Wolfie's Plumbing and Electrical Services - The Northern Beaches Most Trusted Plumbers and Electricians

An award Winning Local Business of the Year, and with innovative client reward programs, Wolfie's Plumbing and Electrical Services leads the pack.

Our Manly spoke to Megan Wolfe about her company's industry forward initiatives and picked her brain on best practice in local business. Here is what we learnt from from the Northern beaches 2007 business of the year!

Our Manly: How did Wolfie's Plumbing and Electrical Services Northern Beaches come to introduce a client rewards program - HOWLING Rewards? It’s the first of its kind in the plumbing and electrical service industry?

Megan Wolfe: Most of our clients have been with us for years and many from when we started the business 10 years ago. We don’t advertise, only in the local Yellow Pages, and recently on Our Manly, and are proud to have built our business on the support and referrals of our existing clients. HOWLING Rewards was developed so we could reward those clients who use us time and again and monitor the quality of workmanship our team of technicians are providing. It’s not a typical rewards program where clients only earn points when they spend money, although they do earn points for that! Clients can earn points for referring our services, providing online feedback on the service and workmanship our technicians provide, paying their service call by credit card when booking, and scheduling both a plumbing and electrical technician during the same appointment. We also have bonus earning opportunities throughout the year, for example, we tripled all points for the month of December last year as a thank you to our clients when Wolfie’s won 3 TrueLocal Business Awards (i.e. Trades & Services, Business/Professional Services and 2007 Local Business of the Year).

O M: The GreenPlumbers® program originated in Australia in 2001 and now has global influence. How is Wolfie’s changing to reflect sustainability concerns? Better efficiency in heat transfer, innovative lighting, preventing water loss?

M W: We believe the best tool is education. Our team of plumbers and electricians regularly attend training courses to ensure we are up-to-date with the latest technology, materials (such as recycled drainage and stormwater pipes) and environmental procedures. We also subscribe to industry magazines and conduct regular research into new opportunities.

Our qualified team strive to provide our clients, both commercial and residential, with advice on water and energy saving solutions ranging from rain water tanks to grey water solutions as well as simpler suggestions such as having shorter showers, installing energy efficient light globes and solar heating systems for hot water.

Educating our team ensures we are equipped with the knowledge and skills to provide our clients with the latest energy and water saving solutions available in Australia and overseas.

O M: How else does Wolfie's Plumbing and Electrical Services Northern Beaches use the internet to its advantage on the Northern Beaches?

M W: Our website has been set up to be simple and user friendly. We encourage our clients to schedule work requests via the website and many of our clients utilise email. We still ensure we contact our clients by phone but email and website bookings are efficient and more precise as everything is written down and can’t be misinterpreted. A number of our clients also request text message notifications, rather than phone calls, prior to our technicians arriving at their property. Instead of sending messages direct from our mobile phone, we use an onlilne smser.

All of our technicians are equipped with PDAs and portable printers. Once we schedule a job in the office on SmartTrade, our job management program, we wirelessly transmit the job sheet and client details to their PDAs. Once they are at our clients’ property they have all the details required to conduct the work, complete the job sheet and invoice the client. The invoice is then emailed to the client or printed on the spot and the job transmitted back to the office. It not only saves time by eliminating handwritten paperwork but our technicians spend more time in the field than they do in the office.

A lot of research is also conducted online about our industry, both in Australia and overseas, to ensure we are up-to-date with the latest tools, equipment and services. Plus internet banking and paying bills online is a great time saver!

O M: Will the Internet level the playing field for women in business? How about between big box stores and mom and pop’s?

M W: I think the internet offers women in business great opportunities, particularly when they are trying to balance motherhood and a career. My children are now 7, 5 and 2 so last year the internet was my saviour work wise. Although I’d still go to the actual office 1-2 days a week when my mum would mind my youngest children, the majority of time I worked from home and accessed our office computer by a remote link. That has been fantastic for me. I don’t have to save files onto a USB or email them home and risk doubling up, everything remains on the one computer. Also, if staff are working on something and need me to check it, I just log on and can see what they have on the screen.

Emails are also a great way of keeping up with work. Although they aren’t as personal as a phone call, it makes it easy to keep in touch with clients when the kids are around and needing my attention.

O M: Is there enough government and local support for training the next generation of plumbers and electricians in Australia today?

M W: Yes and No. On one hand there are apprenticeship centres that are generally very efficient and helpful when you want to employ an apprentice, but on the other hand it’s often difficult to get correct information regarding their employment. Many Government agencies differ with the information they provide which is quite frustrating. The Government has shown that they are starting to provide more support for apprentices with education and training, tool kit purchase cards and monetary incentives. However, further support needs to be provided for the employer. The monetary incentives for the employer are helpful, but in the long run they don’t go very far when you calculate the cost of training an apprentice for the term of their apprenticeship. Further assistance really needs to be provided by the Government for apprentice wages. Unfortunately mature aged apprentices are few and far between as they cannot afford to live on the apprentice wage.

O M: Wolfie's Plumbing and Electrical Services Northern Beaches strategy to stay competitive on pricing?

M W: Naturally we want to remain competitive. We aren’t the least expensive nor the most expensive in the industry. Our pricing strategy reflects the service, workmanship and entire experience we provide our clients. We don’t just go to the job, get paid and that’s the end of it. We take the time to listen to our clients’ requirements, go through the work required and provide a fixed price for our residential clients before we commence any work. Our clients always know how much their job is going to cost before we start work.

O M: Is Wolfie's Plumbing and Electrical Services Northern Beaches getting more or less complicated as it grows?

M W: I wouldn’t say it is complicated either way, just busier. We still have all the paperwork we had when we only had one employee, it has just grown with each additional employee or as the Government and industry introduces new things that we have to report on.

As we grew we started identifying the processes that were becoming time consuming. We sourced SmartTrade (job management program) to streamline our job management such as paperwork, invoicing and job scheduling. Although I’m still involved in the accounts and administration, we have someone that attends to those tasks. Now my husband and I have more time to work on the business rather than in it.

O M: What is your most important resource as a family owned Northern Beaches Plumbing and Electrican business?

M W: On a personal note, my family and friends. Without the understanding and patience of our children and the support of our family and friends owning our own business and raising three young children would be much more difficult. Also, my husband and I are great team. His extensive plumbing knowledge and quality workmanship, coupled with my background in public relations and marketing has proven to be a winning combination.

On the business side, our fabulous team of plumbers and electricians. We are extremely fortunate that we have a supportive and professional team who often go beyond the call of duty. They are always more than willing to be on-call or work later, particularly if we have family commitments.

O M: How do you balance life and work?

M W: Sometimes with great difficulty! I am often torn between spending time with the kids and my husband, keeping on top of the housework, catching up with friends and family and of course, working in the business.

I have a rule that I only work when the kids aren’t with me, such as when they are at school or if my mum is minding them. This isn’t always possible, particularly during school holidays, but if I do have to work when they are at home I try to limit my time to an hour or two whilst they are occupied with an activity. I then make sure I do something with them as soon as I’ve finished. We always eat dinner as a family and follow it up with a story book or a board game before bed. We also ensure we have a couple of weekends a month when our technicians are on call so we can have a completely work free weekend.

Although we work long hours and are often up late catching up on things we wouldn’t have it any other way. If we didn’t own our own business my husband wouldn’t be able to attend special school events or take the kids to after school activities and I probably wouldn’t be able to spend as much time with them as I do. Plus it’s also great having a husband who is more than willing to catch up on things at home and get dinner ready if I’ve got work to attend to.