No matter who our potential client’s are, in the first discovery call or email we get the price of services is discussed, of course it is. One question we get in this topic; how much is a PI per day? I don’t know exactly where it came from that we can be employed on a daily rate basis, likely American media or that’s their way but for PI’s in the UK the way we bill is a bit different.
How Do UK PI's charge?
I’ve already said that in the UK we bill slightly differently to how I understand American PI’s do; we bill hourly they bill per investigation.
Now, we can bill per investigation however when we do this costs and budgets can skyrocket as I have found that there is little control for clients when it is done this way.
A job that can be done in a few hours can be billed excessively high for no reason. That is why we at Delta 74 do it hourly. I will always say No Hidden Fees!
What's included then?
Now to contradict myself a little we do charge a minimum rate for surveillance services which is 5 hours. The hourly fee for this is £54.00 per surveillance operative which sounds high on the face of it.
When broken down the whole 5 hours of actual surveillance work turns more into 8 hours really when things like pre-surveillance research is carried out, post surveillance reporting and the video editing we do which is all included.
Not to mention business costs, fuel/motor fees coverage etc plus we are a business so profits are taken into account.
Average Daily Charge
So that the blog is on topic I will cover how much is a PI per day for a whole days surveillance would cost so that readers know.
The numbers below are for one operative so please bear that in mind.
A day rate in our industry is typically for 12 hours solid surveillance which we would bill at £648.00 inc VAT for one surveillance operative. For that it would also cover 100 miles of mobile follow if needed but things like train tickets and large entry fees to places such as theme parks (last year we carried out work at Alton Towers, Legoland and Thorpe Park!) would not be included.
As standard the video editing and post job reporting would all come included too after the job.
Investigation Charging
Certain types of work such as tracing/ people finding we do charge a set fee of £216.00 inc VAT and this is per investigation to locate one individual. This is on a no find no fee basis.
For a cheating partner type case though if a client wanted a complete hands off approach and budget was not a big issue for them it would likely run around £2400.00 inc VAT for a week which would dedicate one operative to the case for the whole time. This would enable us to use a full surveillance suite though of vehicle tracking, hidden cameras, surveillance, open source planning etc. So how much is a PI per day? Like that it would work out at £342.86 per day. A much higher initial fee but less overall daily cost..
Clients that opt for that approach are very rare and usually not UK based.
Conclusion
Our services are professional and with Delta 74 Private Investigations you get the latest in private sector methods and technologies to achieve your objective whatever it may be.
If these numbers are for you, get in touch to see if and how we can help!
