Technician Wages

[kingpd@businessprints.net]

There's a reason Ricoh bought IKON and not the other way around, and yet Ricoh is picking up all of IKON's systems and policies - morons in management are going to drive us into the ground again.

I think they have too much going on. For instance, they bought Ikon (which I guess had their own rebrand of the machines), Hitachi's Printing Division (which I loved their printers), and have Lanier, Savin, & Gestetner, and recently the joint venture with IBM with the Infoprintsolutionscompany...does the world really need that many version of the same machine? To me Ricoh was always the biggest player, have one company, one product line, and focus on making it the best it can be...just my thoughts.

[Shadow1]

Yeah, Ikon pretty much blows.

There's a reason Ricoh bought IKON and not the other way around, and yet Ricoh is picking up all of IKON's systems and policies - morons in management are going to drive us into the ground again.

[kingpd@businessprints.net]

Technodruid,

From what I able to find out it really depends on your relationship with your manager. What I know is IKON pay scale tops out much lower than RICOH, but RICOH starts lower.

All I know is by joining IKON as a RBS tech I got .30 cent increase. Yippie ! This is only because I was below the minimum for IKON starting wage. At the time of being given my acceptance letter I asked if the DSW Director would see giving me the opportunity to accomplish the requirements for a master tech and allow me to earn a raise, at least the opportunity. A couple of the other managers basically told me in polite terms, either I sign the letter or be fired. I see that as less than honorable. So much for opportunity.

Yeah, Ikon pretty much blows.

[verderacer]

Technodruid,

From what I able to find out it really depends on your relationship with your manager. What I know is IKON pay scale tops out much lower than RICOH, but RICOH starts lower.

All I know is by joining IKON as a RBS tech I got .30 cent increase. Yippie ! This is only because I was below the minimum for IKON starting wage. At the time of being given my acceptance letter I asked if the DSW Director would see giving me the opportunity to accomplish the requirements for a master tech and allow me to earn a raise, at least the opportunity. A couple of the other managers basically told me in polite terms, either I sign the letter or be fired. I see that as less than honorable. So much for opportunity.

[b003ace]

no matter what happens to the economy in the future/ as proven before with slowdowns on purchases/ or new businesses starting up and no matter how technology improves in copiers/printers, u will still need a person (human being) to repair them . Be it on out of production units/ used & or new units. a trained & honest field tech will always be in demand in this business, one consistent proven point is that "word of mouth is your best tool" .

I disagree whole heartedly!

Take a look at the letter/A4 desktop copier. Twenty years ago, they sold for $1000 and ran at 8 cpm. (Sharp Z8/Xerox 8008) Today, they run 25-30 cpm for about $250, and include print, fax, and network scanning. (Most any Brother, HP, Samsung, etc.) All disposable, as are ALL dedicated fax machines. Color laser used to start at $2500. Today there are machines starting around $500. Hell, the replacement drum and toner cartridges cost more than the initial price of the machine.

Then look at a Xerox 700. The drums, corotron, and fusers, are all disposable customer replaced units. Same thing on the 252/260.

In many cases, whole assemblies are cheaper than the wear items inside them (especially fusers and PCUs).

Technology is pushing the speed and features up, while pushing the price down. And the cutthroat competition between the manufacturers is putting downward pressure on pricing as well. At the same time, supply pricing is rising. Any wonder why? The OEMs make more on the supplies and customer replaceable parts than they do the original machine.

Some manufacturers are even putting pressure on their dealers and customers to train key customer personnel to do feed rollers, transfer belts and rollers, decurlers, drum cartridges (ones not normally customer replaceable), etc. All of the regular maintenance items we've been responsible for at PM. All in the name of enhanced customer productivity.

Just as the move from analog to digital created a short spike in the demand for techs, as is the current push to make everything color, in the long run, there will be far less need for technicians in a few years. The built in diagnostics on the network connected multi-purpose printing device will order its own parts online and the operator will replace the parts. And the use of ever larger touch screens on machines, some with color, will allow the manufacturers to even include videos for the operator to follow for parts replacement. Shown right on the machine itself.

All of this may well create a two tier technician pay situation. The top tier will be the ones who can actually diagnose and repair abnormal failures. The lower tier will be just like the guy at the quickie lube shop. He (or she) will make just above minimum wage being a parts changer for those few times the operator cannot, or should not, (safety) do it themselves. Those top tier guys may have it made, but there will probably be a glut of them for quite a while.

[jamesyboy]

underpaid undervalued

Hi guys I work in the uk and itlooks like the same all over

massive skill requirement these days joined the industry in the eighties was an electrician lured by a free company car then you seem never to be able to leave I work for Toshiba in the uk and they are probally the best to work for so far

the problem I think is the copy cost its the only thing that gets cheaper every year with sales wanging in machines at below their running costs so not much in the pot ,there was talk of unions and strikes over here but any such thing would probally result in coming back to work and all youre customers gone somewhere else and no job a catch 22
the future for engineers is to be as financially aware as possible the more money in the pot the more likely we are to get towards a living wage

the manufactures should set a copy cost a sort of cartel then its all down to how good the machines and engineers are engineers should get a part of the sales fee

up the revolution jamesyboy

want to ask the SERVICEMAN for this thread

Hello SERVICEMAN
How long have been you in this business ????? Why you ask for :
1. Entry Level Tech or minimal certs/experiance:
2. Good Tech, trusted in field-don't have to babysit:
3. Senior Tech:
4. Service Manager:

-What kind of vacation and benefits are given?:
-Are raises at regular intervals and what percent?

If you are just one year...you know, but if you are the boss and want to know what to
pay your guys..... that's another story. Just be straight here. If the company don't pay you
just look for another place to go. No tech got six digit paycheck.
Make no sense to me people with no experience want to do the service guy. Technology is
going forward and make things easy but sooner or later fake tech. GO HOME !

[technodruid]

We, here in IKON's Desert Southwest area, heard about the merging of RBS Phx and IKON Service - Tempe a few weeks ago. I know the Director of Service personally. I believe he has the best interest of the techs in mind. Although, I do know he has a lot of presure from the VP's and such in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. In my experience (8 years with IKON) getting raises and promotions is not as tough as you might think. I started green with zero copier experience and I'm a master tech and team leader with IKON now. I've made a point to take the initiative with my training. I pester my service manager for time to take self pace courses every time I see a usefull one come available. I request training at Ricoh University in Tustin, CA every chance I get. Keeps me on top of the latest gear Ricoh releases and therefore, less expendable than some of the other techs. Overall, I've been pretty happy with IKON. Who knows what the future will bring, but, at the moment, I'm just happy to have a job at all.

[teckat]

no matter what happens to the economy in the future/ as proven before with slowdowns on purchases/ or new businesses starting up and no matter how technology improves in copiers/printers, u will still need a person (human being) to repair them . Be it on out of production units/ used & or new units. a trained & honest field tech will always be in demand in this business, one consistent proven point is that "word of mouth is your best tool" .

[Klydon]

From what I have read with Ikon (and experienced myself), it is fairly highly regionalized. Some areas are better than others as far as management goes and other areas just plain seem to suck. Around here, you do what is asked and you generally get promoted. Realize that some promotions are not possible. You are not going to get promoted to color graphics if your territory is only 25% color.

Part of the issue not only for Ikon, but for just about anyone is getting "right sized" and staying that way against a moving target. As the machines get better, last longer between calls, and require less time, each tech can cover more. I have been in this biz for nearly 20 years and the machine/copy count that makes up a standard territory now is far different than when I got started. A lot of companies deal with this through attrition. Someone quits, they don't get replaced.

IF you have a manager worth a lick, they are going to take care of their techs as best as they can. Some of the things a tech can do is get as much training on their own as they can through courses, getting with other techs, etc. It may not pay off for a long time, but becoming a "go to person" will at least improve your job security if/when cuts come. In general, hard work does pay off in the long run, but it might take awhile to get there.

For pay increases these days, etc all I can say is it is the economy stupid. We are somewhat fortunate in that the industry weathers bad economic times better than most businesses do. You may not get that pay raise, but at least you still got a job. Unfortunately, the economy is not going to get better anytime soon between employers being forced to absorb more costs with the government health care coming and all the tax increases that will go in effect on Jan 1, 2011. The economy is going to go into shock and just nose dive.

For now, if you are in a not so hot situation, bide your time, increase your education through your own efforts and pester your manager for additional training. When things get better, you will be better positioned to either demand more money from your current job or there will be good opportunities elsewhere.

As far as former Ricoh techs getting merged into Ikon; In general, from what I know of Ricoh owned techs from before, you are going to be better off. Ricoh/Savin was not exactly on the ball with the service side in taking good care of their people either through compensation or just in general.

[teckat]

IKON dishes out the same crap that DANKA did back in 96/97 when they were buying up companies left and right. Canon has also cut off IKON (Canon) trained techs. IKON's promises of pay scale structure to experienced techs. & management never came about. Canon finally gave DANKA the boot , kicked them out, & eventually prevented their Canon trained techs access to online & phone support. Even now Konica Minolta/ which took over DANKA accounts has given their Canon techs the shaft when it come to pay scale raises for experience personal.

I will stick with small companies/ they are more loyal to their personal

[Ikon Princess]

No you wont be making the same as the delivery guys(couldn't pay me enough to lug those heavy boxes around), what you would be getting is the minimum pay scale of a technician with your experience. After a while you will get a review where they have this formula to figure out your percentage of a merit increase. All of this should be explained to your manager soon and he/she should then be able to explain it to you. There is pleny of room for education to expand your experience and grow as a technician. My manager does not have any problems with educating us techs because he feels that well educated techs can handle a more diverse industry.

[verderacer]

Well we all got the news: The adjustment came in the form of, as my manager put it, a lateral move. The actualy adjustment came in the form of since were were making below the minimum for our position that we were given the increase, or a raise as my manager put it, to the new minimum set by IKON.

Oh golly geez... Thanks IKoN for giving the same wage as the truck delivery driver and warehouse man.

Now here is the interesting part and please any IKoN people chime in here and correct me. I have been told many times now that IKoN offer great opportunity to advance and get promoted. I have asked many a local IKoN tech about this and had a good conversation today with one of them that I met for the first time today.

He's been working for the company 7 + years and has told me his struggles on getting promoted. Mind you I have heard slightly differing versions of this from as many as 8 or 10 other local IKoN techs. "What they do is to stick in a service place (I am assuming a tech level) and if you ask to or try to improve your shut down immediately." Some of his examples where in huge struggles in just getting training on supporting 30ppm or less machines that he currently supports now. From what he explained he came to the company with 6 years of HP and Xerox experience, and like me, was told the story of opportunity. I have heard so many times now of the "You dont get promoted unless someone is fired, leaves or dies. Then its another fight to get that one opening amongst all your peers, not including the favoritism, internal politics, and Mgmt team infighting. My new friend has been trying to become what IKoN calls a "Master Tech" for 2 years. Not that he has not accomplished all the pre-requisites, which they kept changing and adding to.

So today I signed my offer letter and acted like a good sheep so I can keep my job. Bhaaaaaaa....

[linuxxpwin]

I have read all comments and stuff and I have to generally agree that as tech we are very often overlooked for pay rise, I use to work with a an agent, where profits sore on the technical field, I mean the Technical was making its own monies to buy parts and stuff, because of my experience we had almost everyone calling us for service even Xerox and HP and yes it was good for them.

All I got in the at christmas is a $100.00 BONUS, which I did not take after making close to $600,000.00 for this firm, oh and I left the company there after and guess what the rest I will not into......


UNFAIR



Linuxxpwin

[Ikon Princess]

News Release: Out here in the great west (AZ) all RICOH techs are about to come IKON techs. We were givin the news a couple of weeks ago about the big change. We have been told that our wages will be adjusted. What that means is totally up in the air. I eagerly await to see and hear what this really means along with my paycheck.

Maybe good news for you because they have not said anything about wage adjustments to us.