Trailering Cost

[savannahallyce]

I need to know how much you would charge this family.

I have a family from our barn who asked myself and my boyfriend, who has hauled horses for years, to haul their two kids and their horses in THEIR truck and trailer to a venue that is 4 hours away. My horse will also get to ride on their trailer. My trainer charges $150 round trip per person to go to this venue.

I want to charge them a fair price and I don’t know what a fair price would be considering this has some extreme circumstances being this isn’t my truck and trailer

[dotneko]

First thing I would do is talk to my insurance agent. What if there
is an accident and you are found at fault?

[IrishDeclan]

I agree with dotneko. I think that unless you’re licensed and insured as a commercial shipper, you’re not technically supposed to be charging people for shipping.

[hosspuller]

Sounds to me a wash… no money changes hands. You get to go & transport your horse. You supply the labor to drive the rig. They supply the rig & fuel. Since they are minors, unless the parents are going, get written permission for you regarding their emergency medical treatment (kids) and their med cards. It’s just like taking the neighbor kid to a horse show. You are responsible to supervise the kids. Make sure the kids & parents understand this … There are risks for everybody. Suppose your horse damages the trailer ? You could have a crash. So what ? Life is full of risks. … have fun together.

[savannahallyce]

This is a family I’ve babysat for since their kids were little. I have gotten paid to babysit them for many horse functions and personally, now they have a trailer so they want to add the trailering in. It is still considered babysitting just taking time out of my boyfriends weekend to haul is the reason for why we wish to charge. I do not haul on my own yet because I’m not experienced enough to go on a long trip however my boyfriend has hauled for years.

[savannahallyce]

Also it sounds like they have decided to take their two horse now since they don’t think their big trailer will be out of the shop by the time we leave. So now my horse is NOT going to be hauled by us. I will be paying my trainer to haul him. Now what would you think would be reasonable to charge or would you charge at all?

[China_Doll]

For sure they should pay for your horse to be hailed by trainer. Is this something your BF would be going to anyway? If so then the fee to get your horse there maybe enough. If he wouldn’t be going then his time is worth something.

[HungarianHippo]

OP, I think you are probably overthinking this.

There are two separate tasks going on here. You are babysitting, like you normally do, and your BF is doing the trailering. So:

1. you charge whatever you normally charge to babysit these kids at shows.
2. he charges for trailering. I’d use your trainer’s $150 as a benchmark-- since that is the “market rate” --but then subtract a bit from that since there’s no wear and tear on his vehicle. Let’s say make his fee $100. That’s $10/hour (4hr to show, plus an extra hour to go get them, each way).

And then ask you BF if $100 is enough $ to make this worthwhile for him. Bump it up, if not. If they balk at paying that much, then then it’s not a good match.

Know that they probably value their time much higher than $100-- obviously they don’t want to give up a whole day to go to this show, so $100 will seem like a bargain.

This may cause you to say, hmmmm that means we could have gotten a lot more than $100, right? But these are trusted employers who you seem to like, and it’s not good business to gouge someone at higher than the market rate, just because you can. So just decide what number makes it worth it to your BF, and go with that.

As for Gas expenses, the simplest solution would be for them to give you a $100 pre-paid gas card, which you just return with whatever balance is left on it.