Do electricians charge for quotes?
For standard work, no; a reputable Bristol electrician quotes defined jobs free, and we do. The honest exceptions are diagnosis (finding a fault IS the work, so it bills as fault-finding) and large-project surveys where a detailed specification takes real hours, which some firms charge and credit against the job.
Quoting a defined job free is normal and right: a fuse box, an EV charger, a room of downlights can be priced from a survey visit or good photographs plus a conversation, and pricing that work is part of winning it.
The boundary cases are worth understanding rather than resenting. Fault-finding cannot be quoted before diagnosis because the diagnosis is the labour; anyone who quotes your mystery trip a fixed repair price sight-unseen is guessing, and one of you will pay for the guess. Similarly, a full rewire specification on a large house is hours of survey and design; firms that charge for that document usually credit it to the job, which keeps it fair.
What free never buys: pressure. A free quote that arrives with same-day-discount theatre ('sign now and it is £300 less') is a sales tactic, not a price. Real prices survive being slept on.
Our practice: free quotes on defined work, fault-finding billed as the diagnostic visit it is, and every price in writing with its assumptions stated, valid long enough for you to think.
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