Do you know why we call a service man to our house? Certainly not because we know how to fix what we want fixed, but because we don't know how to fix what we want fixed. I hate it when a customer starts to grill me about a job I am doing for them; often long before I am finished. What do they think-that when I stop and answer their questions that the clock stops. No! It doesn't. I do like telling them that I answer questions and it is gonna cost them a buck a minute whether I am working on their equipment or talking to them. Which would they prefer.That by the way Steve is why I clamed that my name in Japanese is really Ahhh-so and not what a previous entry of mine said.I don't tend to blame them too much after all most of them are spoiled by the Air-conditioning and now are HOT. Crazy HOT. To which I say have patience because they have just gotten the most persistent and conscientious HVAC tech in this whole region. In fact that may be my main problem. I will try to fix some stuff that should be junked.
Most HOT customers though are pretty well burnt by the time I get there and for some reason don't seem to understand that if they would save the questions until I write the bill that they would get cooooler faster. But NOOO. They have to ask me:Have you found the problem yet? (said with a nasally wine)What is wrong with It? (It is broke I tell them)Do you know what your doing?(which I try from then on to make them feel like I may not just to see them turn blue with fear)How long have you been doing this job?(oh-only since last week, I tell them)How much is it going to cost?(I will tell the next customer that asks that one I have a surgeon on standby for when I finish the work to amputate whatever appendage I deem necessary for payment.)How come it stopped working. (to which I love to say "Oh I don't know, Stuff breaks, gets old, and wears out, people abuse things or it was an act of God".)I know I know I shouldn't be so customer friendly and honest but you know how I feel about lying. Beside I have always felt that the customer deserves the absolute truth about what I am doing and how I feel about their equipment, after all it is their stuff I am working on. Now if I could just find a way to tell them how I feel about them without making them mad.
For instance one day when a particularly interested customer who insisted that he worked on electronics in airplanes and persisted in trying to tell me how to fix a furnace to which I finally told him to go sit down in the living room I wasn't building an airplane here just wiring up a air handler. The guy freaked and I just don't know why?
How about the time I kept getting called back to the house where a wife with a husband that had Alzheimer's kept trying to blame us for her A/C problems until one day I discovered that the husband was going up to the T-stat and shortcycling the unit until it would quit. He had blown up the gas furnace(luckily it was a package unit and the explosion occurred outside). Oh, but no, it was our fault. God...Does that woman know that her life is in jeopardy? NOooo. Can't tell her that either, I tried....... she freaked.
How about the time that I practically saved a woman's life. This is an interesting one. She calls up and says, "if my carbon monoxide detector is going off does that mean my furnace is bad?" I asked, "How do you feel, do you have a headache and feel nauseous?" To which she replied, "Yes I do". I said "Turn off your furnace and go outside immediately and I will come right over". You know when I got there that she was still in the house and still running that furnace. God. Help me have patience with these people. She is a freaking nurse at the hospital. She should have known the symptoms. I checked her furnace and woah. The heat ex-changer was broke and pumping enough carbon monoxide into her house to supply a Nazi concentration camp. I shut it down and then disable it and made her go outside and get some fresh air. Just the couple of minutes I spent in her house made me woosy. She must have been an carbon monoxide breathing alien to still be conscious. C-mon people if you knew how to fix your stuff you would have done it yourself and not called my company.
Get with the program. I know their are shysters and just plain old morons for technicians out there but are you people so jaded that you can't tell when a sincere technician has showed up to do the work or is their just no hope for America?
No comments:
Post a Comment