I run a design, landscape and maintenance company based in North London. I have a very good landscaper who I currently pay £12.50 per hour. He does excellent work, is good with clients and does all day to day running of his jobs, ordering materials etc, although I still do main contract management.
He has just asked me for a pay rise, up to £16 - 17.50 per hour.
I want to keep him, as he is a good worker and a lovely guy to boot, and probably does warrant a higher hourly rate, but I can't afford £17.50 per hour. Charge out rate is £25 btw.
My instinct is to offer him £15. Another complication is that my other 'foreman', who runs all the gardening and maintenance jobs, is on £12.50. I feel that that is about right, and that landscaping is a more skilled and thus warrants a higher wage. However, he won't be happy, but I feel that I can deal with it, although it is bound to cause some friction unfortunately.
I was wondering what other people pay for a comparable landscape foreman, and garden foreman come to that. Obviously this will vary over the country, but he told me that landscaper friends in Bath were surprised at how little he was paid and that they are on at least £16 per hour.
Any input welcome please, as this is a decision that I do not want, and cannot afford, to get wrong.
Thanks.
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Dangerous thing, listening to what other people earn as most don't / won't tell the truth.....
Suggest you go query AndersPlus web site and see who is advertising similar jobs and/or see what candidates they are trying to place and on what salary. We used them a couple of years ago when 'recruiting' a 'Supervisor':
http://www.andersplus.com/candidates.php
You could let him 'know' you are looking at what any 'available' candidates are expecting to receive on the open job market ;-)
Ultimately, the answer is down to his worth to your business..what effect would this increase have on your costs and ability to recover this thru' your rates....
Thanks Gary. Good advice. I have looked at AndersPlus. Seems like asking rate varies between£24-30K. Which equates to £11.50 - 14.50 p hr.
I will mull it over and make a decision tomorrow.
I had a decision like this to make a few years ago, - I wanted to keep the staff, but couldn't afford what they wanted to be paid, - I did the sums many times, but it boiled down to, - did I want to work harder for less so that I could pay them more. - The answer for most business's particularly in the short term is, - no way.
If you are paying them a fair rate, maybe offering a bonus for bringing in more work would help?
Jeremy can you be sure the member of staff in question won't find this discussion online? Would it make things awkward if he did?
Its hard to tell simply from the numbers quoted but it boils down to what he's worth to your business.
For that sort of money,in London, I'd be expecting him to be jockeying about £250k PA into the business but it all depends on your margins.
We will soon be back to dark nights, peoples minds on things other than their gardens, offer him a whopping 10% pay rise now (£1.25) with another 10% starting may 2013, this gives you time to alter your pricing to allow his cost out on next years projects, make him sign a none dis-closer regarding the rise If your gardener comes demanding the same you have found out were the landscapers loyalty lies get shut of both, you run the asylum not the inmates
Could it be that you are paying £12.50 to a full time employee and his friends in Bath are self employed or on short term contracts?
Thanks for everyone's input into this vexed question. Although it's unlikely that the employee in question will see these posts, I think it is good advice to move the thread to the private group. Can this be done Phil?
You can only pay your people what the business can afford.
Your costs do not stop at the hourly rate paid to an employee but also include employers NI and holiday pay.
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