Originally Posted by
pepper38_cnd
Someguy, You are the customer that every Dealer dreads! You’ve been a customer for a long time and we want to keep you. But you have no loyalty and after you get a quote from us, you purchase the same equipment from somebody else. Somebody else who offers no support, no installation, no qualified technician, he may not even have a shop or any overhead ! And because doesn’t have to offer you any of this, he can offer to sell to you at a much lower price than us!
So your bargain doesn’t work and you call us. We send out a Tech, he does whatever it is and says he’ll get back to you. But because he is so busy looking after customers who actually bought from us, your quote gets put on the back burner or in this case forgotten about. (Not a good thing no doubt, but shit happens. I am not condoning this.)
Now the ethical question: Does someone who places a service call, on equipment they did not purchase from the Service Provider have an obligation to pay for the Technicians time spent regardless of the out come?
Keep this in mind the cost of a Tech includes:
-Service Vehicle Costs
-Vehicle inventory
-Liability insurance
-Dispatch costs including elaborate service record keeping
-Tech Training
-Tech Wages
-Health Benefits
-Parts inventory and warehousing
-Tools and communications
I’m sure there are many service related costs that Dealer incur that I haven’t mentioned.
But the point is “It costs money to send a Technician to your office” The days of “Free Estimates” are mostly gone, unless those terms are prearranged with management, and it doesn’t sound like that happened.
I agree with most others. That this Tech did a poor job. But he is not charging you for a repair, only for an estimate. I believe most estimates are 60% of the minimum 1 hr charge, and are to be completed in 30 minutes or less, if you go ahead with the repair that fee is rolled into the total labor charge. That’s what I believe you should be charged 60% of a 1 hr charge..
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