Get More Damp Proofing Work

Why damp proofing quotes get turned down

Because the customer has been told to be suspicious of you, and increasingly they have been told correctly.

Consumer guidance on damp now routinely says: get a diagnosis from someone who is not selling the treatment. That advice exists because the free-survey-then-quote model has produced a great deal of unnecessary injection work, and it is the model most of your competitors run.

So you arrive as a competent operator, and the customer is measuring you against a warning.

The honest operator's dilemma

Diagnose properly, check ground levels, gutters, pointing, ventilation, and a large share of the time the answer is not rising damp. It is condensation, or a bridged DPC, or a failed downpipe.

Say so, and you have just told the customer they do not need the thing you sell.

That feels like lost work. It is actually the most valuable thing you can do, because the customer who was told the truth tells other people, and the surveyor who sent them starts sending more.

Where the work comes from

Chartered surveyors, who need a damp firm they can recommend without risk to their own reputation. This is the single most valuable relationship available to you and it is won by being the firm that does not over-diagnose.

Estate agents and conveyancers, where a damp report has held up a sale.

Builders, who find damp mid-project.

Homeowners searching, often after a survey flagged something.

What separates you from the quote below yours

Charge for the survey. A paid, independent-standard survey signals that you are not selling a cure. It also filters out the customers who were never going to instruct.

Report what you checked, not just what you concluded. Ground levels, gutters, pointing, ventilation, internal environment. A report showing the work behind the conclusion is worth many times one that says "rising damp, £2,400".

Say when it is not rising damp and what to do instead. Some of that work you can do; some you cannot. Referring it out builds the relationship that brings the next three jobs.

Be clear that replastering is usually the larger cost. Customers who discover that after accepting a per-metre injection price feel misled.

Make the guarantee real. Insurance-backed, with a named underwriter. Thirty-year guarantees from firms that dissolve in four are why nobody believes them.

Making the money conversation easy

Labour-led work, so no deposit is needed. Saying so plainly, in a trade where large up-front payments are common, is a differentiator by itself.