Question

A plumber charges $85 to start a job plus $46 per hour. If the plumber charges his customer based on every half hour, how many hours can Fred afford to have the plumber work if he only has $250?

Answer 1

The maximum number of hours he can afford is 3 hours

Here, we want to get the number of hours Fred can afford to have the plumber work

From the question, we have a fixed $85 charge

Let the number of hours worked be h

Thus, we have an equation where the cost of hiring is c

We have this as;

$c\text{ = 46h+85}$

Now, from the question, we are told that the charge is based on every half-hour

We can now have;

$\begin{gathered} 250\text{ = 46h+85} \\ 250-85\text{ = 46h} \\ 46h\text{ = 165} \\ h\text{= }\frac{165}{46} \\ h\text{ =}3.5 \end{gathered}$