How Much Do Electric Gate Repairs Cost?
If automatic driveway gates get broken or go wrong, the electric gate repair costs can be high. But there are ways to reduce the chance of many issues occurring, ways to minimise wear and tear and even opportunities to spot potential problems before they become major issues.
So, here’s our guide for anyone who wants to avoid electric gate repair costs as much as possible.
When electric driveway gates are working perfectly, they make your life easier, they make your house look more impressive and they make your home more secure. They are a great investment, and they can even add value to your property.
But electric gates are machines designed to do a job. They should open and close without you having to put in any more effort than pressing a button. Unfortunately, sometimes they can go wrong or they can be damaged by careless drivers. And if your gates stop working it’s important to get them fixed straight away.
Mostly, electric gate problems are caused by poor maintenance, impact from vehicles or electrical gremlins. So, while regular gate maintenance is a great start, if the worst happens you will usually need to call out an electric gate repair engineer. That’s when you will want to know what it’s likely to cost. So, here’s our guide on how much electric gate repairs cost.
What Are Electric Gate Systems?
We won’t go into detail about the components of electric gate systems or the costs to have electric gates installed on your driveway here but if you want to read more on any of those topics, we’ve provided a few links below.
You can read more of a general overview of electric gates here:
https://www.electricgaterepairlondon.co.uk/choose-the-best-gate-automation/
Click the link below for more about the different types of electric gate openers here:
https://www.electricgaterepairlondon.co.uk/what-are-the-different-types-of-automatic-gate-openers/
if you’re interested in having electric gates installed, you can read more about how much they cost here:
https://www.electricgaterepairlondon.co.uk/how-much-do-electric-gates-cost/
What Can Go Wrong With Electric Gates?
There are a few things that can cause problems with electric gates including:
- Wear and tear due to age and/or poor maintenance
- Electrical problems
- Vehicle impact damage
- Flooded underground motor housings, resulting in motor failure
- Seized hinges
- Debris in mechanisms that accelerates wear
- Gate alignment issues where wooden gates contract and expand as the weather changes
- Rust or rot depending on what the gate is made from (Iron gates can rust and wooden gates can rot)
- Seized, noisy or worn sliding gate wheels
- Bent, worn or broken swing gate arms, brackets or rams
- Gate motors failing with the gates closed, open or somewhere in between
- Seized manual release mechanisms that won’t operate when you need them to open your gates
- Failure or misalignment of safety components such as photocells
- Slugs and other creepy crawlies getting into control boxes and wrecking control panels
- Transmitter issues https://www.electricgaterepairlondon.co.uk/why-dont-my-electric-gate-remotes-work/
- Poor installation
- Poor servicing https://www.electricgaterepairlondon.co.uk/automatic-gates-need-servicing/
- Poor repairs to previous issues.
You can read more about the problems electric gates can suffer from here: https://www.electricgaterepairlondon.co.uk/electric-gate-problems/
In all cases, regular maintenance can help spot the tell-tale signs of water, insect or spider ingress. It may even be possible to suggest that a component that is over a certain age be swapped out for a new one. But unfortunately regular servicing will not predict the spontaneous component failure that occurs for no obvious reason. In that case, you’ll need someone to track down the fault and repair your electric gates.
How Can You Reduce The Chance That Your Gates Will Breakdown?
1. Choice of gate equipment in the first place
Choosing the right gate motors that are strong enough to move the weight of your chosen gates is important. Your gate installer will do this for you but don’t be tempted to go for less powerful and cheaper motors that will be under stress and more likely to fail.
2. Choosing a reputable gate automation brand
A well know and trusted brand of gate automation equipment is always a good starting point. Some of the big names include Nice, Came, Faac and Beninca but a good installer will be familiar with many different gate automation manufacturers’ products.
3. Warranty
Make sure that there is a warranty from the manufacturer on the gate automation equipment and that the gate installer provides a warranty for their work.
4. Choose the best gate installers
Good electric gate installers will provide a full quote for you so that you understand what is involved and why the work needs to be done. They should always answer your questions and give you all the information you need to make a decision. Many will also offer you references if you want to check out their previous work. You want to find out how polite, helpful and tidy they were and how happy their customers are with their new electric gates, gate repairs or servicing.
5. Gate cleaning
Keep gates clean and in good condition, remove debris from sliding gate tracks and check that plants aren’t interfering with gate operation. These are simple but effective ways to help keep gates working well.
6. Regular visual checks
If you drive through your gates every day, have a quick look at the components as you pass through. Is there any sign or rust or does anything look wrong? Does everything move smoothly or is it jerky or juddering? Open your window and listen. Does everything sound smooth or are there graunching, grinding or scraping noises? If anything sounds or looks different, it’s wise to call and engineer to look at what might need a simple adjustment but could have turned into an expensive repair if you’d ignored it.
The best way to keep electric gate repair bills to a minimum is to keep your gates working smoothly and efficiently with regular servicing and maintenance.
Electric Gate Servicing
Like all machinery that is exposed to the elements and required to work every day, electric gates benefit from regular servicing. In most cases this only needs to be once or twice a year but the benefits of catching potential issues before they become major and expensive headaches is worth it.
Most installers will offer servicing for electric gates. Ours are Bronze, Sliver and Gold services that include different levels of preventative maintenance once, twice or three times a year respectively.
Please contact us on 0800 194 1470, email info@egrl.co.uk or complete our gate servicing form if you want to book a gate service or find out more about what’s included and how much it costs. You can also read more about electric gate maintenance at https://www.electricgaterepairlondon.co.uk/automatic-gates-need-servicing/
How Much Do Electric Gate Repairs Cost?
If the worst happens and you need help to get your electric gates working again, what is involved and how much is the gate repair likely to cost? Basically, a gate engineer’s charges can be broken down into three areas.
1. Callout
You nearly always need a gate engineer to come and look at your problem so that they can assess the extent of the damage and give you a quote to fix the problem.
2. Replacement parts
Any gate motors, mechanical items like motor arms, hinges or sliding gate wheels etc that need to be replaced will cost money and your final gate repair cost will include this.
If you have a faulty or broken motor, replacing that can cost on average between £300 and £1,800. Repairing or replacing an intercom system could cost from £250 to over £1,200.
3. Labour
The gate engineer who carries out the gate repair will need to include a price for their labour. This will cover the amount of time it takes them to investigate why things aren’t working or establish what’s broken and needs replacing. They can then carry out the repair and leave your gates working perfectly.
Repairs to electric gate breakdowns or damage will vary based on the installer and what part of the country you are in.
As an example, callout for electric gate repair cost from £50 to £100 and hourly rates for the repair itself can go from £65 to £85.
Where Can You Find Someone To Repair Your Gates?
The best gate engineers are always busy because their service, approach and professionalism are in demand. But you should never scrimp when paying for new gate installation, gate repairs or servicing. Not only are you more likely to experience problems later, but you could be seriously compromising your safety.
Electric gates are strong machines that move large and often heavy gates. The principle of leverage means that considerable forces are applied near the hinges of swing gates and sliding gates can create slicing forces as they move along static objects.
The message is simple: don’t try to cut corners with installation, servicing and repair costs for electric gates, it’s just not worth saving a few pounds.
Finding good installers is easy if you know how and we’ve put together an article to help.
Getting The Best Prices For Electric Gate Repairs And Servicing
While we never recommend trying to save money by cutting corners with electric gate repairs, there are still ways that you can make sure that you’re not paying over the odds. If you’re having new gates installed, now’s the time to talk to the installer about them servicing the gate automation system. You may be able to get a beneficial rate from them and they will be familiar with the equipment and the installation.
Some installers may offer discounts for signing up to longer service contracts rather than saying you’ll call them when you want the gate maintenance carried out.
Finally, if your gates don’t work and you think you need them repairing, always change the batteries in your handheld remote controls first and try them again. It could save you a callout charge!
If you need to have your electric gates repaired quickly, contact us and we will diagnose your problem and give you a quote to provide high quality gate repairs for a fair price. Similarly, if you want to know that your electric gates are being serviced properly, call us on 0800 194 1470, email info@egrl.co.uk or fill in our contact form and we will do everything we can to help.
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