дискуссия на тему расценок сисадминов в ирландии

[stocking]

для тех кто сисадминит вероятно интересно почем кто берет. на сисадмин.ие развели разговор о ценах, идея и пр. приведу тут письма для тех кто не подписан.



---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Patrick O'Connor <patrick.oconnor@sysadmin.ie>
Date: 2009/2/11
Subject: Straw Poll - IT Consultancy / Contract Sysadmin Rates
To: members@sysadmin.ie


Hi All,
I've been trying to get a handle on what market rates are for contract sysadmin and IT Consultancy work given the recession seems to be forcing prices down across the board. After completing a mammoth job (caused by lack of planning on the clients part) they have been balking at the rates I charged them to pull their asses out of the fire.
It would be very useful if we could perhaps compare rates and see if there is any consensus as to market value, especially since I'm sure I'm not the only one getting squeezed by clients.

I've always believed that I was on the lower end of costs, providing sysadmin support to smaller businesses (focussing on businesses with 0-50 employees) by charging Ђ80 per hour for the first 5 hours in a month and Ђ60 thereafter. I bring a range of windows, linux and networking skills to my clients, albeit not to the degree that some of you heavy hitters dealing with large scale enterprises What do you think about these rates? I'm also starting to provide independant consultancy services, to help advise customers on sane implementations / improvements / consolidations of their existing infrastructure. This is really a more hands off service but from my experience of badly planned jobs, the costs really add up when things go awry. I was toying with the rate of Ђ120 per hour / Ђ840 per day (8 hours) for this service.

The rates, from my experience seem to be fair enough when there is a few hours a month but when it comes to the situation where I and another engineer have to put in some heavy hours concentrated over a short period of time, the s**t hits the fan. Anyone have any ideas on how to accomodate jobs like that without completely devaluing my services?

I'd really appreciate any of your ideas on this becasue as a small operator it difficult to get a handle on what is right / equitable to charge for services.

Thanks,

Patrick
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Decided to post to the lists directly since 20+ people mailed in looking for info.

- Standard Hourly Rate: Ђ75 - Ђ90 .. This is for odd hours here and there.
- Daily Rate: Ђ470 - Ђ550 - The more frequent/stable the work, the lower the price. In fact, if the work is so stable as to be practically permanent the daily rate could easily go to Ђ350.
- Daily Rates charged for work from 9AM - 6PM Monday to Friday, hourly outside those times. e.g. lets say you work 10 hours from 10AM to 10PM, the client would be billed 1 x daily rate plus 2 x hourl rate.
- Hourly rates apply for any weekend work.
- I personally don't get much daily work given the nature of my clients. To suit their needs I also offer a discounted rate of Ђ60 per hour after I have worked 5 hours for them in a month.
- Callout charges are not a good idea, unless of course you have to go out of your way and your client is made aware of this.
- Never ever lower your rates, if you want to give your client a good deal then apply a percentage discount off the price.
- Never ever give anything away for free. For example, if you have a habit of giving phone call support for free, stop! Instead make the client aware that phone calls are billable event e.g. Ђ20 per call. That said, you should never really bill them Ђ20 a call. Instead bundle all calls together and bill them at a steep discount. That way they appreciate the service you are giving and do not exploit you.

- A preferred practice for work like ours is to quote a flat rate for a well defined project. This can be difficult given some clients ad-hoc approach to projects but it should be preferred practice so everyone knows where they stand. Obviously you need to be very conservative with your estimation and avoid over confidence. On the other end of the scale nobody appreciates gouging either! It might take new skills to accurately gauge a project's requirements but these are very powerful management skills that will make your life a lot easier.

One respondant mentioned the difference between a contractor and a consultant. The difference being that a contractor is brought in to accomodate an overflow of work whilst a consultant is hired to deliver a specific project. Here's the link he provided to elucidate...
http://www.stcwestcoast.ca/index.php...c_distinction/

Another respondant sent me this very useful link to a list of rates for IT professionals. This can form the basis of your calculations for billing...
http://www.brightwater.ie/salary-survey.aspx

Finally, this topic has raised an interesting point given the pretty big response. There is quite a bit of interest in establishing a status quo for rates in the industry. I think this interest probably extends further into establishing best practices for other elements too. There is great scope for a professional body of ICT consultants / contractors.
Membership would guarantee that the services and products of the members' would be provided to a particular standard / method. Thinking ahead, this could actually extend to a more structured manner in which members could integrate and inter-operate. The idea of this is something I am actively working on and if people would like to know more get in contact (off list perhaps as it might not be of interest to the majority).

All the Best,
Patrick

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Gary Boland <gary.boland@gmail.com>

I found these posts to be extremely informative and I'm very grateful that you decided to reflect some of the responses you received.

I'd like to question our rates in relation to our professions. I have seen consultants in a number of different fields charge >Ђ250 per houri
Certainly 'daily' rates for the speaking classes are currently Ђ2500 per day, which is nearly 5 times what you are quoting for the average daily rate

While I'll accept we are neither curing cancer nor defending the constitution, I'd like to see the equation that says
"thou shalt earn one fifth the rate of other consultants"









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