Materials costs - TilersForums.com

[hazza1969]

I wonder if someone could give me a vague idea of how much adhesive and grout should cost to tile an average sized bathroom at current UK prices? (16 square metres of wall and 3 square metres of floor tiling)

Thanks.

Harry.

 

[Fekin]

That would depend on wether you are trying to guage what a tiler is charging you for doing the job for you, or are you buying it from a shop like Topps or B&Q.

Then it all depends on what quality of adhesive and grout you are on about.

If you go into somewhere like Topps Tiles just look on some tubbed adhesive and it will say how many sqm thast size of tubb will cover, same for grout.

You can pay anywhere from £9.99 for crappy B&Q 4.6L tub tile adhesive that will cover upto 5.5m2 or upto £30 for the better end of the range, same idea for grouts too.

 

[hazza1969]

Thanks for the swift reply. I'm trying to guage whether £170 is a reasonable charge for the above job.

That was £170 for the materials only. Labour extra, obviously.

 

[scrubmuncher]

As fekin said, alot of what ifs. Would need more info than that to give a rough idea. Other than that just check out how much it would cost down Topps. If you want to know how much it would cost your tiler for the ads n grouts, trim, levellers, primers n whatever else needs to be used I wouldnt know, depending where we buy from we all get different trade discounts and different % on different gear, depends what he needs to use. I can tell you it costs a lot more for pro gear as apposed to DIY muck than the average client would think.
If you are trying to do the math, get a couple of quotes in and that'll give you an idea if your getting hit a bit hard.


Have you had any other quotes yet?

 

[hazza1969]

Therein lies the problem. It was organised by my other half. The job's been done and I'd assumed she'd got a quote but it looks like it was an estimate, not a quote and the final bill is about twice what we were expecting and I now feel we're being ripped off. It will probably turn out to be an expensive learning experience!

I think he used Ardex adhesive but I'm not 100% certain.

 

[Fekin]

When it was stated the job was an estimate then yes the price can go up versus being given a quote where it cannot, but twice the price does seem over the top.

Saying that though, did the tiler say he\she had unforseen work to carry out say once the old tiles were removed, like large repair work on the walls first etc ???

 

[scrubmuncher]

If the price has worked out twice as much then I would have expected him to clarify with you that you were ok with that. I would ask him first where the extra cost has gone as getting your materials wrong by half is a bit of a bad judgement. If he has had to replace walls and level the floor out (although should have known this before) then it is quite realistic for the original estimate to be way out.

 

[hazza1969]

Well it's a new house, only a few months old. One bit of plaster about 6 inches square needed to chiseled out and filled as it was loose but that's about it. There were no previous tiles to remove, it was just painted plasterboard.

 

[scrubmuncher]

If it was as straight forward as that I can't see a price almost doubling. I'd be honest with him. Ask him where it went, he will more than likely give a completely genuine answer and you'll have no probs. If not I'm not sure what you can do about it, an estimate is an estimate not a quote.

 

[grumpygrouter]

If the guy had use BAL Fastflex on the floor, that would account for about £70 straight away for just 1 bag! Still maybe a bit pricier than I would have "estimated" though. If the plasterboard was painted with emulsion, he may have spent a lot of time removing it as it is not ideal to tile over emulsion paint.