A Checkatrade alternative is a channel
Checkatrade finds people who are already looking for a tradesperson and puts your firm in front of them, on a membership. Their join page says customers can call you, request a quote, or book from your profile, and that you pick the plan and the number of enquiries. The price is on that quote. We are not going to print one here.
An alternative is anything else that puts a real enquiry in front of you: your own website, a Google listing, a referral, MyBuilder, or the jobs that still get posted on Rated People. Each one has a different bill and a different delay. None of them answer the phone for you.
If you are deciding whether to leave, do the sum on is Checkatrade worth it for electricians first. The method is the same for a plumber or a builder. Cancel off two or three months of your own cost per paid job, not off a forum thread.
Your own website as a Checkatrade alternative
A page that ranks for the job and the town, with a form a homeowner can finish on their phone, is the channel you own. There is no per-lead fee. There is also no queue of enquiries on day one. Search takes months, and a site that looks like every other template does not get the enquiry in the first place.
The other half is what happens after they send it. A form at 9pm that waits until Monday is a lead you already earned and then gave away. Websites for electricians is how we think about the page itself. The reply is a separate job, and it is the same job whether the enquiry came from your site or from a directory.
Pros: you keep the customer relationship, you are not sharing a shortlist with a platform’s other members, and the cost is the site rather than a fee on every job. Cons: slow to build, needs looking after, and invisible if you never ask past customers to look at it.
Google Business Profile
Google Business Profile is the listing that shows when someone searches your trade plus your town, on Search and on Maps. Creating one does not carry a fee from Google. The work is the unglamorous bit: the right categories, a phone number that is actually yours, photos of real jobs, and reviews from people you did the work for.
Pros: people who search “electrician near me” can ring you without a directory in the middle, and a steady run of honest reviews compounds. Cons: you do not control the layout, a thin profile gets skipped, and the call still lands while you are on a job. A listing that generates calls you miss is an expensive kind of free.
Referrals and repeat customers
For a lot of established firms this is already the best work. Someone who was in the house last year, or their neighbour, tends to be a better fit than a stranger comparing three quotes at 10pm. The cost is the work you did, plus the ask. A text after the job, asking them to pass your number on, is the whole system.
Pros: higher trust, fewer tyre-kickers, no platform fee. Cons: you cannot turn it up because the diary has a gap next Thursday. Referrals arrive when they arrive. Firms that drop every other channel before this one is actually feeding them spend a quiet month wondering what happened.
MyBuilder as a Checkatrade alternative
MyBuilder is a different shape of product. On their how-it-works page, a homeowner posts a job for free, MyBuilder alerts trades, and those trades can express interest. Contact details are shared when the homeowner says so.
The tradesperson terms say a shortlist fee is shown before you do anything that shares those details, and that the fee becomes payable when the details are shared, whether or not you win the job. The fee is worked out from the likely size, value and location. The same terms say MyBuilder does not guarantee you will quote or win the work. Sponsored placement, if you buy it, is a separate monthly fee. We are not quoting a number. Read the fee on the lead.
Pros: you can see a description of the job before you spend, and you are not on a 12-month membership just to look. Cons: you can do the quoting work and still not be shortlisted, and once you are shortlisted you have paid for the conversation, not the job. Several trades can be interested in the same post. Your reply, your price and your reviews are what the homeowner is comparing.
Rated People after the Checkatrade Group change
On 17 September 2026 Rated People’s own site said the brand had become part of Checkatrade Group, that Rated People memberships had ended before the change, and that jobs posted there are now matched with Checkatrade members. The same page says the two still work differently for the homeowner. Checkatrade: search, then call or message, or request a quote. Rated People: post a job, and trades get in touch to quote.
So “a Rated People alternative” depends who is asking. A homeowner can still post a job there. A trade who wants those jobs is, on that page, being told to join Checkatrade. Their page also gives a starting membership figure. Plans vary with trade, postcode and how many leads you ask for. Use the quote in front of you, not a number from a blog, including ours. The comparison is written up, with the date on that figure, in Checkatrade vs MyBuilder vs Rated People.
Pros, if you join on current terms: one membership reaching jobs posted on both, which is how they describe it. Cons: it is no longer a separate switch you can flick if you are unhappy with Checkatrade. Read the offer again before you act on anything written this autumn. It will move.
Other places UK trades actually get work
Facebook local groups, a line on the van, a leaflet through doors on the street you are already working, the builder who keeps asking you back. These are real. They are also lumpy. Track them the same way you track a platform: what it cost you in time or money, how many enquiries, how many paid jobs. A van that gets you two calls a month is a channel. A van that gets you two calls you never pick up is a sign.
We are not going to rank these. A firm in a town where everyone already knows them does not need the same mix as a firm that moved patch last spring.
How to get more from every lead you already have
Whichever line you keep, the enquiry still has to be answered. A Checkatrade call, a MyBuilder shortlist, a form on your site and a Google Maps call all go cold the same way: the customer hears nothing, and rings the next firm.
Shoogly works with the platforms and the website you already use. We are not a replacement for them. Missed calls are texted back in seconds from a background number, so your own number stays on the van. The reply, from the text, the form, WhatsApp or Facebook, is in your voice within minutes. It asks what the job is, where, when, and for a photo where that helps, then passes it to your phone ready to book. It does not price the job and it does not promise a day.
The commercial side is a one-off build and a flat monthly figure, agreed on a call. We do not publish the price. Three months minimum on the monthly side, then 30 days’ notice, and a 60-day money-back guarantee on the build. Plumbers, electricians and builders each have a page on how the enquiries in that trade actually arrive. Missed call text back is the piece on the calls you cannot take.