Do customers understand the cost implications of their decisions?

Let's start with the good news. Most homeowners have a clear vision of what the end-result should look like. They might have looked for inspiration in interior design magazines or have used professional designers or architects to help them form a vision of what the end-result should look like.

However, very few homeowners have sufficient experience (let alone expertise) to properly evaluate the cost impact their design choices can result in. To an untrained eye, two custom kitchen designs may look very similar but be worlds apart when it comes to cost.

More than meets the eye

Although two products may be very similar in appearance the work required the completing work may be very different. This may be due to the material used but could equally be because of the time required to complete the build (e.g., because of preparation work).

Another example of customers struggling to appreciate cost implications is connected to change requests. Many customers make minor changes to the construction throughout the project. This is normal aspect of any construction project and includes things like the choice of tiles, fittings, drain types or appliances and may require significant structural changes to the original plan and lead to delays, additional work, and increased cost.

Unwanted surprises

Unfortunately, providing accurate, ad-hoc, cost estimations on the construction site is difficult and estimates are known to be wildly off by the time the customer receives the invoice for the work. This can lead to complaints and customers refusing to pay their invoices.

How to fix the challenge

At Buildbite, we want to do our bit in making construction projects less frictous despite the gap in knowledge between professional builders and customers. Bridging the gap requires proactive and transparent sharing of planned tasks prior to work commencing.

Using Buildbite, customers and specialists can easily share pictures, drawings and design ideas and discuss these in detail prior to work getting started. A specialist craftsman can use simple drawings to explain and visualize to a customer how a certain task would need to be completed and what the cost implications are. By creating a change request the customer can be required to approve of these changes to avoid misunderstandings.

Start your free trial with Buildbite today.