How can anyone do business anymore???

[Nesikep]

Well, we've been renovating the house this year.. and it came time to do the wallpapering.

So we try to find a nice neutral wallpaper, which was next to impossible, but we finally found something we liked. We wanted 5 rolls going by what our previous project required. They said "We don't sell single rolls, they're all double rolls", so we got 3 double rolls.
Well, it turns out that we would have needed 5 double rolls 'to be safe'.. like what we had planned. So we called them up and asked for another roll (er, I mean double roll), and had them courier it out to us. The lady said "Oh, we send everything by DHL", and their depot here is the chainsaw and motorcycle shop that we know well, they'll call when it comes in. So after a week of not receiving a call, we called them.. no package for us. So we call the place we bought it from again, they get the tracking number and find out it was shipped 2 weeks ago and that it was signed for. It was my dad doing all the phoning at this point, and I had a 'Eureka' moment.. It was shipped by Purolator!, which is a different depot, so we call them up and sure enough, there it is.. They said there was no phone number on it. We go to pick it up, and there's our phone number on it.. Besides the fact the address it was supposed to go to was STILL the other depot. I think the reason they said there was no phone number on it was our phone number is 7141, and the depot's number is 7114, perhaps that was the confusion there.

Anyhow, I'm wondering how anyone can do business these days with such miserable screwups left, right, and center.. rarely does anyone listen, and those that do rarely understand.
What kind of a ridiculous idea is a "double roll".. If you showed it to someone they'd say that's 1 roll!... Then they say they can't sell you a single roll...

People are no doubt getting dumber by the year.. Who was it (I think it was here) that had a ranch hand feed his cows in a pasture, and then moved his cows across the road, but the ranch hand kept feeding them in their old pasture, and it didn't dawn on him that yesterday's hay was still there.. and most likely the cows were bawling saying "Hey moron, we're over here!! MOOO!.. Look.. OVER HERE"

 

[greybeard]

Don't get me started..........

Wife had her windshield cracked by a big truck. Full coverage insuarnce. Not a ding--a crack too long to be repaired.
The insurance company sets up a repair guy to replace the windshield at our place and gives them the info on the vehicle (2013 Dodge Dart limited) They call 2 days ago, said they will do it Friday morning. (today)
He calls this morning at 8:30am, says he will be here by noon at the latest.
I wait around all morning.
Finally calls around 12:30 says he will be a little late.
I ask "You know how to get here?"
'oh yeah, I got it in my laptop on the map'.
Hour later, he calls says he can't find us but he is on our road.
I give him directions. "come all the way to the end of the gravel road you are on, which is Albright Rd, passing by 2 houses, enter the open gate at the end of the road and turn left-go 1000' down the powerline road and you will see the house on the right in the middle of a pasture.
Calls back, says he still can't find it.
"Where are you?"
"I'm at the first house"
"Come on down the road past another house and come in the gate at the end of the road and turn left"
"Can't--the road just ends" :dunce: :dunce: :dunce:
"No it doesn't, just come on down like you were--never mind--wait where you are, I'll be there in 1 minute" :dunce: :dunce:
I lead him the last 1900' to my house.
Our windshield has a rain and condensation sensor built into it so it kicks the wipers on automatically.
Ins co ordered windshield for plain Dart--no sensor in the windshield and no mirror mount built in to it.
:bang: :bang: :bang:
Re set appointment for next Tuesday, with another guy to come out with the correct windshield---3/4 a day wasted.

 

[MO_cows]

We're having trouble with the company doing the repairs on the tornado-damaged houses. Roofing crews were pretty good. Roofs got done timely and look good. Siding crews, terrible. The one house, they are gonna have to tear it off and try again. One piece at the top fell off, the walls are wavy and loose looking. The other house, different crew, they started too high up from the bottom and left a big gap between the porch floor and the start of the siding. They must have forgot to nail a little strip above the porch roof, it's flapping in the wind. Another guy was brought in to fix siding, plus do the gutters and repair some bad wood found at a window sill. He did the gutters first, one run pulled away in a big rain the next day. Then he didn't show up all week this week, had truck trouble. They sent a statement, it's $2000 more than we agreed upon for the one house. I'm sorry now we hired this outfit. I was leaning towards another co. but my dad wanted this one, and the references they gave were all positive so I went with his pick. We thought we would get a better deal to put both houses with the same co., and be a higher priority customer with two projects working. Not so much.

 

[skyhightree1]

Unfortunately customer service and companies having employees that give a dam are becoming extinct.. People today are just in it for a check. Companies want to pay least as possible which makes employees ticked off and they do not care about the customer. I blame all that outsourcing to other countries.

 

[msscamp]

Unfortunately customer service and companies having employees that give a dam are becoming extinct..

Becoming extinct? As far as I can tell, they have been extinct for at least the last couple of years. Case in point - a while back we had a belt break on our McDon swather. Went into the local implement company that services McDon to get a new one, ended up having to order it from McDon because the store doesn't carry them in stock. My nephew noticed 3 different numbers by each of the belts in the parts catalog, asked the guy behind the counter about it and was told he didn't have a clue and my nephew would have to call McDon. Turns out the numbers by the belts relate to the different lengths of the header bar. Maybe I'm wrong here, but I would think that would be something a parts man in an implement store should know.

 

[greybeard]

Unfortunately customer service and companies having employees that give a dam are becoming extinct..

Becoming extinct? As far as I can tell, they have been extinct for at least the last couple of years. Case in point - a while back we had a belt break on our McDon swather. Went into the local implement company that services McDon to get a new one, ended up having to order it from McDon because the store doesn't carry them in stock. My nephew noticed 3 different numbers by each of the belts in the parts catalog, asked the guy behind the counter about it and was told he didn't have a clue and my nephew would have to call McDon. Turns out the numbers by the belts relate to the different lengths of the header bar. Maybe I'm wrong here, but I would think that would be something a parts man in an implement store should know.

no such thing as a parts house anymore

 

[Nesikep]

We've had a couple people come by to do estimates on work for the house, nearly every time we could tell we weren't going to be happy with the job they'd do, whether it's roofing, siding or whatever.
We did have a lady come in and do drywall for us, she had 2 helpers, one to place and cut it, the other to screw it in. these are 4x12' sheets, and at the Home Depot they recommend 80 screws per sheet. Before she came to do the work, my dad and I painstakingly made sure there were lots of places where they could fasten it, and that the walls were straight, etc. The guy spent about 3 hours in the room, put about 30 screws in and left. We came and looked after and there's hardly any screws in there, but she didn't have the screw gun so she couldn't put more in,... Then came the mudding and taping.. Well, most of the mud was on the floor, and got trampled on, spread around on the floor, and then tracked onto the carpets in the rest of the house. Just another disappointment when dealing with people!
When we built our shop 15 years ago, we hired a concrete finishing crew when we were pouring the floor.. we had 6" grid laid out, floor heat tubing tied to the grid, etc.. Had we not been there, they would have poured the floor over top of it without lifting the grid into the concrete, and then it would rust and crack, and we'd be wondering why! They also came with only a half a set of tools, and needed shovels, etc which we had to scramble to get.. hey, the truck is already here and that was some darned hot concrete mix.

I guess the lesson here is always watch over the back of people doing work for you!, there's far too many people out there that even if they don't have a full schedule will take any shortcut they can.

As for parts houses... I was in the big city when my throttle cable jammed on my dodge... the cable had frayed, and was hanging on by 1 strand.. so I was in a big hurry to find myself another one. I had a GPS, so I found out I was 2 blocks from a chrysler dealer.. Great!.. or so I thought. Now a 1994 Dodge diesel is a pretty darned popular truck, they'll have a cable somewhere.. Man was I mistaken.. Not only was there none in stock, there was none in the city, there was none in the province, there was NONE IN THE COUNTRY!.. it would take #$%$ 3 WEEKS #$@# to get a throttle cable. I tried NAPA and a couple other stores, no luck... I couldn't even find one at a wrecker!
Thankfully I can think on my feet and will give Macgyver a run for his money any day... I went to a bicycle store and bought 10 feet of bicycle brake cable and a couple clamp nuts for it, clipped the frayed inner wire, pulled it out, and put the bicycle cable in it's place, and used the clamps to tie it in.. I ran it that way for a year until I finally 'got around' to taking it out of my parts truck

I don't think outsourcing to other countries can be blamed for the poor work ethics in the trades here... It can be blamed for poor quality materials and people you can't understand on tech support. Things like our wallpaper fiasco are because of people who don't give a rats azz... Besides all the screwups until it got here, at the depot, if the phone number wasn't on the package, our name sure was, and these days finding someone's phone number is a matter of a couple clicks online if you don't have the energy to pick up a phone book...

 

[hurleyjd]

If you want it done right and on time you need to hire a crew Mexicans that are the illegal ones that most folks want to send back.

 

[CottageFarm]

Nesi, sorry, but I had to laugh a bit while reading about the wallpaper.
The single roll/double roll thing is rather archaic, but it's just always been that way. The last time wallpaper was actually sold in a single roll was about 100 years ago. It's still priced by the single roll but only sold by the double. Stupid, yes, but it'll probably never change at this point. They people you purchased from absolutely should have explained all that to you!

The trades are a lost art for sure. My husband and I lament this often. I feel it's actually been a vicious cycle. Manufacturers come out with products that make the job faster, easier, cheaper, etc. so in turn we produce tradesmen who have fewer skills and training because the basic job requires less skill to accomplish. Then the clients want lower prices because the job is supposed to be easier and require less time, which precludes talented people from learning or staying in the trade. All the while, the end results are becoming cheap and crappy because nobody knows how to do it right anymore!

 

[greybeard]

If you want it done right and on time you need to hire a crew Mexicans that are the illegal ones that most folks want to send back.

When I had my house built in '08-09 that was the one extra stipulation I insisted upon when I looked over the contract.
If any illegal workers show up on the property thru builder or sub-contractor, the contract is voided.

 

[CottageFarm]

If you want it done right and on time you need to hire a crew Mexicans that are the illegal ones that most folks want to send back.

This is not true, ...never mind... you just go on thinking it is. :roll:

 

[3waycross]

If you want it done right and on time you need to hire a crew Mexicans that are the illegal ones that most folks want to send back.

This is not true, ...never mind... you just go on thinking it is. :roll:

+1 :deadhorse:

 

[Nesikep]

CottageFarm, I think I know the worst offender in trades you speak of..
Electrical.. Now with all the plastic junction boxes etc, how can an electrician take pride in his work? I will say that's a place all the shortcuts haven't made it cheap, electrical stuff is outrageously priced for serially made garbage.
I really couldn't keep sane being a drywaller either.

As for the wallpaper, selling it by the double roll and pricing it by the single, now that's a real bad idea. The point is we knew how much was on a physical roll, and knew we needed 5 of them.

GB,.. you'd be getting rid of the better bunch of illegals... the ones on handouts aren't going to be working anyhwere!

 

[greybeard]

"better bunch of illegals" are still illegal by any other name. I won't have any part of it---too many good framers and roofers here that are here legally for me to allow illegals to make $$ off me.
Just because the federal govt won't enforce the laws doesn't mean I shouldn't.

 

[Workinonit Farm]

All the while, the end results are becoming cheap and crappy because nobody knows how to do it right anymore!

:nod: :nod: :nod:

My husband has been working on a somewhat large project. The client wanted an overlay of the walkway, stepps and stoop to their house, then a fresh new walk to an oval area with other elements. Anyhow, the overlay is on top of a concrete walk,steps and stoop. The concrete is in really good condition....no cracks etc. The hole area looked good......but....it is not square and all out of whack. Almost impossible to see with the naked eye, but if you take a tape and a square, it is all whacked. It's been quite the challenge to get all the pavers to lay correctly and work with it.

The homeowner/client had no idea that the concrete work was so out of whack until huisband showed him with string set-ups etc. It has taken a bit longer to complete that phase of the project, but the client is very happy with what husband has done and has been able to make it look right.

 

[herofan]

I don't think anyone demands good customer service anymore. Sure, we complain about it, but I suppose people need the service and would go back anyway. My dad is always talking about how when he was a teen and young man, people actually tried to serve you and be above their competition in quality of product and how they treated you.

I've noticed that these days, it doesn't matter how people are treated, they go back. Sure, occasionally somebody will get fed up and say, "I'll never go in there again," but it's not like it hurts their business.

We have a local building supply store. They deal with a lot of contractors with big orders. If a regular Joe goes in to buy a hammer or get a key made, they may be ignored for 20 minutes before they are waited on. Does it hurt their business? Apparently not.

It seems like people have business running out their ears, so they don't worry too much about customer service, and we allow it.

 

[I luv herfrds]

Had someone looking for a concrete company to do a foundation. A contractor I know told them to call the guy who bailed on us at the start of our house. I warned them to stay away from this guy. Contractor came back yelling at me that he knew the whole story and I was wrong and this guy is great. I just told him I do not remember him being there nor being any part of the contract so how could he know the truth with not being there!
Told him he might want to be quiet before I start informing people how he had agreed to put in a door for my fire company, but bailed on us and never did it!

 

[Gelbvieh 5]

Had someone looking for a concrete company to do a foundation. A contractor I know told them to call the guy who bailed on us at the start of our house. I warned them to stay away from this guy. Contractor came back yelling at me that he knew the whole story and I was wrong and this guy is great. I just told him I do not remember him being there nor being any part of the contract so how could he know the truth with not being there!
Told him he might want to be quiet before I start informing people how he had agreed to put in a door for my fire company, but bailed on us and never did it!

The power that you wield is simply amazing. :clap: You are quickly becoming a legend in that part of Montana. :tiphat: in your own mind ;-)

 

[dixiedrifter]

Everything is going to e-commerce. It cost a lot less money to have one big giant warehouse and ship items on the customer's dime than it does to build and upkeep smaller brick and mortar stores that are subject to zoning, commercial land purchase and development costs, taxes, and employees. And usually by the time it is all said and done on anything above $100 shipping is more or less paid for because there is no sales tax.

It's just like the starter for my tractor that died last week. My Kubota $tealer$hip wanted $267 for a replacement. Local rebuild place wanted $35 for new brushes, $40 for new solenoid, and I think it had a bad field coil or armiture on top of all that... basically it was just about worn out. I got a brand new aftermarket one off Ebay for $150 and free shipping. May not be as good as a rebuilt unit who knows. But by the time I fooled around with making another trip back to the rebuilder and potentially ending up with a functional but well used starter I said to heck with it and bought aftermarket online.

The only time it pays to go to the $tealer$hip or local store in most cases is when the item is too heavy to ship, requires occasional servicing, or you absolutely got to have whatever it is you gotta have the same day.