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Fuel surcharge

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Bonibelle:
I just received the final bill from my water/well fiasco and I was surprised that the plumbing company has added a fuel recovery surcharge for each visit to my house. As I think this over, it is really making me angry! And I am sure the way that I view this charge will make some people in business angry as well but my feeling is that plumbers, electricians, contractors (and to keep this relevant, even spa service people) conduct their business at my house...that is why they are in business. They could not do business if they didn't travel to the site of business, so fuel to get there should be considered a business expense. Just because the cost of fuel has gone up drastically, I don't feel that I should be expected to absorb all of that cost. To put it in perspective, my husband drives to his job 45 miles round trip, and WE are paying for the extra fuel costs, we have no one to pass that on to. He can't tell his employer that he wants an extra $5.00 to drive to work each day)Likewise, my grocery store, Walmart, Target, Sears...merchants havent reduced the price of things because it now costs me more to go there to buy their products.

I am paying over $3000.00 for this repair to my plumbing and $20.00 in fuel recovery fees. (OK.. $20.00 isn't much, but they had to come back because they didn't fix the problem the first time). I know for a fact that the one day, they came from a job only 1/2 a mile away from me.

Am I right in thinking that fuel costs can be incorporated into the cost of doing business and don't companies that are service related deduct some of this at tax time?  

My trash company hit us with an $11.00 fuel recovery fee / 3 months ANd an administrative fee, to send a bill....Needless to say all of those blue cans have been replaced by green ones belonging to a competetor who charges one fee (and if they are adding for the rising cost of gas, it is incorported in regular fees! )

I am sure that with all the added fuel charges, these companies have way more than they need to cover the increase in fuel prices and are probably realizing a profit. If companies are going to do this, they should be required to tell the customer up front... Geeze I wonder if my oil delivery company will hit me with a fuel delivery fuel surcharge?? >:( >:( >:(

spaman--:
I think its happening all over, but your repair company was up front about it and didnt hide it in the bill, so they will get it one way or another, unfortunate I know!

Dr. Spa™ Ret.:
Sorry Bonibelle, but this is going to piss you off.

Fuel is a cost of doing business, but like EVERY OTHER "cost of doing business", YOU, the consummer IS paying for it. As costs to do business go up, the cost to the consummer, YOU, is going to go up. Do you REALLY believe the company should have to absorb additional costs to bring in the same amount of income? They're not responsible for the incresed prices, and they shouldn't be liable for it. In my opinion, they're MORE than right in passing these extra costs along, and the $20 sounds cheap :-).

Let me give you a real life example. We make covers for a few spa manufacturers. All of them get fulkl trailer loads at a time. Roughly 180 to 210 covers depending on size. I give them a delivered price (with some "outs", but I'll omit that for now). The customer furthest away from me, when we started thsi "arrangemet" 8 months ago, cost $3000 for the delivery. NOW it's costing $5500. I'm not eating the $2500 per truck load. HELL, I'm not making that much per load....so, where it the $2500 supposed to come from? A second morgage on my house? :-)

Over the last coupls of years copper prices have been SOARING. Do you know that you can sell scrap copper for $3 a pound??????? Man I wish I didnt throw away what I had a few years ago. Anyways, most plumbers now, when they estimate a job, call and get a current price on copper pipe prices before writing the estimate. A plumber friend of mine actually writes into the contract that the price is subject to change based upon copper prices. Would it be fair to the plumber to have to eat the costs of the price increase?

As far as your husbands commute to work. Hey, he chose the job, and where to live. I chose to live 3 miles from my office. He needs to hit the boss up for a cost of living raise.

Once again, the "cost of doing business" does NOT come out of the pocket of the company in business, but out of the pocket of the consummer buying their product. If it came out of the businesses pocket, there wouldn't be a business there for very long.

would you have been happier if they just raised their normal rate to cover the fuel costs and didn't itemize it? How would this be different? So what's your husbands job?

Dr. Spa™ Ret.:
OMG! I typed all that?

Dr. Spa™ Ret.:
Here, let me give you a hypothetical example, based on reality. Lets say a company is buying spa covers from us. After all the overhead for manufacturing the covers is paid for, for each cover there's $5 remaining that goes into my pocket, or perhaps is used for expansion. Regardless, this $5 is the profit on a cover. Now, lets say, that because of rising oil prices, and the fact that a spa cover is 95% oil products, the cost to manufacture a cover increases $6. Now I'm not even breaking even, I'm losing $1 for every cover I manufacture and sell. So where's this dolar come from? My kids college fund? A second morgage? Begging on the street corner?

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