enandess

Thank you for everyones comments... I have refrained from replying as I wanted to give time for any 'other side' contributions to be made. There have been many points that I wanted to add a comment to but rather than go over things adfinitum I thought I would add a quick round up... We left the boat thinking that the bill would be around the £90 estimate. We already had the machine onboard and in place. When we rang the yard to enquire about progress we were told that it was going to be a bigger job than they thought. No explicit mention of revised costs were made and we didn't ask - we thought maybe the bill will double in price but as we wanted to have the machine we thought it would be worth it. If a figure of over £500 had been quoted we would definitely have said stop, please do not proceed. The main aim of my post wasn't to point a finger at any particular yard - indeed from the comments and experiences of others it seems to happen in other yards too - but to highlight how important communication is in situations like this. We should have tied Rose Narrowboats down to indicate a revised cost in our phone call but never thought in a million years that the bill would go to 500... we relied to much on our assumption that things would be reasonable. As a newcomer to the boating world we haven't had the experience that seasoned old hands have to draw on. That said we are learning fast!

Very true... I can only put my side as fairly as I can. More than happy for it to be put under the microscope...

Thanks for everyones comments... as I have mentioned in other replies we have chalked this up to experience. However glad to see the comments from some people with a lot more experience than I have confirming my thoughts about the job.

So you would have thought an established boatyard would realise this and have added a caveat to their estimate that they will be in touch once they have had a look at what is actually involved.

I don't think I was blackening the reputation of anyone. The reason I posted in the 'new to boating' section rather than the 'maintenance' section was to highlight our experience as newbies in not getting what we expected due to not knowing what questions to ask. I do think I would point the finger at a lack of communication - as others have pointed out, to go from an estimate of £90 to a bill of over £500 without discussion seems to me a little short sighted. And to add... I haven't accused anyone of being a 'rip off merchant' - in fact in the earlier comments I made I did make this point. Perhaps you could point out where I have accused any boatyard of ripping me off.

The original £90 estimate was given by what we said in the office. We had thought that some pipes going behind the w machine were water pipes but it turned out they were C/H pipes. The pipes in the kitchen cupboard come up from under the floor and then into the cupboard. Hindsight is 20/20 vision but wish we had waited until I could get the tools from home and had a go myself.

No we didn't... when we dropped the boat off a Rose employee came to have a look and not much was said come to think of it. I mentioned about having a valve so that we could add hot water as I had read somewhere that it was a good idea but that was pretty much about it.

As I mentioned above I am not suggesting rip off just a lack of communication on both sides. We are novice boaters and had trusted Rose Narrowboats (it could equally have been 'insert boatyard of choice') to do the job... when we rang them they merely said the job was bigger than they thought. In hindsight this is when we should have asked for more explanation and Rose should have flagged up their revised estimate. The reason I have posted is as a warning to others to be careful if they want work undertaken so that they don't end up with a surprise like we did.

Although we have renovated houses we are not boat experts but approaching it from our house experience we thought it was a case of feeding off the supply to the kitchen taps and using the existing sink waste for the machine waste. I will try to add a photo to explain. When we picked the boat up they explained that the kitchen cupboard had to be dismantled to access the pipes and a new skin fitting added which is why it took longer.

I am not suggesting that they are a rip off merchant but I do think that they lack some communication skills. After estimating £90 then being presented with a bill for over £500 you would have thought someone would think to phone us to check we still want to go ahead. It seems a bit illogical to have a £40 machine costing over £500 to install and if I was the fitter/boss alarm bells would be going off as to the sense of carrying on.

As a new arrival to the world of canals I have quickly found out that BOAT means an empty wallet but was shocked at how much fitting a washing machine cost us recently! We had a second hand Candy machine that cost us £40 but didn't have any tools on the boat to install it. As we were near Rose Narrowboats we asked them if they could do the job for us. It was going in a space next to the kitchen sink so a fairly straightforward job we thought and so did they, suggesting 2 hours labour - £90 - would see the work completed. 2 weeks later and after some phone calls from us chasing things up when Rose Narrowboats said that it was going to be a bigger job than they thought, we were presented with a bill for £518! Ouch! The moral of the story is to get a proper quote in writing before work starts rather than rely on a verbal exchange. We were (are) wet around the ears so thought maybe the bill might double... Rose Narrowboats never suggested that we were looking at over £500 because if they had we would have said forget it. The aim was to save the hassle and expense of launderette visits but as it stands for the cost of the install we could have a couple of years worth of service washes with round trip taxi fares included! Needless to say they will not be getting any other work from us... feel free to pm me if you want more info.

Thanks for the heads up... I did agree with this sentiment earlier... the 2 examples I gave are completely different fish even to my untrained eye. This is a good point... and seems to be one of the major benefits of getting a used boat compared to a new one. Thanks again for all your wisdom... I think the general message seems to be get out and look around and the right boat will come along. I am hoping that the more we talk to people and the more boats we see, will get us up to speed as to what to look out for. When you hear horror stories of lemons being passed off as bargain buys or boats needing major work just after purchase, I do not want us to be the next victim. Without wishing to make a nuisance of myself, I have no doubt I shall be asking more questions and seeking more advice on our boat buying journey!

Thanks to everyone for taking the time to add your thoughts. We are finding out quite quickly that there never seems to be a clear cut answer to our questions but instead varying degrees of opinion as to what the right answer is. I think, as mentioned by others here and elsewhere, we will know the right boat when we come across it and age, price will be an irrelevance; much like buying a house, you just know which one is the right one. We will be getting ourselves out and about over the coming weeks/months... hopefully the boat finds us sooner rather than later!

Thanks for your comments thus far... I did think about including an analogy between a Rolls Royce and Ford Focus in my original post but decided not to. From your comments it would seem that there is no definitive answer to the question... maybe it's a 'how long is a piece of string' question?!? I know I have certainly seen quite a rise in overall pricing since we started our research a year ago or so with some prices making me think the world has gone mad. We had originally thought we would go down the decent second hand route for the reasons mentioned, but when we started seeing the disparity in prices it made us think again. As Athy pointed out, the true test of what something is worth is the price someone is prepared to pay for it. I am not totally convinced paying top dollar for a boat with a particular badge on it is worth the extra. However, I do think paying top dollar for reliability is worth it. So this brings me back to where I started I guess. If 2 boats have the same engine, made from the same grade of steel etc, I am not yet convinced for me, paying an extra £50,000 is worth it simply to have a brand attached to the boat. That said, I suspect from what I have read elsewhere, that this torturous brain wringing will count for nothing when we see *the* boat and it is what it is as we hand over the cheque (or carrier bag full of dosh!).

As we search for our boat I am increasingly bewildered by the price of differing boats. I understand how the various 'brands' and fitouts will affect the price, but, as an example, when I see a new boat costing less than a 10 year old boat, is the price differential between one and the other really that justified? www.apolloduck.com/boat.phtml?id=559080 www.apolloduck.com/boat.phtml?id=560404 We are no where near experts although we have done lots of research, and we are getting stuck on the new versus used issue. With a budget of around £60,000 is it better to go for a new boat from a less known builder but still with some type of warranty or is it better to go with an older boat from a favoured builder? Looking at the maths would it be fair to say that a 10 year old boat is going to lose a third of its value from new? This means that in the example above the new boat at £62000 is likely to lose £20000 in 10 years time but we will have had the benefit of having a new boat without any corrosion issues etc. Would the depreciation on the older boat have levelled out by now so we could still expect a similar return when we come to get our next boat (this will be the first boat we have owned so fully expect to learn what we thought we wanted in a boat turns out to be wrong so will want to sell it). Would appreciate your thoughts and suggestions.