Worst Lead Of The Month

go dart

met w/ a couple in their early 80s. asked for a BASMENT shower that would accomidate his wife and her new knees. after scoping the crappy bas bath i quickly laid out a seated shower but told them it should really go on the 1st floor as she uses one of those stair lifts to get up/dwn stairs. after scoping 1st fl i said what they need is a another bath that would also accom a stacking wash/dryer. some restiance here but they have no business in the basment and the new caddilac in the gararge led me to belive they had the resources. well they also still supply thru galvanized water lines (some buried in plaster) during my appt the sprinkler installer tells them he doesn't have enough pressure to run his system. homeowner asks if i can replace and i said i'd send my plumber to lay it out as this one was tuff. left shortly after and said i'd call and did. told him i would charge 69.50 for my mans time then deduct if he ordered work. i've got 2 1/2 hrs in this thing by now and he says he won't pay the service charge. so i simply said if it wasn't worth that to him it certinly wasn't to me as my plumber is an employee. he get po'ed at me (wow) some people

joasis

Sounds typical....I was quitting for the day yesterday and a lady calls and says her husband is putting in a privacy fence, and wondered if I could auger the post holes for them. So in the 100+ degree heat, I go and hook the Bobcat to the auger, load up and drive over to their home, unload, and did 24 holes...took about 45 minutes start to finish. While I was there, she brought out iced tea and glasses, and they sat in the shade and watched me...and when I was done (no tea offered) I loaded up and wrote her a bill, charging $50 and she thought I was so high and out of line. The ground is dry and hard, no rain for weeks, and they would have been there for weeks diggin the holes by hand....jeez....some customers. In retrospect, I should have charged $5 a hole and brought my own tea, but her dad was talking to me about a new home, so there you go....bet I don't get to build his new home now.

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Mike Finley

One thing I have found is lots of people, and the older they are the more true this is, have a hard time making big leaps all at once. Older people especially react more favorably to smaller, easily understandable and digestible pieces than trying to make such a huge leap in one meeting. It sounds like you went all the way from 'their' project of just installing a shower in a basement bathroom, to an upstairs bathroom, then modifying it to include a w/d, then even after all that, then focus got stuck on a road block of the plumbing having to be addressed before anything at all could even happen. I meet few customers who are ready to make such a huge leap in both scope of work and budget all in one meeting. His resistance you said is a pretty good indicator that things were moving along way to fast for him. You might have had better success with a design and budget established for what they wanted and another meeting a few days later to go over it and then start talking about the pros and cons, and their timeline and expectations for how long they planned to stay in their home.

The kicker is, somebody else might actually do the exact project you suggested for them, but it probably will take them awhile to get to the point where they realize it is the best thing they could do. When I get into situations like this I always have to walk the fine line between doing what the customer wants and doing what the customer might need, but when I start noticing resistance or losing their interest because they are getting over-whelmed, I have to slow it down and weight the possibility that continuing to push them away from their initial ideas could lead to walking away with nothing.

Downeast

50 bucks for 24 holes ? I would gladly pay that for about any kind of digging. Sounds like a real bargan to me. I don't care if it took the guy 5 minutes to auger them. Then to just drop the fence and back fill. I be happy man.

copusbuilder

Those old folks can be tough..It's almost like they think they have a lot of years left and need the money??

The amount of time needed to get them to comprehend is great.
They can flip on a dime and you can't win in the public eye!! IMHO

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AkA Richard Cranium

Mike Finley

Tell me about it!

Just think of the fun that would have ensued if joasis had hit a telephone, cable, water, gas or power line for his good deed!

ron schenker

Must be a typo, 500 bucks sounds more realistic

Downeast

go dart

mike i know where your coming from but
#1- to sell them a basment shower considering the circumstances would of been unethical. bordering on theft
#2- at 83 how much time should they wait???? ps she pushing 300 lbs
#3- to piggyback a 1st fl laundry would probably save her or him a bad fall. forcing them to take drastic, kneejerk measures to try to maintain their housing situation
#4- gee wiz i was charging 69.50 for a block certified plumbers time! the big boys in town bill 99.00 per and you can get a rookie easier than a journeyman

Double-A

If you have not read "The Greatest Generation" by Tom Brokaw you should. It chronicles ordinary Americans that grew up in the depression, fought in the Second World War and built modern America.

These folks are of that generation and their minds don't work like ours. They have a sense of decency and pride that is founded in slightly different values than ours.

If you are face to face with them, they expect to hear the worst of the news you have to tell them. By calling them back with the news of the service charge, you exhibited weakness (in an attempt to "take advantage of them") and denied him the chance to 'poke you in the nose' for it (he is the alpha male in that house). Now I know you weren't trying to take advantage of them, but did they?

They also grew up in the hay day of the door-to-door salesman. They're on guard anytime anyone comes to their home selling anything. Their first reaction is to say, "No thanks", even when it was they that called you out.

If you're going to sell, you first must understand what the motivation of your buyer is. In this case, your clients had not realized that your first concern was for their safety and comfort, and that by scraping the basement idea, you were not trying to take advantage of them, but rather to be sure their last few years together were as trouble and hassle free as you could provide.

To get them on the same page as you sometimes takes asking tough questions such as, "Mr. Greatest, how do you feel about your wife having to go down to the basement to bathe and do laundry? Would it be safer and more convenient to keep her off those stairs and up here where you can help her if she needs help? And, Mrs. Greatest, are you comfortable with Mr. Greatest moving a hose around to water the lawn in this heat all the time? At this point in life, wouldn't a sprinkler system be a better choice?"

At this point, they should be realizing that doing these things as you suggest is a more loving sign of commitment to one another than saving money by sticking with the original plan would be. Talking them into the shower in the basement at this point would be fighting words.

Also, consider this. You went out and spent two and half hours with these folks and didn't charge them a dime. When you decided that the estimate for the plumbing was beyond your expertise and elected to send your company employee to cover that part, you were still in the estimate mode. Why would you ask for compensation for a free estimate?

You can grump all you want to about older folks, but you were the one that stepped on his toes and didn't apologise. And in his own home.

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"My clients’ wishes are the center of my attention." -- David Guido, a contractor in Woodstock, N.Y.
New York Times, July 20, 2006

Patty

This thread makes me think we should have a "That's Absurd" forum! Because that's exactly what came to mind when I read what these people did!

Chalk this up to that group of people out there who are so cheap, they squeak when they walk! Personally, each and everyone of us is worthy of a $100 an hour service charge for our time. If there is no offsetting (crediting) this "call charge" to a future order from the customer, I think we are nuts to even letting them THINK we will work for nothing!
And, it is ludicrous and audacious of the general public to expect it!

Simply absurd!

Mike Finley

Guess what? If your competition is doing exactly what you are saying, they are the ones educating the customers to be the way you think they are. Customers of any sort no matter what they are buying are being educated to act and react the way they do to you. In contracting they are being taught how to act through radio consumer advocates, online websites on how to avoid being screwed by contractors, the 6 o'clock local news money segments and most of all by contractors ourselves everytime we do business as you are describing. In this month's issue of Money magazine there is an article about dealing with contractors, there is a section that tells people all kinds of interesting things that I'm sure most of us would find eye brow raising.

Patty

I couldn't agree more with what you say, Mike. And that is EXACTLY why we should ALL band together to create acceptable terms and policies. For some people, (the cheapos), it is second nature to try to get something for nothing. And more than a waste of time at our expense, it is insulting and rude. I have a problem with anyone who is like that. But, if all tradespeople make it common place ( and standard policy) to charge "X" for, let's say, a housecall or estimate, it will eventually be considered "reasonable & customary" to the consumer.
Unfortunately, we, as a whole, have spoiled people to the point of absurdity.

And, go dart & joasis aren't even talking about mere house calls or estimates. They are seeing reluctance to pay for actual labor time!

It's ridiculous! Where has decency & common sense gone? No one should expect work done for free. If a builder/tradesman CHOOSES to give a "spiff" away because it is a regular & frequent customer, that is totally different. But, these situations are just plain nuts! Some people are just cheap and they are just 'takers'!!!

maj

So when you're car shopping, and leave the car lot without a car, do you get a bill from the car dealer for wasting an hour of his time?

How about insurance... When you contact an agent about insurance, he/she sets an appointment and drives all the way out to your house. The meeting lasts two hours and you decide you don't need additional insurance at this time. Does the agent bill you for two hours of his/her time?

If you think you might want a new Rainbow vacumn cleaner, and you check the yellow pages for a dealer. Salesperson comes out to demonstrate and even cleans your carpet to show how awesome the product is. He pitches the best vacumn on the market, but you decide it is out of your budget right now, because you had no idea a vacumn cleaner could cost $1,000!!! So do you get a bill from the saleperson YOU called? You even got your carpets cleaned for free!!! Doesn't that count as a service & time spent by that person?

Why do you seem to think contractors are the only ones entitled to compensation for every minute spent on the business time clock? Don't most of us take this time into consideration when figuring our hourly rate.

go dart

have to hand it to double A. thats an interesting take and i believe him to be more right than myself. personally i think the free estimate ends when i leave but i understand he probably didn't. i'll let that post soak in. thanks

Gordo

Go Dart,
You did the right thing. I wonder what the situation would be like if the customer was obtaining their medical condition(instead of plumbing condition) from a doctor. It would have been much different.....all payment forms would have been filled out before any information was devulged. Then the information would have been received as the gospel truth.
Some people on this forum who believe in the consultative approach to selling may say keep going back and educate. I say you are wasting your time. Most people know within the first few minutes of the meeting wheather they trust you or not (percieved). If they do not trust you(perceived) they will not buy wheather you were handed the diagnostics on stone tablets by GOD himself.
I love senior citizens. I have enjoyed gleaning wisdom from them since childhood. The greatest generation has done wonders for this country and as they pass on we lose IMO a part of our foundation that can not be rebuilt.
Dart, dust your feet and move on.

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Looks like some pros were here.

Gordo

The initial meeting with the potential client is a mutual one. This gives both the H.O. and contractor a chance to see if this relationship will be a good fit. In Darts case the fit was not there right off the bat, even though he was suggesting what was in the H.O. best interest.

It is the second meeting that will cost if they want a complete specialty contractor analyisis of the whole situation. This is where the rubber meets the road.

Maj, I hear what you are saying, but you are not comparing apples for apples.

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Looks like some pros were here.

Double-A

Go, its a damn fine person that can admit he may not have done his best, even when he thought he was doing his best.

You learned more from this than can be told and I'll bet we all learned something from it. I know I did.

Thank you for sharing the experience.

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"My clients’ wishes are the center of my attention." -- David Guido, a contractor in Woodstock, N.Y.
New York Times, July 20, 2006

maj

Never tried to use it as an apple to apple comparison, only examples of other businesses that WE take advantage of. I, myself would really be upset to get a bill for any amount of money if it was not explained to me upfront that I was going to get charged x amount of dollars for a consultation. The way I read the post, there was no work done on the house. The customer is being charged for an estimate from an employee of said contractor.

Gordo

Ah,
Now I understand. I mis-understood the situation. I thought dart told customer their would be a service charge if a plumber comes out.

I now am not surprised at the response of the customer. Thanks for clarification.

A school of hard knocks lesson for Dart.

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Looks like some pros were here.