We deliver VFM with every skip

Value for money in construction is about more than delivering a project to time and cost. A good building project must also contribute to the environment in which it is located, deliver a range of wider social and economic benefits and be adaptable to accommodate future uses.

But there’s a popular misconception that, when it comes to skip hire, customers are only concerned with getting the lowest price and are not bothered about value for money.

After all, a 12-yard skip is a 12-yard skip. How can one skip hire firm deliver better value for money than another?

When time is money. No matter whether your building project is a single-storey residential extension or a multimillion pound addition to the national infrastructure, if your skip fails to arrive on site at the time of day it has been requested then work will grind to a halt, leaving construction crews idle and increasing the chance of the job over-running.

In an age of limited funds and tightened belts, the term value for money – or VFM – is being used more and more. This is one of the reasons why university boffins have spent vast amounts of time trying to define the meaning of VFM, and how to measure it.

Most people use what academics call cost minimisation analysis to measure VFM. This is a simple comparison of the costs of two providers – in this case skip hire firms – delivering exactly the same service (an eight-yard skip). When it comes down to cost minimisation analysis, the firm offering the skip at the lowest price is declared the best value for money.  

But this type of analysis not only fails to take into account the possible cost of the cheapest skip failing to arrive on time, it completely ignores the costs incurred through time spent getting quotes, booking and paying for the hire, not to mention the social – and legal – benefits of a skip hire firm arranging the permits many local councils demand are in place when a skip has to be positioned on a public road.

This is why professors at Cambridge University say VFM is a term used to assess whether or not a business has obtained the maximum benefit from the goods and services it both acquires and provides, within the resources available to it.  

They use cost-benefit analysis to define VFM. This takes into account the time saved from a skip arriving on time, and how this can reduce the cost of any construction project because it does not mean site workers are still being paid despite being left idle. It also takes into account the social benefits of the skip being removed from a public highway when it is full.

We’re quite sure that a skip cannot be adapted for any other use than carting away construction debris or any other unwanted items, so we concede that the definition of value for money in construction offered by the National Audit Office doesn’t match VFM in skip hire.

But we do not need to spend years studying at university to know that ProSkips – the UK’s number one skip hire company – provides all of our customers with the lowest price service in your area together with the best value for money.  

This is because we meet your every need, from a same-day or wait and load service to arranging all necessary permits and collecting the skip when you want it removed.