Scenario: SHould I Pay Commission On This?

Grumpy

Ok one of my sales guys has one foot out the door in terms of he's just doing barely well enough to keep around. let me tell you something that happened very recently and you can give me your opinion.

Someone called about a month ago, and wanted an estimate. As it turns out when my sales guy got out there, they were buying the house and it needed a new roof. Anyways he gave them a verbal of $8,000-$9,000 to replace the roof. That's breaking one of my cardinal rules of never ever giving a price without giving a written estimate.

So the guy calls back ready to go ahead with the work, they are going to close in the next few days and want to schedule the work so it's complete BEFORE they move in. This was on the 11th or 12th of July. My sales guy makes an appointment to go meet them on Friday to close the deal.

My sales guy shows up doesn't have nay contract forms, doesn't have any samples... nothing. So he gives them a measurement form, for flat roofing not shingle roofing Im might add, and makes another appointment to meet the guy on Monday the 17th at 10am.

The customer called the office a few times looking for my sales guy unable to reach him on his cell. After I recognized the voice I asked if there was anything I could help with and he explained the scenario.

I know I am boring you by now but he missed his second chance to sell this customer because he overslept hung over from drinking all Sunday night. Real Good Going!

Anyways Sorry I bored you with all that crap history but now here is where the story really begins.

The customer was frantic by Tuesday and my sales guy blew him off a 3rd time. He called the office to find out what was going on and I told him I was the GM and I am taking over now and not to fear we would have everything closed out and scheduled by the end of the day.

I sent out one of my roofers to measure. I figured the price. I typed the proposal. As it turns out the $8,000 is really a $14,920 job. No wonder the customer wanted us to do it so badly! I managed to upsell the customer to $14,200 and we agreed to do the work!


So here is the question.... Would you pay the salesman commission on this sale? My first inclination is to fire this guy but I'm going to have a hard time finding a replacement at this time of year. Infact when it's time to trim the corporate fat he's going to be the first do go.

Double-A

Who got the signature on the contract? That is who I would pay. If he wants a cut, fine. $1000.00, minus $500.00 for every appointment missed and every phone call not returned. Seems to me he owes you money.

ProWallGuy

Why should he get the commision? He didn't sell anything. You did.

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Digital Murals Installation

Mike Finley

Fu#k no!

And if there was ever a catalyst to sit down and chew his ear off, this is certainly it, all the while I would have the commission check for this job sitting on the table made out to yourself and make sure he looks at it and realizes what it is. Make it a point of telling him thanks and let him know you are going to buy a big screen or something with his missed commission. Your "salesman" is a total clown in my opinion and is costing you a lot of money, you only find out about this one because the customer is a total lay-down and begging you guys to take his money, think of the customers that you aren't hearing about this guy is burning through with his 'salesmanship'.

jmic

I'd say I don't even believe you have to ask anyone's opinion, the guy's going to drag you down. Now that you have to go and duplicate his work to make sure he isn't selling you down the river, you might as well just do it yourself till you find a replacement

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___"Remember You Never Get A Second Chance To Make A First Impression"______________________
Joe

mdshunk

Does your commission structure have "lead pay"? Say, if the commission total is 10%, is it 2% for the lead and 8% for the sale, totalling 10% for a contract who's lead was generated and sold by the salesperson? If so, if his actions generated the lead, he at least should get the lead pay. He certainly didn't do anything to sell this deal, and you're darned lucky you managed to salvage it yourself.

ricpacer69

I'd tell him we have to do this $14,000 job for the $ 8,000.00 he quoted and ask him for the difference.

By the way great save on your part.

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bmartin

Fire the Bum. It shouldn't be too hard to hire someone who dosen't sale roofing, won't return phone calls, quote 40% off your actual price and come unprepared to close the deal too. I think your laborers could do that.

Woz the Painter

Did you hire this guy from Craigslist?

AtlanticWBConst

One other possibilty: 50 percent and a pink slip.

I think he should just get fired...then he'll have planty of time to drink....

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- Build Well -

Teetorbilt

From what you have said, this guy is a poser. Ol'#2 is a salesperson and would NEVER break a rule, much less all of them at once.

BTW, I believe that salespeople are born, not made. They thrive on the art of the deal, can shrug off rejection with impunity and go looking for their next mark....er, CUSTOMER!

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Tscarborough

The door could not hit him in the ass fast enough, and he would not get any commission on that sale.

Patty

DITTO DITTO DITTO TO ALL OF THE ABOVE!
(especially the first two words)

You keep the ENTIRE commission, show up at the Chicago Members Get-Together and buy us all a round!

All in Favor, say "I"

nadonailer

You're being way too nice on this one This guy should be shown the door asap, a bad sales guy representing you is worse than no one at all, IMHO. i would fire him today.......

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joasis

I know why I do my own sales now....and to think I fired a guy from blowing a motor in a van....this guy could potentially cost you a fortune in lost work.

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Grumpy

No actually. Woz absolutely HATEs craigslist.

Grumpy

Hey guys I agree, this guys needs to be canned and if it were in a slightly less crucial time of the year he'd already be gone. He will be canned once things slow down. Firing him right now would be like shooting myself in the foot financially, though he's a hack he does bring in some work.

Thanks for confirming what I already knew. No commission for him. (I wish I could say it like the soup nazi from seinfeld.)

jblati

Grumpy, I am new here but have lurked a bit. You and I have similar thoughts.

On this one, be sure to remember what he is COSTING you. Your name is something you can rarely buy back. Sometimes never meeting a client is better than meeting them and aggrevating them.

Peladu

My God, if I was originally told 8K to 9K to complete a job, and
then the same company came back with a quote of 14K+,
I wouldn't hire them. I would feel as if I was lowballed and
even if it cost me more I would go with another company.

Grumpy

I agree, if in the customer's shoes I wouldn't have hired us. However all the other quotes he got were in the ball park of our revised estimate. He was under no pressure to sign up, the re-sale was done by me over the phone and fax. Take it or leave it basically is what it came down to. I'd rather not do a job then to do a job for $8k and lose $1k out of pocket. However a standard line in my service agreement, on the back of all my proposals, is that the contract is not final until reviewed and scheduled by the management.

What suprises me more is that he had 3 proposals about $14k and then ours at $8,600 and it didn't raise any alarms or red flags. I even asked him why he hired us and didn't throw our proposal in the garabage... The answer was obvious but the question wasn't asked to be answered but was asked to provoke him to think about the dumb move he had made.

Anyways this job is almost done. The roof is on. We did manage to break a 2nd floor window on the neighbor's house some how (not even sure if we did this to be honest) but it's already been fixed. We are just waiting on the gutters, but they are half done. This HEAT is killing us.

I've decided that I am going to use this incident as an excuse to sit the salesmen down and tell him his position within the company is in major jeopardy and he has X ammount of time to impress me or else. Then I am simply going to ask him.... "Do you really feel as if you deserve any commission on this job? Before you answer, stop and think and examine your conscience and heart and tell me if you really really think I should pay you anything on this job."