On 17 Oct 2005 02:37:26 -0700, wrote:

My foundations will be around 4 x 5 metres, one side by a party wall,
one side by my house wall, another side 2 metres from a public sewer.
The foundations near the sewer must be over 2 metres deep. The rest of
them should be 1 metre. I am starting to think the best plan may be to
get a company to do this work, presumably with insurance against
damaging the sewer with the probably using 3 tonne digger. Any idea of
the cost for this, and how much I would be paying in labour against
materials. Not including the floor slab. I will still to that.
Thanks,
Simon.

Digger hire 3 days at 60 quid
Dumper hire 3 days at 40 quid
2 men at 9 quid an hour for 3 days
concrete at 70 quid a cube, going up with the price of oil so check.
skips at 30 quid per cube of muck

+ VAT

at a guess

If you can claim the VAT back, you can claim the VAT on operated
machines, but not on self drive. Also they will work faster than you
could, so the extra you pay on the men, is saved by then not needing
so much machine time. The same appys to the concrete delivery, these
guys charge by the minuite if you keep em hanging arround too long
(you get 10 minuites plus 5 minuites a cube).

What I do is become a laborer for them, so I get one guy with a digger
and dumper, then drive the dumper, work the shovel, make the tea,
order the stuff up etc etc ....... This normally means I work 12+
hours a day, and they work 7.5.

I guess your costs will be up, due to the sewer, you may need a bigger
company with more organisation, rather than just a "man and digger"
operation.

Rick