Does This Seem Ethical?

michael084

I got a call from a guy last Monday needing two lots cleared. Met him on the site, he said he worked for the man who owned the property handling his boss's real estate holding throughout the southeast. He wanted a price on clearing two lots broken down separately in case his boss only wanted to clear one of them. Okay, cool I can do that. Then he asks if I can get him a comparable bid from another site contractor I know so his boss will have something to compare my price to. I thought this was very odd considering this is what he had said his job was supposed to be. So I am heading back to the office from meeting him and I see a new sign that says "Abba's Land Clearing and Tree Removal." It has the same phone number as the man I just met to discuss clearing the lot for. At the very least he misrepresented himself wouldn't you agree? There are a lot of crooks out there. This guy has signs at most intersections in the three counties I do work in . I called everybody I know doing site work and warned them about him.

realpurty2

While I don't think his method was the most scrupulous, gotta give him credit for market research.

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Woman in a Man's World.

concretemasonry

Sounds like he needs a price and is willing to do it for your price since he already may have made the contact.

Its better than having him blindly quoting to do it for a low ball price that could effect your prices later.

If not, it is just market research to see what the going rate is.

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Dick

Engineer, designer and consultant recently active domestically and internationally on construction and design in about 35 countries.

Wolf

You should notify the owner of the property to press charges against ABBA for trespass.

denick

Michael,

First welcome to E&SW. Glad to have you posting.

If you use the word "ethical" as the dictionary states "conforming to accepted professional standards"
I consider lying wrong. Even the little stuff. It then falls on all of us here and every guy you called to warn about the gentleman in question. And every other businessman in our business. If "WE" accept that it is okay to lie he's ethical. If "WE" reject the thought that lying is okay he's unethical". Unless professional standards are also subjective and what you think is ethical for you is okay, and what dayexco thinks is ethical for dayexco is okay. and what jmic thinks is ethical for jmic is okay, and what PipeGuy thinks is ethical for PipeGuy is okay, and what rino thinks is ethical for rino is okay, and what tgeb thinks is ethical for tgeb is okay, and what Cat385 thinks is ethical for Cat385 is okay, and what DirtGuy thinks is ethical for DirtGuy is okay, and what Excaliber thinks is ethical for Excaliber is okay, and what jojo thinks is ethical for jojo is okay, and what Duff thinks is ethical for duff is okay, and what Nac thinks is ethical for Nac is okay, and what Tmatt42 thinks is ethical for Tmatt42 is okay, and what tnmtn thinks is ethical for tnmtn is okay, and what MC Excavating thinks is ethical for MC Excavating is okay, and what every guy (that this tired old brain forgot) thinks is ethical for every guy (that this tired old brain forgot) is okay.

I am no saint. I have known no other life than the excavating /masonry business from the day I was born. This is a very tough business. But wrong is wrong no matter how I tried to justify it.

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Nick

"Every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life are based on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving" Albert Einstein

Glasshousebltr

Do the bid ....then charge him for it .....that's as ethical as it gets.

Bob

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Bob

tgeb

It is clearly unethical in my book!

The question now is how to handle it.

I would not waste my time giving him a price quote, but I might waste my time and meet w/him again...with one of his signs in my hand....... Then make him explain himself.

Then....I would explain myself.

I'm willing to help anyone out, even my competition. But to do what he is doing is just like stealing in my book. I would stop short of kicking him in the N*ts, but I would also let him know that's what he deserves.

PS. Welcome to the site!

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Tom

www.gebcon.com

dayexco

i not only found his actions unethical...i'm enough of a creep....that i'd set him up...i'd make up some bogus proposal so that you couldn't be held to it....and really lowball the thing, i mean 50% under cost lowball. he's scratching his head now trying to figure out how to price it, wants you to do it for him, ..i'd give him another reason to scratch

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someday, i'll be as patient as Nick.

CheckmateOhio

I would do just the opposite. Price it 50% higher than you normally would, give that bid to the creep. T hen find the owner and give him your actual bid. You would most likely get the job and leave the other guy scratching his head.

HD3

I would'nt give him a quote, But id sure think about sending him on a wild goose chase, id call asking him to bid at an address that did'nt exist.

denick

Welcome to the forum HD3! good to have you in the mix!

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Nick

"Every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life are based on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving" Albert Einstein

rino1494

I was thinking the same thing. I would notify the owner of the property what was going on and hand him my bid

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C buck

You gotta love the way some people think ,lol. I had a situation like that last summer. Another excavator in the area kept calling me to do some jobs with him, I kept making excuses telling him I didn't have time, even though I kinda did. Nice guy, but heard alot of bad stories about the him, wrecking other peoples equipment, p!$$ing off alot of custumers ect. I got a little slow twards the end of summer and thought I would give him a chance. He was following around a guy tearing barn bords off old farm buildings and he would give the home owners estimates on demoing the foundations. I drove around all day with him on a SUNDAY looking at jobs, and the next week gave him my bids on my end of all the jobs, which was 95% of each one. Over the next week he notifies me when each home owner called back and he told me they either were going to hold off with the job or they got someone else to do it. Over the next few weeks I find out that he got 3 out of 5 jobs we looked at, at the prices I figured. To top it all off, he calls me asking to BORROW my equipment !

Driftwood

"Son , Don't go to bed with anyone crazier than You are"

This Bird qualifies ! HE HE

4theroc

I would find out who the owner of the land is and send him a letter in mail, telling him not to deal with that guy. IF somebody going to lie about who he works for just to see what you would bid so he could get the job,imagine what he will lie about once he starts working for the customer. ITs guys like him that make other contractors look bad. That's bull sh*t what they guy did. I would report him to the BBB for that.

michael084

I figure he is just out to scam people. We have a lot of roofers come in from out of state after hurricanes and get money down and just never show back up. We did a lot of roofs for people that had already paid to have it done. I was thinking about at least letting the sheriffs office know what is going on even though as far as I know he didn't commit a crime against me. I did find out he is living in a motel.

mahlere

What if he has nothing to do with the owner of the property? What if he's just using empty lots to do some market research? What are the legalities?

Duff

As we all know there is no shortage of people like this. Based on what this guy asked for and how he went about it, you can dervive that 1.) he has no confidence in his own ability to come up with his own competitive bid & 2.) deception is the only way he knows how to operate. That tells me he is most likely not going to be around for long.

If it were me I'd be non responsive and I'd put the word out locally, so others could be aware of his character/tactics.

PipeGuy

I have never in my life heard of such a thing. I can hardly believe I'm reading the post correctly.
If this is a guy that's trying to compete in a target market area by tricking his competition into giving him quotes for the work he wants to bid on himself then he needs some serious "straightening out". I hope he knows how many bad things can happen on job sites after hours so he can make sure to include such risks in his quotes.

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childs.dm

I hate to say it, but if this guy is starting his business maybe the local new businness center advised him to carry out his market reasearch this way.

Right now I am in the process of starting a Skid Steer/Mine excavator business. When they explain to you about local market reasearch, this is the exact thing they describe you do to find your compititions pricing if they openly wont give it to you. To me that seems a little sneaky and wrong. But to people who loan money they want to see you do what ever it takes to make the payment on your machine, even if it means having under handed methods for the reasearch you need.

Right now I am stuck because the local market is tight, few of the locals will talk about their pricing, I have no reasonable way to figure out what they charge, how they charge and what not.

Pretty much I am basing my rates on the little bit of solid market reasearch I do have which is from Framing sub contractors who need back filling done to keep themselves working. Other then that I have no clue other then to take a friends word and jump in head first with a $40,000 payment.

Although sneaky, it may be the only way he can figure out how to break into the industry.

I do not agree with his methods at all.