Wet hire: pricing a machine and an operator

A wet hire rate bundles a machine, an operator and everything needed to put both on a site.

The machine costs money from the moment it leaves the yard, and it earns only while somebody is using it. The gap between those two is where the rate has to be right.

Float costs are real, and often forgotten

Moving a machine needs a truck, a driver and permits on anything large. That happens twice per job regardless of how long the work takes.

A float charge stated separately makes a short job viable. Folded into an hourly rate it either overprices long jobs or loses money on short ones.

Minimum hire protects the small job

A two hour job consumes most of a day once the float, the travel and the setup take their share.

A four hour minimum is standard for good reason, and saying it at booking prevents a customer expecting to pay for two.

Idle time is billable, and needs agreeing first

A machine waiting for a truck, a surveyor or a decision is a machine the customer is consuming. The operator is there either way.

A stated position on standby time, agreed before the job, turns an awkward invoice line into an expected one.

The operator is half the value

An experienced operator moves more material, damages less and finds problems earlier. Customers who compare only the hourly rate miss that entirely.

Where the business competes on price alone, the experienced operator becomes the reason the job finishes early, which is the argument worth making.

Attachments belong on the quote

Buckets, augers, breakers and grabs each change what the machine can do and what the day costs.

A job needing a breaker for two hours is a different job from one needing a mud bucket, and the rate should say so.

Underground services stop the machine

A site with unknown services is a site where the machine waits for a locator, or worse, finds a service the expensive way.

Raising service location at quote time protects everybody, and it names whose responsibility it is before anybody is standing in a trench.

Spoil has to go somewhere, and that costs

Material coming out of a hole becomes trucks, tip fees and, where the spoil carries contamination, a classification before anybody accepts it.

A quote covering the digging and leaving the disposal vague is a quote with an open end on it. Naming the assumption protects both sides.

Fuel, wear and tyres belong in the rate

Diesel is the visible cost. Tracks, tyres, teeth, hoses and filters wear against machine hours whether anybody budgets for them or not.

A rate covering fuel alone looks competitive and funds nothing towards the rebuild the machine will eventually need.

Track hours by machine, not by job

Machine hours drive servicing, resale value and the true cost of ownership, and they accumulate whether the job was profitable or not.

Our guide to an equipment register covers holding those hours where the service schedule can read them.

Utilisation is the number that decides the fleet

A machine working three days a week earns very differently from one working five, and the finance costs the same either way.

Measuring utilisation monthly answers whether the next machine is an opportunity or an expense, which is the largest decision this business makes.

What to change first

• Float charges appear separately from the hourly rate
• A minimum hire period gets stated at booking
• The position on standby time gets agreed before the job
• Attachments appear on the quote with their own rates
• Service location gets raised at quote time, with responsibility named
• Machine hours record against the machine for servicing and resale
• Utilisation gets measured monthly, per machine