Any experiences with this website?

[IronMike16]

Hi everyone,

I have been a follower of this forum for a couple of months now, but this is actually my first post. So please be nice to me if this question has been asked before...
www.egenie.com

Our roof needs to be renewed and the local contractors I have contacted so far do not seem to be very interested in this job, god knows why. After almost 2 weeks of making countless phone calls and having 3 different people come to my house, I am tired of wasting more time.

So I searched google and found a pretty interesting website which I hope can solve my problem.

Before I post my job on the website I would like to find out if anyone has made some experiences he/she would like to share with me.

The website is kind of an auction service for services. For me as a user the site is totally free of cost, I think they finance themselves through advertising and the money they receive from the tradesmen.

Please let me know if you have any more details for me!

Thank you!

Mike

 

[stephenf8542]

Like a lot of these websites they were set up with good intentions to get rid of cowboys,but often they have the opposite effect.
If tradesmen pay to get your contact details they can be a lot out of pocket and still get no work .they also encourage the kind of people in some cases that they were set up to try and drive out.
If people are in an auction for your business some will undercut each other to the point where the skilled tradesmen cant compete
There's a lot of good people out there but don't always go by the price
there's more to it than that

 

[SurreyRoofingEstimator]

Your best bet would be to go to the National Federation of Roofing Contractors (NFRC) website to find local contractors who will give a fair price for the work (this doesn't always mean cheapest).

I'm surprised you're not having too much luck though in the current climate. All the contractors in this area would be biting your hand off for a good domestic re-roofing enquiry

 

[IronMike16]

Thank you for your answers!

I am aware of the fact that I get what I pay for. That's why I am not looking for the cheapest offer but for the best value for money.

In my opinion it's a good thing that the contractors bidding for a job can see that they are in direct competition with others - that way I might be able to save some money.

 

[stephenf8542]

The ''ceritfied proffesional'' title is given when you pay a monthly premium to the website so you get more leads not because they check you out

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

Please don't feed the spammers!

 

[IronMike16]

I honestly do not know what the problem is here - I am neither spamming nor advertising! All I did was that I asked a simple question because I am having troubles finding someone reliable. I thought internet forums existed exactly for that reason?! To all those people who believe that I am spamming, please ignore my posts and get involved in other discussions...

As far as I understand it, the tradesmen only receive the "certified professional" status once they have turned in their certificates, so they do have to have some kind of qualification.

I have posted our job over the weekend and I am curious to find out what happens...

 

[kevindgas]

as I can't see any website without an address I can't be specific
but generally, as a tradesman (gas & electrical) I would never use these sites to find work, why would I want to give money to quote for a job!!

I also don't subscribe to parasites like checkatrade who again are leechs sucking the money of trades to justify their own pityful existances.

 

[danielroofer]

Im a member of Checkatrade. I think they are very good and professional. Its good to point customers to an independant company that provides unbiased customer feedback it can help gaining trust with a customer. They were quite fussy about accepting my application - phoning my references, checking insurance and an hour long interview. They even phoned me the other day to tell me my public liabilty insurance had expired and asked for a copy of the new policy to be sent by post before they updated my profile.

That said I have seen sites where customers post jobs and tradesman bid for the work. Not something for me. I wouldnt want a tradesman in my house who has wasted his time sat behind a pc bidding and under bidding for work. I would rather find someone less desparate even if they were more expensive. Good tradesman are generally busy working not scraping these types of sites for work. I know we are in a recession but im still fairly busy and so are all the other good tradesman I know.

I looked at one site that even charged a percentage of the contract total - disgusting.

Get a few quotes, ask akward questions to suss them out, follow up references, do a web search, check their public liabilty insurance, ask friends or local web forums for reccomendations. Its not hard to find a good tradesman.

 

[IronMike16]

Again, thank you for your replies and the tips. One of the reasons why I wanted to try that site was because of a reason mentioned here: I can see the ratings received by future customers!

Where else would I get that chance if not on one of those websites? I personally do not know any tradesmen and therefore would only have the possibility to try my luck - and I don't want to do that.

I have already received some quotes and believe that it will be one of them...

 

[Mw Roofline]

Mike, get lost

Any moderator with half a brain cell must realise that 'Mike' from London doesn't really need his roof replacing

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

Any moderator with half a brain cell

Ahh, i think I see the problem!

 

[IronMike16]

@MW Roofline:

O.k., no, i really don't. That's why I am trying to find help over the internet, writing post after post event though my "spam" was deleted. Because it makes so much sense to keep writing in this forum after MW Roofline found out that I was simply trying to advertise a website that is not even mentioned in this thread! But I will just keep spamming, because so many more people will visit the mystery-website...

Anyways, I did find someone who will start work in a week from today.

Thanks to those of you who posted constructive info...

 

[Mw Roofline]

Thanks to those of you who posted constructive info...

You're welcome