cost and availability of young men to move stuff, question about gas tank

[colleen]

A friend moved here from SMA yesterday. A friend of a friend offered her 2 sons and her husband to help move the furniture and boxes. When I called, no, they have other jobs tomorrow. My friend has been paying 50 pesos per hr for help in SMA. Now I have been quoted 150 an hour. Our jardinero, who is a great worker wanted $150 also. I got him down to $100. I can't imagine that the woman who offered her sons' help has her kids working for more than 50 pesos an hour delivering papers. She said she'd find other kids to work but also wants 100 per hour. Now we got ripped off alot when we moved here but this is pretty amazing. I suppose the person who finds the help takes a good cut.

Also..tho the rental contract was written in English, and says there is a gas tank, there was no gas tank, the portable kind, nor was anything on the roof. It's written right there in the contract and the realtor actually told me that in MX, renters always bring their own tanks. Sure they do. I've never heard of anyone who was renting being required to buy a gas tank which will then be traded off by the guys who walk around selling gas. The one that was brought over has seen many, many years. Of course it will disappear as soon as my friend needs more gas. I'd never go to court here in MX since I don't know a single Gringo who has won the most obvious things. Too bad I'm so involved in this.

So...please share.

[mr bill]

Years and years ago when I was a renter I took a 3br house for$100/mo because it had a phone line [wow I could then get Dial-up] Most everything in the house didn't work. And gas, yes there was a connection but no tank. So I bought a tank - nice shiny and new. Next at 3:30 in the afternoon it was a chase around town in my even then old Caribe to find a gasero truck. Gave them the new shiny empty tank plus 70 or 80 pesos for a dented flaky paint tank that was full. Nothing much has changed. Years later, since I owned the tank and the landlord didn't, I sold it [size=small[at a profit].[/size]

I have had over the past 20-ish years or so a relaxed, laid back and non-stressful existence here. When I have had a consumer conflict of some sort I go to the PROFECO and let them KA and it works. Too bad the GTO office has closed and one must go to Leon -- but then you can add travel and time costs to your claim. You have a year to file. Wait until the clown who sold me a bad 'genuine HP' cartridge and dished me off to HP gets a PROFECO derechos del consumidor challenge]

7 Basic Consumer Rightshere: http://www.scribd.com/doc/14801275/7-der...consumidor.
better is to go directly to the PROFECO site but I couldn't get the link working as I was writing this

[Lisa Andrews]

Is that 150 per hour each?
It's only $12 so I would just pay, support the local economy since it is a one off job not a regular thing. You could never get people that cheap in Australia, generally like $30+, I am happy to pay a bit more for things since I can afford it and locals never could, make someone happy for a day and be able to buy a few 'luxuries'.

[colleen]

Now this is the real bitchy me. It's so nice to have an attitude like Lisa does, but, that's exactly what raises the rates of everything around here. Because non-Mexicans have that very nice attitude toward the young, poor, deserving Mexicans, they rip us off over and over again. I know. I've paid in the past with exactly that attitude. But then I got smart. 150 pesos is a little over $10US per hour. $10 is not the minimum wage in many states. Many Americans who are working full time jobs with families and much higher prices than are here, are making less. Does my policeman earn 100 pesos per hour? I'm going to find out. I'm sure he doesn't. That would be more than $4,000 a week. And I'm pretty sure he works more than 40 hrs a week. Why should we pay a kid more than the cop makes?

One time when some guys came to the house to figure out a railing and design and build it, they gave us a price. They wanted 1/2. It was reasonable. My husband gave him what they wanted. I'm sure he was tempted to pay the full amount. But he held back. When the young man offered a receipt Sven said, no. Huh? He thought he was saying "I trust you" and the guy heard (I am sure) "money doesn't matter". If we are getting a better deal here than we did wherever we came from that doesn't mean that we should help raise the base price that independents are charging, to what it is in that other country. We live in MX. Yes, my friend can afford the 150 pesos but that's not what a Mexican would pay.

I thank Bill and I'll check out that site. I was a lawyer in the US but I don't want to fight any more. The price of that gas tank was $1,000 (!!) pesos and it was nowhere near new. If they'd just lower it a little to the amount that is more than you expected but not so out of line, it would be easier to take.

So today I'll take my friend to the vet who has family in this area and find out what his take on this is. Maybe he'll have someone he would call. Maybe he'll call for me. That always worked well when I was looking for property. Once I had a MX friend call for info and then I called for info. Oh, how different.

[jesm]

Unskilled laborers earn around 1500p for a 5 1/2 day week. So 300p per 6-8 hour day is a market level wage. Per hour more negotiable, but 75-100p would be generous in my experience.

[Lisa Andrews]

I paid my first cleaner the going rate and I got what I paid for, my new cleaner is double and she is way better and will do what I say. I think you get what you pay for a lot of the time and part of travelling and living overseas is paying more then the locals. In one country I have visited there were local prices and tourist prices very clearly labelled at entrances to attractions which I actually thought was pretty fair considering the price differences.
I don't think you should be paying a western rate of $20 an hour but i do believe in paying a fair rate and if you don't like it you either negotiate or go somewhere else. You can always get a local to hire someone for you if you think they will get a better rate or keep searching, if you say no and they don't go any lower then it obviously isn't worth their time. What is more valuable, spending a few hours looking to save $2 or to pay the $2 extra, that is the decision that you have to make. Maybe you will meet some more people and make new friends trying to get a better rate and you have time available to you to do it but I personally work 6 days a week so don't have time to search for better prices I care more about getting something done quickly and hopefully properly.

[colleen]

Well, good news for my friend. I got my jardinero to lower his price to the $100 per hour price and he brought a friend who I will also keep contact info for. Pancho has been working for us for 8-10 yrs and does a great job with anything and is super reliable so this contact will be good all around.

I asked the friend what happened w/ the movers on Thursday. I left at 9PM and they were nearly done. They had tried to up the price that was still due, from $2500 to $2750 so they'd get a little less than $100 each. The company owner said, no, the price was $2500. I asked how much he paid the guys as a tip after their 14 hours together with a return trip still ahead for those poor guys. They are lucky he reduced the price back to what the real price was because he gave each of them $300 pesos. I thought that was very nice and generous and they certainly deserved it. But that was his choice, not imposed so you feel ripped off.

I'm not trying to argue or continue anything except letting you guys know that it worked out very good for the SMA movers and a new good relationship w/ my jardinero, soon to be his jardinero also.

[laconstance]

I think the situation of how much to pay for work here in México goes beyond what we foreigners think of as "good and fair" in comparison to where we come from. I see my neighbor from time to time over coffee. She has lived her whole life in the house where she lives now. Once, in conversation, I mentioned that a man who had lived in the neighborhood was doing some work for me; she thought he was a bit expensive, but when I told her how much I was paying she thought that was O.K. Then, she asked me how much I pay my housekeeper, and I told her that. She thought that was just right, too. Then she pointed out that when foreigners come in and pay more than the going rate for work, it makes it really hard on the Mexicans! The workers want to charge everyone the "foreigner price" and Mexicans can't pay that.

At the risk of sounding preachy, I believe that foreigners should leave their foreign attitudes at the border and learn to live with the customs of the country they have entered!

[doncoulter]

Brava, laconstance! I could not agree more.

I would add one observation. You mention that "when foreigners come in and pay more than the going rate for work, it makes it really hard on the Mexicans." It also makes it hard on some of us expats! Not all of us are wealthy, though some of the more well-heeled recent arrivals appear to think so.

Don

[cam00]

Greed is a big problem here in GTO, sadly. It has created problems for those of us who have no pension, SS, and have little income that's usually very irregular, both for MEXICANS and foreigners like myself.

The sneaky "saying one thing and doing another" is a cultural habit here, as is selling lots of junk, like cheap sunglasses that die in less than 2 or 3 weeks, but they'll never return your money or let you replace them because the product was bad in the 1st place. That's happened to me almost twice a week continuously since I've been here. Just a few days ago, a fruteria up the central callejon in Plaza Baratillo sold me a small watermelon, and told me it was "delicious" and ready to eat, but tasted like nothing when we opened it up, no sweet flavor at all. BUT, when I told him he needed to take responsibility for any of his products he sold that were bad, he threw a limon and hit me hard on the back of the head as I walked out the door. And this is the norm for virtually all the vendors in GTO.

COPS never investigate crimes, and often actually protect the thieves. They almost always tell me that I MIGHT GO TO JAIL when a verbal dispute occurs, because TRANQUILITY is more important to the police than actually stopping thefts and thieves. I don't know why.

The propane oand butane tanks are a very antiquated way to bring an absolute necessity to the people who must have gas to cook, wash themselves, etc. I too, bought a NEW tank but ALWAYS insist that the gas dealers bring mine back....I usually have to wait a day or two to get my bottle back full. That's no problem since I have 2 tanks.

Water delivery is also very backwards, with a massive amount of plastic being used to contain and transport the water. A water filtration unit ( someone needs to check to see if there are HEAVY METALS in the presas and pozos, to see which system would be best) would be much more practical and eliminate the need for the plastic 5-gallon containers used everywhere. Much cheaper too. The government should provide a partial subsidy to have every house, hotel and restaurant have one or more installed system.


BUT, dang the weather sure is nice. AND, hardly ever any violence that I've seen.