas too.

Some people think tradesmen sit looking at their phone waiting for a call.

Years ago I went through court to be able to see my daughter, when you don't see your only daughter on christmas day - you really don't feel like celebrating.

I made up for it with a huge amount of presents and a party when it was all over - like Australia having another Christmas in the middle of the year.

But this Christmas I got a call.

10am, some one had started to get the dinner on and it just didn't want to work.

It was a close friend, they said they didn't expect me to come out, they were just after some advice on what to do.

Like i'm going to try to explain it all over the phone, I was only sitting watching TV so I over to pop over.

It turned out the ring circuit had been split sometime with one socket for a lamp in the living room and the rest of the downstairs sockets on a 16 amp mcb.

That was getting overloaded with all the appliances in the kitchen.

I wasn't going to run and cables that day, so I just split the ring in the kitchen to spread the load.

It worked and saved the day.

I didn't want to tell him how much I was going to charge on christmas day, but that £500 bought my daughter a load more presents.

This is the only time I have actually gone out on christmas day to a call out, another day It's all about me and the family.

But if you're prepared to go out on the most popular holiday of the year - most people will pay anything for you to save the day.

One of the best call outs I have ever done was a ram raid on a post office.

Someone had stolen a red astra and a petrol grinder and drove it through the doors to raid the cash machine.

I think they got £700 cash from it.

I got a call at 4 in the morning to attend and make all the electric cables safe.

I was told there are bare cables everywhere and nobody can do anything in case they got a shock!

Well the bare cables was and alarm cable for the door.

The door was gone so all I could do was isolate the door contact so the alarm could go back on.

Do you know how much I got paid for that???? Over 2k.

That was a good day to be an electrician.

There are some electricians who make a business of being a call out electrician.

24 hour on call emergency service. And they get paid well.

Especially with insurance jobs. I used to do a lot of work for a company who worked for an insurance company. They never argued at the price and just wanted all the paperwork to pass on, I bet they put a mark up on it too.

If you want to get a new car, bike or van - Go on call for 6 months.

You will have to get out of bed at all hours, and be good at fault finding.

A lot of the time, it's cut your losses and rewire the whole thing, if it's going to take you hours to find fault, but 2 hours to rewire…

Go for the rewire.

I wouldnt say its a fun job to do, as the client or customers are always waiting for you to fix it and get it all back up and running, especially in a restaurant - time is money.

And that's the thing with being a call out electrician, if the property had a fault, they cant open.

So paying an electrician £100 an hour can be cheaper than closing for the day.

That's just another idea I have put in your hear for 2024.

And that's the next time you will be hearing from me - next year.

Don't worry - It's not that far away.

Have a lovely Christmas and I will see you all again in 2024.