Faztek Industrial Solutions
Cut Charge Comparison
1. What you're ordering
Count finished pieces, not saw strokes.
Angle cuts usually carry a premium and are the most common source of rework in-house.
$
Use your quoted rate. Cut and uncut material are priced the same here so the comparison isolates the cutting.
2. A supplier that charges for cuts
$
$
$
Sometimes billed per line item rather than per order — check the quote.
3. Cutting it yourself
Where the hidden cost livesMeasure, mark, clamp, cut, deburr, verify. Not just the saw stroke.
$
12%
Full lengths rarely divide evenly into your cut list. The remnant is paid for, stored, and
usually scrapped. This is the single most-omitted line in a make-vs-buy comparison.
$
%
Wrong length, out of square, burr. Costs the material and the labour again.
Counted at the same labour rate, at 3 minutes each. Leave at 0 if not applicable.
4. A supplier that doesn't charge for cuts
$
Set this above zero if you want to test what a no-cut-charge supplier would have to add before
the comparison flips. That is a fairer test than assuming zero.
Cut-to-length supply also means the drop waste is the supplier's yield problem, not a remnant
rack in your building. That is counted below.
Cheapest route, per order
—
—
Delivered cost per order
Over a year
Vs. paying per cut
—
annual saving
Vs. cutting in-house
—
annual saving
Shop hours returned
—
saw and deburr time, per year
Every rate you entered prints with it, so procurement can check the comparison rather than take it on trust.
Full breakdown
per order| Cost element | Pay per cut | Cut in-house | No cut charge |
|---|
What the in-house option also costs you
- Time to first piece. Cutting 96 pieces at 4 minutes is over six hours of saw time before assembly starts — and it competes with whatever else that person was doing.
- Tolerance ownership. Once you cut it, squareness and length are yours. A frame that won't square up is no longer a supplier problem.
- Remnant inventory. Drop gets kept "in case", takes rack space, and is usually scrapped eventually anyway.
- Chip and coolant handling. Aluminium swarf is a housekeeping and disposal item.
- Saw availability. If the saw is also a production asset, cutting framing competes with production work.
- Safety exposure. More manual saw operations is more exposure, particularly with untrained occasional users.
A planning estimate built from the rates you entered. Not a quotation. Material pricing, cut charges and setup fees vary by supplier, profile and order size — validate against your actual quotes before using this in a sourcing decision.