Following on from a previous discussion on the use of Powerpoint, I was interested to find out if trainers are still charging for the hire of the projector.
I know in days gone by a projector to run off your laptop was a very expensive commodity. A lot of venues still charge to supply one, but more enlightened ones don't.
If you supply your own, do you charge a hire rate for it, or do you now see it as a vital tool?
Personally I don't charge. If a client decided that they didn't want to pay for one, how would I deliver my material?
I don't know of any venues that still charge for OHPs, so are digital projectors now seen as an essential or an optional extra?
Eric Sutherland
Neural Pathways Ltd
Eric Sutherland
3 Responses
Internal Charges for Projector
This subject is dear to my heart this week. Our organisation is a charity but has a limited company which runs a conference facility. We in the training department are charged internally for rooms and equipment. There are several sets of charges, and internally we are charged the community rate which is £15 per day for Laptop/LCD projector and £10 for OHP/Flipchart/TV & Video.
These are onsite fees, increased fees are charged for the use of equipment off-site.
If you don’t use your own equipoment how do you know it will wor
Eric
I always use my own equipment and factor the charge into my fee.
I attended a chamber of commerce breakfast in Glasgow. The speaker was a project manager from Accenture. Speaking to him as he was setting up I found him confident and articulate and was looking forward to his presentation.
And then he switched the borrowed projector on.
The colour started to rise in his face as he started to worry about why the image only occupied the bottom right hand corner of the screen. Three of us eventually gave up and since it was too early for his helpline to be manned he had to make do with the largest image he could, centred on the screen while the wall behind was diconcertingly lit in pale blue.
The effect on the speaker was terrible. He went to pieces and stumbled through what had clearly been a very slick presentation.
No matter how good you are or how much you practice you have, presenting to people you don’t know is stressful.
At least by using my own equipment I can reduce the opportunities for sods law to show me up.
Peter
No charge but have a Plan B
I don’t charge anything extra. Same as I don’t (normally) charge for travel and accomodation.
I generally take my own data projector as a backup – but prefer to use the client’s if I can – However I always have Plan B which is to do the training without using technology – Had to do it once this year and all was fine – OK maybe 95% not 100% fine – but I learned a lot and next time it will be 120% 🙂
All the best.
Robert Agar-Hutton.