It’s too bad that all customers can’t follow Marnet’s lead and leave a note with the problem details.
It can help tremendously.
I’ve had a few people do that but they’re as rare as hen’s teeth. I always found that the note the customer left in the seat gave a very different impression from what the service advisor entered on the repair order.
I’ve done the service advisor and service manager gig and whenever a customer brought in a complaint I always grilled them about it for details and would even go out and take a look at it before writing up a repair order.
I got tangled up with a service writer on a VW once who simply put down “Won’t start after driving 300 miles”. That covers a lot of ground. What do you mean; won’t turn over, will turn over but won’t start or what?". The car is in the lot and runs fine. “Well, I don’t know; the customer is out of town on vacation for a couple of weeks and I don’t know how to contact him”.
Dallas is 200 miles one way. You want me to drive to Big D and back and hope I don’t break down or what? Dumbaxx.
He’s talking about airplane work or annuals. A lot of places allow you to help in those processes and can be a big savings. Kinda funny that a car is treated as more of a liability than a plane, eh?
There’s no way on God’s Green Earth I will allow anyone ever to assist me with a repair job. Not only is the liability issue huge it also slows down the works. An ex-boss of mine discovered this by allowing someone to walk out into the shop to retrieve something out of their glove box. He was with them, I was standing there the entire time, and they later claimed the wife fell and injured herself. It cost my boss 4 figures to stay out of court.
Also, as the holder of an A & P license, there’s no way on GGE I would ever allow someone to have their hands on an aircraft I’m doing service on. Plane goes down, kills everyone on board, and it’s traced back to the prior service do you thjnk the assistant who had his hands on it is ever going to admit being involved with that service? Not in a million years.
That would mean the customer was lying . . . which means they’re the kind of ___ customer you don’t want in the first place
I can’t stand people who try to cheat others and get things they’re not entitled to . . . I guess nobody ever taught them “If you want something, you’ll have to earn it”
Yes db4690, they were actually long term friends of the dealer and lived in a small city about 40 miles out. We were a Subaru dealer. They left the car for repairs which required a few special order parts. They said they needed some things out of the glove box and the dealer walked them out in the shop. The husband spent about 5 minutes with me chatting about the repairs and they left.
They came in on Friday, paid the 4-500 dollar bill, and left with the car. Two months later the couple decided that she had “tripped over an air hose (mine) that had been stretched across the shop and was now suffering chronic headaches after the fall”.
A letter from an attorney was the first that we had heard of this and my boss was rightfully livid. He asked me if she had tripped while his back was turned or something and I said no. The air hose was run to another car on an adjacent rack. They came nowhere near it.
And of course the dealer’s “friends” never came in again which is just as well. If they ever did have the gall to reappear you can bet your axx they were going to be facing a huge bill; justified or not.
Yeah, they were good enough friends (and repeat Subaru buyers) that when in town they would often drop by the dealership for some chit-chat and coffee with the owner.
That kind of went by the wayside after the legal proceedings. It seemed to me that pulling this stunt over 4-500 bucks on a dealer who is a friend and has bent over backwards to cut the price on a new car and even provide a free loaner during service is about as low life as it gets.
Doesn’t seem like much money to kill a personal and business friendship over.
Some people just don’t listen these days. I was at a big box store and needed 8 packs of lag screws. They only had 3 in stock so I made sure to order 5 more. I handed a worker the package with the barcode an said “I need 5 more of these on my order.”
I went to the checkout and the price didn’t seem very high. I look at the page and it only has two additional packages on the order. I told them I needed 5 more, not two more. This seemed to really throw them and they kept giving me the wrong number. I was like “I need 8 total and you only have 3 in the store.” Ordering 5 more seemed like a huge challenge. They then were like, so you need 3 more? I am like, no I need 5. They are like “You have 3 in your cart so you only need two more.” I am like “I need 8 total. Give me 5 more on the pickup order.” They are like “OK, you have three so you only need two more.” I am like “Just make the number 2 on this sheet a number 5 and I will be happy.” This seemed like such a simple thing but it was like pulling teeth. I finally got 5 more on their way so that is good. This was at the green big box home improvement store which seems to be a big improvement over the blue one here in town. The blue home improvement store is almost hopeless.
Anyone in a service business has to deal with customers that slow down the process of performing work. This is why I stand on my head about charging by the hour. I quickly learned that customers who insisted on a “fixed bid” job were more trouble than they are worth.
I always get a kick out of those little joke rate schedules you see at places showing how the hourly rate varies by “If you help”, “If you watch”, or “If you have worked on it before.” “If you have worked on it before” is the one that gets me as they often make the product uneconomical to repair by the time I get to it.
This suggestion is golden. From now on, if I have anything but an oil change, I am going to do this. Definitely passing it on to the rest of the family also.
There are quite a few shops that allow owner-assisted annuals, ok4450. The fellow that I go to is an ATP (as I am) in addition to being an IA and A&P. We both are former Part 121 line pilots.
What harm is there in an owner removing seats, inspection panels (my Piper Seneca has many),
cleaning spark plugs, changing tires (all tasks which the FAA allows owner/pilots to do under preventive maintenance 14CFR 43, which I’m sure you’re familiar with) ?
Years ago, Light Plane Maintenance magazine had an article about owner assisted shops. Some (like the one I go to) allow owner supplied parts. A Champion Ch48110 oil filter from Chief A/C costs a lot less than an FBO supplied part.
The FBO has to eat, yes. But if I couldn’t do the owner assisted route, I’d have to sell the plane, and the FBO would get zippo from me.
Funny story. I think everyone’s been at the mercy of store clerks who appear to acknowledge you are standing in front of them, but don’t seem to listen to what you are saying. Part of the problem I guess is the store staff these days are distracted by all the stuff going on around them, both actually, and electronically. And part is b/c the store’s marketers have developed a theory that if some complicated marketing idea is possible to do, it should be done. So the grocery stores for example no longer have a simple one-week sale advertisement. Instead they have some items on sale from Tues-Thursday, some only on Friday, some Fri-Sun, and some items are on sale all week. So the clerks are understandably confused; when a customer asks a question they feel the only way to answer is by interrogating the cash register computer, so they pay more attention to that than you. Ah , modern life
The problem with all the electronics and computers at stores is that the employees don’t know how to do anything themselves. If something is wrong in the computer, that is just it. This also happened at Menards and I had to tell them how to look it up.
I told them I wanted to special order something. I had seen it on their website but it wasn’t in the store. It wasn’t showing up in their computer so the guy kinda figured it wasn’t something Menards even sold.
I told them it was on the website so he went and found it there. It had some type of item number that he copied and pasted over to the other interface and then it came up. It had been put in the other system wrong.
Something similar happened with front control arms for my truck once as well. I was replacing both sides and got the two boxes in. There was a left control arm in the box for the left control arm and a left control arm in the box for the right control arm. I took it back and they ordered me in another one. The same thing happened. They tried again like 2-3 more times and the same thing happened. They were sourcing from a warehouse or distribution center like 100 miles away. Finally the sourced from one across the country to see if that would work and it did. I got the correct part.
Some of the sales that stores do these days are annoying. You never know when a rebate is going to take place at Menards and sometimes they are only good for 2-3 days and are over by the time I find out.
On the other hand, having a Menards in your area means you can get the Masterforce rolling tool cabinets, and they’re fantastic, especially for the price. Great thing to have when you’ve collected a lot of car tools.
That is good to know. I always kinda thought some of the Menards brands were cheap so am glad to hear the tool cabinets are of decent quality. I always kinda avoided the house brands of tools because I didn’t know if they were decent or not. I guess some are and some aren’t. It is probably like HArbor Freight although they seem to have stepped it up a bit.
It seems that Menards has Hitachi and Metabo tools which I hear are good. Lowes sells Dewalt and Home Depot sells Milwaukee. I recently started standardizing all my power tools on Milwaukee. The only bad thing is that there isn’t a Home Depot in town but this isn’t a huge deal as I can order online.
There are different grades of all the major brands which is frustrating. Milwaukee has 3 basic lines. Not all tools are available in each line. They have a standard brushed model, brushless, and Fuel brushless lines. Common tools like drills and impact drivers are available in all lines. Others are only available in a certain line. The good news is that the batteries and chargers still interchange. I don’t think the cheap line is bad but the average person may not know and certain other brands appear to sacrifice a lot of quality on their cheaper lines as compared to their top of the line.
Some of the Menards brands are cheap. I don’t buy Tool Shop or Performax. Masterforce is quality stuff, though. I’ve got a bunch of hand tools from them as well and they’re all good stuff.
I hear you on cheap drills. I’ve got crappy B&D drills that I intend to replace sometime. Probably soon. It gets frustrating when you’re trying to drill out a snapped bolt and the chuck is so weak that it just spins on the drill bit instead of spinning the bit. Been considering switching over to the Fuel line. Just haven’t pulled the trigger yet.
You WILL NOT be disappointed in the Fuel line as they are solid quality units. I actually upgraded from a Harbor Freight set of drills. I can’t really knock those tools as they still work and did the job but there is no comparison with something better.
I bought a landlocked bit of land a few years back and always have issues getting equipment across a small creek. It was a pain and if there had been any rain, you got wet and likely got the equipment stuck. I had to winch a mower out of there once. It couldn’t wait as more rain was predicted that day and I didn’t want it destroyed.
I finally decided to build a bridge over this creek and the hard part is now done. I used the M18 Fuel drill to make 1/2 inch holes to bolt the thing together. It went through 6x6 timbers like a hot knife through butter even on the fastest speed.
One tool I probably won’t upgrade is the 1/2 inch automotive style impact wrench. I bought it from Harbor Freight not long before I switched to Milwaukee and did some research. It is the Earthquake brand and seems to be a solid tool. It sank quite a few 3/8 inch lag screws without trouble. My only complaint is that I ran out of battery in the middle of the work. It only came with only battery and I was close to 1/2 mile from the nearest power outlet. I had 3x Milwaukee tools with charged batteries sitting right there but couldn’t use them.
The other issue with a lot of the cheaper brands is battery compatibility. I could go buy another battery for the impact but that would be the only tool that could use it. It is $60 which isn’t a lot different than the cost of a battery for a real tool brand. Even if I was still buying tools at HF, this appears to be like the only tool in this series. None of the other lines interchange.
Another issue is battery availability. Some guy wanted to sell me some older 18V Harbor Freight tool set for not a lot of money. It had been sitting and the batteries were dead. I couldn’t find replacements easily so passed on that deal. It was the Chicago Electric NiCD line. I have the same thing in 18V except it is a slide on battery while his was the post type.
Milwaukee also makes tools in that line for just about every trade. I mean there are tools I have never heard of. They have lots of automotive tools, construction tools, and so on. You can select your trade on their page and get a huge selection of tools. I also bought some yard tools like a chainsaw, blower, and trimmer. I like these because you don’t smell like oil and gas and need to take a shower if you just want to blow off an area for like a minute.
Another issue with the batteries on the cheap tools is the battery size. You are limited to the one size that comes with the tool. The HF impact I have only has a 4.0AH battery available. The Milwaukee line comes in 1.5AH up to 12.0AH. The chainsaw and other tools work best on the 12.0AH for both run time and available amperage but many smaller drills, etc. do fine on the smaller batteries and these are nice for working in tight spaces.
I used a 9.0AH battery on the drill when drilling all those large holes because I knew I was going to be taxing it pretty hard and would drain a smaller battery sooner. I have a flashlight as well. These pull very little power so a small battery is nice in tight spaces. If camping I hook up a 12.0AH battery and set it in place. I don’t have to think about changing batteries. This is probably a bad example as I have never run down a power tool battery by using a light.
I also bought a slide on adapter to turn the batteries into a USB power source. You can power whatever in your vehicle without having to worry about running down a car battery by using the accessory position.
About 20 years back I was going to the hardware store. My wife was working on a sewing project and asked me to buy something she needed from the variety store which was around the corner. I brought the $1.69 item to the 19 or 20 year old cashier. I handed her 2 $1 bills. She produced a pad and pencil and started “cyphering”! I asked what she was doing? The cash register function that displayed change due was not working. OMG! What a crisis!!! I told her my change was 31 cents. One quarter. One nickel. and one penny! She asked if I was sure! I replied yes. She gave me the change then asked how I could do that in my head. The only reply I could think of was: “When I went to school, they still taught basic mathematics”. Poor thing.
