The quote

There is always somebody cheaper. Matching him costs you twice.

Published 2026-08-07 9 min read

The short answer

Do not match it. Dropping to his number says your first one was invented, and you still have to do the work. Name what is in yours that he cannot claim without lying — then let them choose.

This is the one that stings, because it is not a misunderstanding you can clear up. They have two quotes, yours is higher, and they have asked you the question straight out: why?

The two usual answers are both losers. Dropping your price tells them the first number was made up. Explaining that you are better tells them nothing, because the other firm says that too.

You do not know what is in his quote

Worth saying plainly, because it is the whole situation: you have not seen it. He may be doing exactly what you are doing, more cheaply, and good luck to him. He may be doing something narrower. He may have read the job differently.

The customer has not seen inside it either. That is the actual problem, and it is not solved by you having an opinion about a document you have never read. It is solved by making your own quote impossible to misread.

The test: could he say it too?

Here is the filter that decides whether a sentence is worth including. Take anything you were going to say about yourself and ask whether the cheaper firm could put the same words on their own page without lying. If they could, it is not an argument. It is wallpaper.

Written by us to show the test, not quoted from anybody. The middle column is the whole method: if the answer is yes, the sentence is doing no work.
What most quotes say	Could the cheaper firm say it too?	The version that survives the test
“We pride ourselves on quality workmanship.”	Yes. Anybody can.	“Posts go 600 into concrete. Dig one up when I am gone if you like.”
“Fully insured.”	Yes, and they may well be.	“The public liability certificate goes out with this quote, and the policy number is on it.”
“Family run for over twenty years.”	Possibly longer than you.	“There is a fence I built nine years ago on the next road. Go and look at the gate.”
“Competitively priced.”	Everyone, always.	“Here is exactly what is in my price. Ask the others whether theirs includes the same four things.”

Almost everything a trade business writes about itself fails that test. Reliable, professional, honest, established, quality — every one of those is available to anybody with a keyboard, which is why reading them tells a customer nothing and why they fall back on the number.

Name what is in yours. Do not guess at his

The temptation is to explain the gap by what the other quote probably leaves out. Do not. You would be guessing, in writing, about a business you cannot see into — and if you guess wrong you have said something untrue about a competitor in front of a customer who may know them.

The move that does work is the same information from the other end: set out what your number contains, item by item, and invite them to ask the others the same questions. You have made the comparison possible without having claimed anything about anybody.

Illustrative figures in whatever currency you work in, not a claim about any real quote. The point is where the gap sits: it is a block of named work, and once it is named it can be discussed. Unnamed, it is just eight hundred more.

Our own illustrative breakdown of a gap, not a description of anybody else’s quote — which we have not seen. Substitute the four or five things that genuinely differ in your trade.
What the extra covers	What that actually means	Illustrative
Taking the old fence out	Out of the ground, into the van, gone. No skip to hire and no pile in the driveway for two weeks.	250
Deeper footings	600 rather than 450 into the ground, which is what stops a fence leaning after a bad winter.	180
Treated posts	The part that rots is the part in the ground. Treated timber there is most of why one fence outlives another.	150
Clearing up properly	Off-cuts, concrete bags and old nails leave with us. The lawn gets raked.	120
Written guarantee, insurance on the job	Two years in writing, and a certificate in the folder rather than a sentence on a website.	100
The gap		800

If you must move, move the scope

Sometimes you want the job and the number really is the obstacle. There is an honest way to move and a dishonest one. The dishonest one is to take 800 off and do the same work, which teaches them that your prices are negotiable and that this one was inflated.

The honest one is to take something out and say what. “I can get to 3,950 if you take the old fence to the tip yourself — same build, same footings, less in it.” Now the price moved because the job moved, which is the only reason a price should ever move.

And if you do move, never move by a percentage. Ten per cent off is a round number, and a round number has no reason behind it — it says the figure was always soft. A specific amount for a specific reason is a different thing entirely: less to the price because the old fence is not coming out, or because ordering the timber this week holds a price that moves next week. Only ever if the reason is real. An invented one is the same lie as the round number, told at greater length.

What to say when they tell you the other one is cheaper

Do not flinch and do not apologize for the number. “That is a fair bit less than mine — worth working out what the difference is.”
Do not speculate about their quote. “I have not seen it, so I cannot tell you what is in it.” This is true, and it makes everything you say next more credible.
Go through yours, item by item, in plain words. Not the materials list — what each item does for them.
Hand them the questions: “ask both of us how deep the posts go, whether taking the old one away is in the price, and what happens if a post moves next year.”
If they still want the lower number, offer a smaller job rather than the same job cheaper — and say which part came out.
Then stop. One pass at this is persuasive; two is pleading, and they can hear the difference.

Some of them are not your customer

There is a kind of buyer who is genuinely only interested in the lowest number, and no amount of naming things will change that. That is not a failure of your explanation and they are not doing anything wrong.

Recognising them early is worth real money, because chasing one of them costs the same hour and a half as quoting somebody who will say yes. The sign is simple: they ask what the price is before they ask what is in it, and they keep asking.

If you win a job by matching a price, you have taken on the same work for less, taught the customer that your numbers are soft, and set the figure they will quote back at you next time. That is what costs you twice.

When they go with him anyway

Sometimes all of that is done properly and they still take the other quote. What you send back in the next ten minutes is worth more than anything you could have added to the argument, and most people get it wrong in one of two ways: they go quiet, or they leave a warning dressed up as good wishes.

Let me know when it goes wrong is a prediction, and they will remember that you made it. If it goes fine, you were bitter. If it goes badly, you were the man who wanted to be right, and nobody calls him.

The message to send when you have lost it

Answer the same day. A reply that takes a week reads as sulking even when it is only busy.
One line, no case reopened: “Fair enough — thanks for letting me know, and I hope it goes well.”
Then one question, and only one: “Out of interest, was it the price or was there something else?” Ask it as somebody who wants to know, not as somebody building a case.
Whatever the answer is, accept it in one sentence. Arguing here undoes everything above and teaches them they were right to go.
Leave the door open without a forecast: “If you ever want another pair of eyes on anything, you have my number.” No prediction, no conditions, nothing about the other firm.
Write the answer down somewhere. Ten of them tell you whether you are losing on price or on something you can actually fix.

That last one is the part that pays. Ask ten people why they went elsewhere and a good number of the answers will not be the price at all — it will be that the other one came out sooner, or answered the phone, or that yours arrived nine days later. Those are all things you control, and you would never have found out by reasoning about it at the kitchen table.

There is a second reason to send that message, and it is not the one you would say out loud: the cheap job sometimes goes wrong, and the person they call is whoever was gracious about losing. You cannot say that to them and you should not hint at it. You can only be the person it would be true of.

The short version

Never match a price. Change the job or leave the number alone.
You have not seen his quote. Say so, and say nothing else about it.
Any claim he could also make is worth nothing. Cut it.
Replace every adjective with something checkable: a depth, a date, an address, a certificate.
Set out what is in yours and hand them the questions to ask.
Make one pass. Two is pleading.
Some buyers are price-only. Find out early and use the hour elsewhere.
Never a round percentage. A specific amount, for a real reason, or nothing.
When you lose: one gracious line, one question, no prediction.

None of this makes you the cheapest, and it is not supposed to. It moves the decision off the one axis where the most careful tradesman always loses, and onto ground where the person who actually does the work properly has something to point at.