June 2010
4 posts
Hips abolition paves way for return of ‘chancers’
The abolition of home information packs (Hips) has opened up the housing market to chancers once again, it has been claimed.
Restrictions imposed by the much-maligned Hips discouraged opportunitists from putting their property up for sale in the hope of being offered a very good price, according to Briffy.com.
Founder of the...
Women opt for DIYers over green-fingered men
Survey reveals that women prefer men who can tackle jobs around the home to those who are handy in the garden, despite just 38% of male respondents admitting they enjoy DIY.
The survey by Bosch revealed that 37% of women want a man who can easily put up a shelf of fix a wonky door knob, but just 16% want a green-fingered partner.
Just over a third...
Tesco announced on Tuesday that Terry Leahy is to retire, bye bye Tel. As one of the greatest business minds of his generation moves from running his “corner shop” to the private investment market we have to ask - does anyone care?
What a week for our find a local tradesmen...
Wow! Last week was a very successful week here at Vetted Tradesmen and Quotation Supermarket. Our find a tradesman service received over 1,000 job leads and more than 300 new tradesmen registered for work. This is fantastic news it means we are well on our way to increasing the amount of job leads we get by 30% by Christmas 2010.
Congratulations to Keith and Alan who have worked tirelessly to...
May 2010
5 posts
Supply of rental properties rises
Nice houses are in demand, not just flats for students. The number of properties up for rent has jumped as people who cannot sell their homes decide to let them instead.
The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (Rics) says the slump in house sales is forcing many more people to become either landlords or tenants.
In July, Rics members saw new instructions...
CUT THE VAT ON HOME IMPROVEMENTS
There is a National campaign running to eradicate VAT on home improvements. Show your support today by visiting http://ping.fm/ScsLG
Getting Help With The Cost of Home Improvements.
Improving your home doesn’t have to cost a lot of money. The Government offers a wide variety of home improvement grants and low interest loans. See this link for more info.
http://ping.fm/FyiNA
Nick Clegg - Deal or no Deal?
Well I hope he’s ready for the questions Noel because the banker is on the phone in the form of the Great British Public and we want an answer.
I’ve been on to the Conservative and Labour websites and read their Housing and Construction policies. The put what I think, I’m no Ian Hislop but I hope you found it as enjoyable to read is as I found writing it.
Who...
Hi Everyone, sorry about the gap between posts i’ve been quite ill over the last week or so.
This week we have a new marketing avenue to pursue that we envisage bringng an additional 4,000 job leads per week taking us to nearly 10,000 job leads sold EVERY WEEK. WOW!
I’m going to go and have a flick through the last weeks news stories and get some interesting ones posted here. Spk...
April 2010
9 posts
Royal Liverpool Hospital plan backed by ministers
Work on the new hospital could start in 2012
Plans for a new hospital to replace the Royal Liverpool have been approved by the government.
Trust bosses said the £451m development would transform health services for communities in the city.
All in-patients will get private rooms in the 643-bed hospital, which will also have parkland...
Have you heard up to 1,000 construction jobs may be needed to build power plant in South Wales. To be honest I can think of much better places for 1,000 new jobs than Port Talbot!!!!
Check this out, Gyppo’s Getting Homes from The Government - http://ping.fm/GlrkU
A fighting Chance for Brummy Builders - A midlands University is celebrating today after plans for a new £17m Engineering Academy were given funding approval from Government Minister Ed Balls (Love that name!!!).
The Aston University Engineering Academy, which is led and sponsored by Aston University, is seen as vital in raising the aspirations of young engineers and developing a creative and...
All us “plucky” brits dont need to know this but here it is anyway - How to complain, by TV’s Dominic Littlewood - mirror.co.uk http://ping.fm/iSEk4
BBC - Watchdog http://ping.fm/gWZTn
DIY and Home Improvement Forum - DIYnot.com http://ping.fm/plmGd
Mid Week update - WOW we have issued over 1200 job leads this week so far. We have 32 new registered businesses and more than 20 rejections.
I’m going to a meeting later today to speak to the Business development manager of Click Liverpool, one of Merseysides top news agencies.
New Squidoo Lens for Vetted Tradesmen.
One of the biggest parts of growing our business is SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) and SMO (Social Media Optimisation) this drives loads of people looking for tradesmen to our website. As part of this we have set up a series of micro-sites.
We’d love to hear your feedback on how we can improve these sites and make them more useful and interesting to our readers.
Don’t forget the...
March 2010
7 posts
Bigger boys strikes again!
Balfour Beatty-owned company to build Eton Manor, which will host swimming and tennis events during 2012 Games
Mansell Construction Services has won the last major construction contract for the 2012 Olympic Games.
The Balfour Beatty-owned company will build Eton Manor at the northern end of the east London park, on the former site of the Lee Valley Eastway Sports Centre.
During the Games...
Take a leaf from the Yanks.
I was on an online Builders magazine from America earlier today and spotted a rather interesting article about how some Yank Builders are increasing their revenues from new builds by offering new ways of enhancing the customers plot with extra spaces etc.
Add second homes and second incomes by upselling smaller spaces on existing property
Guesthouses have gone beyond a second-thought approach...
7 tags
Another interesting week.....
Construction News has just launched a new campaign to “Vote For Construction”.
This is brilliant news and we would love all Vetted Tradesmen members to get behind it.
The aim of Construction News’ Vote for Construction campaign is to get the construction message across to MPs and prospective parliamentary candidates to explain how the industry can help achieve their political...
How much time do you make your customers wait?
According to THIS ARTICLE from The Telegraph.
Over the course of a year, the average Brit has to wait in for tradesmen for an average of six hours and three minutes.
That’s an overall average of 366 hours (15 days) waiting for workmen to arrive over your life.
That’s not the worst bit - some are left waiting even longer as 82 per cent said a contractor turned up late, while more than a...
Too good to be true?
Some members have contacted us recently saying they have been approached by companies offering to train them to be ‘Energy Assessors’. These companies promise instant employment in a “booming” industry once you have completed their training course at a cost of anything between £5,000 and £12,000.
A lot of the traders we have discussed this with have expressed concerns over the...
Liverpool Council Green Light for £350m New...
Liverpool’s biggest ever school rebuilding programme has been given the go ahead. The government has approved Liverpool city council’s proposals for Wave 6 of the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme. This means work can now get underway on the next phase of the largest ever investment in the city’s education. The £350 million plan will see 24 Liverpool secondary...
3 tags
Wow my first blog....
Hi everyone and welcome to my first ever blog post.
In my blog I’ going to sift through the daily news releases for any relevant tradesmen related issues and post them here. This blog will be a one stop shop for any developing construction news.
I’ll also be keeping our members up to date with info and any major changes to the organisation.
I hope you enjoy reading my blog as much...