Heres two questions, the first one is my competition is in the process of sleeving one of my customers on a project that will never work in this life or the next and should I tell the customer he's getting taken or just shut up and sit back and wait it out. Half my crew is telling me to say something to the customer and give him the heads up as to my concerns and the other half is telling me to keep quiet and stay out of it completely, its not my problem. I've learned in the past the public doesn't like negativity and it reflects badly on me badmouthing my competition but at the same time the customer has no idea as of yet he's being taken for a ride on this deal and is throwing his money away and unless someone points out that the idea will and can work he'll never try it agian, its a good idea just flat out implemented wrong. I'm trying to remain positive but when someone screws up that badly and totally robs a customer of mine that badly am I obligated to tell the guy and if so is it badmouthing my competition and will it backfire and cause me the guys business in the future, he's a great guy to work for and has the money, so what its costing him won't cause him financial hardship, but he might not know any different and probably won't try it agian, even though its a great idea and will work just like he wants, if it were done right. I've run across other things his crew totaly dropped the ball on and I had to go in and take care of and thats the next question: How do you tell the customer my competion screwed up the project without being negative and badmouthing them and still getting it fixed and working for the customer. Would it be better not to tell them anything but just do the changes and leave and say nothing even when they ask? or not go at all and just avoid the issue altogether and tell them I didn't cause the problem, I'm not fixing the problem. I've been in business for quite a few years now and last week one of my really good cusotmers told me to avoid doing work for this competators customers and fixing the problems he created and just avoid the problem altoghter, they only call me when the jobs done and needs someone to make them work and just say no and then we came to this project, I never knew this perticular customer ever hired my competition and maybe hasn't before I never asked him but was speechless as to whats taking place and how to handle it.
Advise them you are concerned as someone who cares about them. Treat them as you would a anyone else. As my dad would say, give them enough information for them to make educated decisions. To keep the peace, you might even suggest they contact a 3rd party for advise. Be careful and professional. Be careful about giving too much advise beyond just stating your concerns.
Would it be professional to just say, thats a good idea but maybe I'd go about it differently and I have my doubts it'll work like it should, and let it go at that. Thats what half my crew is saying and the other half is saying, nobody has asked your opinion as of yet and wait until someone does before stating anything, and by doing that I'd personally be upset with someone holding thier tongue because they knew something but kept quiet and said nothing. I've gone down this road before and have come out being the bad guy and lost some customers out of the deal, half would be appreciated and the other half would be upset and I'm not sure how to handle it. I don't quite understand how someone can screw up so badly and still come out the good guy in the end even if I've been dipliomatic about it I seem to turn out shorted. I'd love to tell him its a great idea and to make it work it needs to be done a certain way and it would solve all his problems but I'm cautious, he didn't come to me to solve this perticular problem in the first place so why step in now, maybe wait until it fails and then approach him with a different idea as to how to solve it. I'm sure anyone who does solve the problem he's having will have a lot more work from him, he's that kind of guy, if you solve a problem then your his person he gets for that set of problems in the future and just upsizes the jobs to match. Say for example he's got a problem with a waterway and you solve the first one for him then he's got 10,000 feet more waterway work for you to do. Maybe this is his approach to see if it works and the guy can do this job before diving in big time doing 50 grand worth of work just like it, thats what the other half of my crew is saying, keep quiet and wait your turn and when it fails talk to him while doing other work for him and do a small project that works and then get the larger portion after that and give the current deal time to fail so you can prove your right and the other contractors wrong and it takes time. I guess I'm too conservative and don't like to see money and time being wasted for a bad result and when I come across something I'm not sure of working I tell the owner and basically will only proceede if he's under the understanding its an experiment and we can go back and do major changes to try and get it to work, or just don't it at all. Thats not how my competion works, they just do anything and do it the way the owner wants and if it works or not its not his problem, they take the money and run, more than half the time it works out the other half, well thats too bad its how the owner wanted it done and its not his fault. I've always tried to work for the benefit of the person who hires me and if its not in his best interest then I don't do the project or try to talk him into something that would benefit him for the outcome he's wanting, most who hire me know this and just turn me loose and say this is the outcome I want, make it happen and do what you think, however you want to do it. I've never really been a witness to a future failure before or watched it take place, I've always come along later after the fact and tryed to figure out how it sholud have been done or how to change it to make it work this is a new area for me and the owner will know I actually watched it happen because I'm literally on the scene this time. I thought maybe I'd wait to be asked what I thought on this issue from the owner first and if he doesn't ask I can't see how he can hold it against me later. I know its a really touchy issue and I'm not sure about it at all, I know whats going to happen and how it'll fail and what the outcome will be but I can't be proven right until it fails, so until then I'm running down the other contractor which makes me look bad, but when failure occurs I gave the heads up to the failure so he knew it was coming and could at least expect it to happen. I'm not really seeing a win win deal for me on this one at all and still remain positive and not having it held against me some how. As for the third party that was mentioned as well by my crew and we ruled it out due to the fact I'd literally have to send them there to speak to the owner and he'd know who sent them and that would literally overstep his authority and I know that would torque him off, nobody else would say a word to him about this issue on their own and if I approached the owner with the idea of the third party that would belittle him and upset him more, it would appear to be condembing someones work before it could or could not be proven viable and right now to the owner its totally viable and he thinks it will suceed and work until proven wrong and only time will show that to be false not anyone telling him anything or trying to convince him of it. What I can see will happen only I can see and the owner can't and will never see unless it actually does happen and fails, all the talking in the world won't make any difference until failure occurs, its not going to break the bank and all it will do is waste time and some money and nobody will get hurt so what do I gain trying to convice the owner he's being taken if he can't see it happen himself? I know whats happening and how its being done and what will happen in the future to the project but not many if any can and will until it happens, thats the problem of doing the projects and making them work and trying to predict outcomes for years to come, as they say its what I do but not many can and do that. Theres a lot of folks here that know what I'm trying to say and see it every day but the average person doesn't understand without seeing firsthand what I can see happening just by looking at a perticular project and see its weakness's and faults. I guess some call it job security I look at it as preventive maintance and it bothers me to no end to see ahead of time somethings faults and not being able to go fix them before a major problem occurs and causes major headaches and costs later on down the road.
yes
Opinion
"Thats what half my crew is saying and the other half is saying, nobody has asked your opinion as of yet and wait until someone does before stating anything, and by doing that I'd personally be upset with someone holding thier tongue because they knew something but kept quiet and said nothing. I've gone down this road before and have come out being the bad guy and lost some customers out of the deal, half would be appreciated and the other half would be upset and I'm not sure how to handle it." Hey Randy88. This is a complex and frustrating problem and it is only natural that you feel like you have to do SOMETHING! watching your customer waste money that could have been yours, but you kind of answer your own question with the above quote. You have a 50/50 chance of not coming out the bad guy, and not much chance of coming out the good guy in this. If you are asked by the customer for your opinion, then you have every right to say what you think, otherwise you are basically telling your customer that he made a bad decision, which he may have done but it will be an unpleasant experience for him and he will probably shoot the messenger.
He is not your customer as he is using someone else now. He probably dropped you for a dime. What is he doing that he is getting screwed on? Will it fail soon or take years? Is it up to code? Your only good as your last bid. Did your so called customer come to you and ask why the other guy is cheaper or just give him the job?
Today we again talked about the whole deal and decided that unless he asks directly my opinion I'll wait until if fails and then approach him on how maybe to better implement the whole idea and make it work, thebaz I think your right that he'd shoot the messenger and I'm afraid its me so for now I'm keeping quiet and watch things unfold and probably get paid to clean up the mess so to speak but again thats speculation on my part. What gets me is my competition gets the gravy jobs and I end up cleaning up the mess left behind, it would be many times easier to just do the job from the start than first undo whats been done and then redo it so its functional the second time. My crew calls it job security but maybe its getting to me a little, most of my time is spend trying to figure out how it got messed up in the first place where it would be better spent on something more constructive say for example doing it right the first time in about one third the time and make the same or more profit. Thanks for the replies guys, maybe I'm not alone after all dealing with some of these issues.
I've learned two things over the years that now I live by. First and foremost is "You can't help anyone who doesn't want to be helped". Second and foremost is "You can't fix Stupid". It's hard but you have to learn to let someone fail.
"What gets me is my competition gets the gravy jobs and I end up cleaning up the mess left behind, it would be many times easier to just do the job from the start than first undo whats been done and then redo it so its functional the second time. My crew calls it job security but maybe its getting to me a little, most of my time is spend trying to figure out how it got messed up in the first place where it would be better spent on something more constructive say for example doing it right the first time in about one third the time and make the same or more profit." I am hearin' ya on all this stuff. Business SHOULD be about doing a good job at a good price and that is the end of it, unfortunately you can loyally serve a client, give them what they want, when they want it at a good price for years and they will still choose another contractor for one job who burns them and still maybe never come back to you due to embarrassment or whatever. Not your fault and hard to fix. Others may have the skills to open the line of communication with the old client, but I have sure found it difficult as the ball is in their court. Hope your customer realizes the error of his ways and recognizes the value of quality contractors long term. Baz
Right or wrong, 9 times out of 10 the messenger gets shot.
Ok, we made the decision to keep quiet and not tell the customer about the major blunder on my competitions part and I can live with that, I agree the messenger gets shot, but now my phone has been ringing tonight and I have another problem over this whole deal I have never had before ever and it is as follows. A lifelong friend of mine who's also a good customer of mine called and asked me about whats going on at his neighbors, the guy I did work for and is getting sleeved by my competition and had all sorts of questions about what was done and how it was done and basically wanted to know first what I thought of the whole deal, if I thought it would work, what should have been done differently so it would work and the questions kept coming and he knew me well enough that a sidestepping the subject isn't going to work. I've never had anyone else question me on somebody's work before it was proven or failed and this time he could see the project from the road and knew what was going on and wanted answers, it made no sense to him at all and wanted to know in detail what the purpose was, if it would work as built, and so on. Do I tell somebody else who has asked me my opinion that his neighbor and also my customer is getting sleeved and taken on the project. I again don't want to run the competition down and have it get back to the client who's getting taken but I can't really lie my way out of a direct question from a friend and also a client. As they say when it rains it pours and there's a first time for everything and this again is a new one. For now I made an excuse and told him I was running late for a visit with a client, which was true but not a pressing engagement at the moment and told him I'd get back to him on the issue and let it go for now but I know him and he wants answers and won't stop until he has them and is satisfied. If I tell him the truth it'll get back that I'm criticizing the other guys work and deem the project a total failure and I'm not prepared to lie to him either, he deserves an answer that's diplomatic yet informative, any ideas? I cornered my crew on this one and none have any ideas period as how to handle this one and still remain positive, one of my crew said it about right, you've got to be kidding me, we had nothing to do with it and now we have to answer questions for someone else screw up and not have it bite us in the ass that's about like finding an experienced virgin to marry. I got a chuckle out of it but it still hasn't solved my latest problem, again thanks for the replies in advance.
There are no absolutes in these situations so I can only give my opinion on what I would hope I would do under the circumstances. If I am hearing you correctly the friend of yours is both a client of yours and a neighbor to original customer. There are many potential problems here as no-one in this scenario is totally passive, and if the friend is only asking out of curiosity then it is unfair to drag you into the discussion when you were a potential candidate for the job in the first place. If it gets back to the 1st guy that you are talking about his stuff behind his back, that is worse than if you said it to his face. I think you have to tread very lightly and tell your friend that you would approach it differently and be as non specific as you can, maybe even to say that it is unethical to comment on someone else's work when you don't know the specifics yourself. It is very hard to resist the temptation of venting to this friend but it could easily bite you, HARD especially when the friend is a client as well! Very easy for this to get ugly.
Thebaz, your right on target with the situation, he is asking for several reasons, first, he was confused as to whats going on and the purpose of the project in the first place, second, if it would work he might have a need for something like it himself but was puzzled as to how it ever could work out as built, and I'm sure the nose problem between neighbors was an issue as well, he's a friend and was almost assured he'd get an answer he could understand from me because he actually watched the project unfold from his living room window, he knew who did the work and didn't need to ask if I was involved but also knew I'd done like kind projects before and was wondering if the ones I'd done had worked and if this was common practice and he'd just never seen it done before or been around them. With that stated this puts me in a very tight situation, he needs some answer to satisfy his curiosity and also to explain if it would work for his farm and his situation so I"m sure knowing him he'd want to try something like it for himself and since I do all his work the next question that will come is can I try one for him. Now if the other guy wasn't my client I'd just say, yea no problem, this other contractor screwed up and ripped him off and this is how it needs to be done in order to make it work on your farm and yes we can do it and have done a lot of them over the years and hop in the truck and I'll take you to some to show you how its supposed to be done and have worked great for years and will last for decades more. Now that's not going to happen because its a tight neighborhood and if I said that in ten minutes the whole area would know and basically if I give much of any answer the outcome is going to be the same. The way its looking to me I can keep a friend who's also a client and give him an answer and have work from him that is guaranteed and not worry about hurting someone's feelings and do a like kind project on this guys farm and do it the right way and I know I can keep him happy then its not really my fault the other client got taken and I might lose his work in the future, he didn't come to me or ever ask my opinion so if he's upset over the deal, I guess so be it and keep doing what I do for those that do ask and in the future if anyone asks I can say I wasn't wishy washy about it and just told the truth and gave an honest answer to those that asked and only time will tell which contractor was wrong or not. I'm not seeing how I can keep work coming from both ends and not offending someone here so the way its looking at least keep one happy, the one that asked me my opinion and wants work done by me or at least that's the way I was thinking all last night, I'll see if my crew came up with something different this morning after dwelling on it over night. Any input otherwise would be appreciated but I can't see a win win for me no matter how I do it. I do know that if I don't come up with a good enough answer for my friend he'll go elsewhere and get one and I will lose his respect and work in the future, he's like me he wants a blunt, no holds bar, straight answer to a direct question and I've always given him one before and he's done the same for me.
If your friend wants you to do a similar job, I can't see that you have any obligation to anyone else but your friend/client to do what is best for him regardless of what his neighbor does. I would wait until he is serious about starting the job before you start getting into how it should have been done type discussions. Just tell him the best way to do what he is asking for, and if you have done jobs that have stood the test of time, I can't see any problem with showing him how the jobs have stood up. There is more than one way to do a job and sometimes neither is the wrong way. I would come at it from that angle so you are not then coming across as critical, just advising him the way YOU would do the job. Baz
Never condemn the client's man. If the client is paying him, that means he trusts him and values his services. When you talk to the client, make sure that you remove the word "sleeved" from your vocabulary. It sounds like you're in the position where if you continue to say nothing, you will have allowed him to get "sleeved". He won't be able to trust you after that. If you go in there and say that his guy is doing it all wrong, it's going to look like you've got a case of sour grapes and he won't be able to trust you after that. It's a touchy situation. Your safest approach is to ask questions rather than going in there and trying to "educate" your customer. Tell him that you know it's none of your business, but you've been looking at the project and you don't understand how it's going to function. You can say that it's not how you would of approached it, and just for your own benefit, why is it being done the way it is? You can lead someone into the light just by asking questions. Instead of directly contradicting, ask how and why. If you think about it, people tend to get themselves into much more trouble because of what they say rather than what they ask. What is the work in question??
Personally I would not say anything unless someone asked me direct about what I thought. It is not your job to check on what others are doing and if the customer getting the crappy job comes to you later and asks why you didn't say anything then you tell him that. The only time I would say something is when it comes to safety. Far as the 3rd party asking questions, if you are not comfortable answering questions, say so. If you do decide to talk about the crappy job to someone, make sure you do it face to face, over the phone you may be recorded. Also talking about it on a public forum is not the best thing either.
I agree with HENDRIK, and I always say if I got time to pay attention to what the competition is doing, I better evaluate my own operation....just my 2 cents.
Yep, in business it is your job to look after YOUR reputation, not worry about someone else reputation. Basically I don't see what the issue is, contractor A bid for a job and lost out to contractor B who underbid the job to get it and may well now be cutting corners to make it pay. Contractor B may well end up going bust because he/she don't get paid for a bad job. Why should contractor A be worried about what contractor B is doing. Contractor A may get the job to fix mess left by contractor B which will more than likely end up costing more than the original bid. The customer will have learned a lesson that cheap is not always the best and good work costs good money. The bitter taste of poor quality remains long after the sweet taste of low price is gone (or something like that). Point in case, a neighbour asked me to look at some drainage issue he has out the back of his place, after looking at the situation I advised him that a drainage channel is the best and cheapest solution. However before giving him a firmish costing, I said that I would need to get my laser level out to see how much if any fall was present, which would determine the depth of the channel. A week later I drop in with my laser and he informs me that he's got a mate of a mate to do the job. Now I didn't ask what their plan was to deal with the water and I am not interested, not my problem but if the neighbour comes to me in the middle of next winter and says that whatever the new contractor did is not working and whether I could fix it up, I would sat that the price has just gone up $10 bucks an hour, no neighbour rates for you.
Thanks for the advice guys, there's nobody around me that can answer these questions and are willing to help out. Hendrick, armed with your statement, that brings up another question still, this one has bothered me for a long time now and I've kept quiet and not said anything on the subject. Your saying to basically mind my own business and not worry about the competition, ok, I can agree with that to a certain extent, the reason it bothers me so is partly because experience has told me the project will fail and I know that, they've done it before and failure has happened and I've gone in and redone them to make them work and stand up to the test of time, which was part of my original question of how to go in and redo the project and explain to the owner what has happened and went wrong without running down somebody's work or being negative?? That's not really been answered yet. I've never come across the work being done or slightly ahead of time before, I usually show up on the scene later which brought up the original question to begin with. Next, is it prudent to talk to a boss/owner of a company and let him know his employee has outsmarted him and covered up a major blunder and gotten away with it many times over? Nobody has ever been injured from this employees blunders and I'm positive the owner is clueless to them but time and time again I come across the same mistakes being covered up and not being negative I've remained silent and nobody knows about them, but is remaining silent the right thing to do? I've thought about this a long time now, years in fact and every time I'm called in to problem solve his work I uncover the same things, its almost predictable and I know whats wrong before I ever get there. I've made comment to the employee a few times about the issue and he knows I fully understand what he's done and how he's done it and I've even warned him about changing his ways and being more careful and taking his time and doing it right but nothing has changed. So armed with your advice I should look the other way and keep quiet and mind my own business because its none of my concern? I'm not saying it is and I have no obligation to ever say anything but is it the business like way to do things? I'm not stating a position I'm asking a question.
My friend/client stopped where I was working today and was pressing pretty hard about the project and this is what I told him. First I wasn't asked about anything I was told as to what was going to take place in case we ended up being there working at the same time, it was a statement about what the other guy was going to be doing and the reason for the project, short and sweet, no room for questions. Second if you and everyone else who sees the project has thoughts and concerns then you've already formed your opinion on the subject and there's no need to have my opinion as well. If your looking for me to brag up or run down my competition all I can say is everyone has there own cheering section and complaint department from the citizens in the area of which they work and that includes me as well so history will determine how good someone was not any individual like me. If you have a project in mind for your farm or property then we'll discuss it and I can take you to look at my and others prior projects that have stood up to the test of time and done what they were supposed to do and we can compare them to how they would fit into your operation. As for how the project that my competition has done will stand up, time will tell, but if you need to ask then you already have an opinion and concerns and since I wasn't involved you'd need to address them with the owner or person who did the work not me. You have come to me because you wanted my opinion and draw from my experience, both you can have on work I've done any time you want it and yes I'll tell you the failures I had in the past as well as the success's so you can draw your own conclusion to what will benefit your operation the most, I have nothing to hide and I'm not ashamed of any work I've done over the years, even the failures I've had, I learned from them to move onto better ways of doing things. If I handled it wrong please enlighten me as how better do it in the future, I had no other ideas as to how to remain positive and constructive and still answer the question and not sound wishy washy. He has work for me and I need to take time to go look at it but for today we discussed it and I told him I had to think about it and then go look at it and I'd come up with something that worked for him.
Right, lets approach this from another angle. You are in business to make money for your business and to worry about your employees and how they go about what they do, stuff anybodies else employees. Why are you concerned about someone else worker? From what you say this workers slackness puts bread on your table and you want to tell your competition that one of their workers is not up to the job, which may well mean this worker gets the boot and is replaced by a competent person and you are out of remedial work. Sounds real smart, like I said you worry about your business. Far as telling someone that the contractor they hired was not up to the job, well you either say nothing, be honest or explain how you do things, I mean don't these people have any brains, if a contractor comes in to do a job and the project does not work like it was supposed to, it does not a genius to work out why. The other day I did a job cleaning up after Mr Bobcatman supposedly did a job to level a site for concreting. First thing I did was ask the customer if the bobcat 'driver' used a laser level to check the site prior to beginning work........no, how long was the bobcat working here.........20-30mins, how much did he charge.............$150, did he check with a laser level after he supposedly got to level........no. Anyway I fixed it up with an extra 4 tonnes of dolomite, which brought the total amount of dolomite to 9 tonnes. I wasn't shy in telling the customer that as far as I am concerned if you are in the business of leveling land you need a laser level unless you have very good judgment. What the customer read into that I do not know. I didn't bag the bobcat driver but rather explained how I go about doing my work. Sure the laser level costs money and eats batteries but at least I can prove that my work is up to standard.
You seem to have a good handle on this Hendrik and I totally agree with you on worrying about what is going on on your own job site and you cannot be held responsible for what one of your clients does with another contractor. If he expected Randy88 to say something about the bad job being done then he should have hired Randy88 to do the job. If the Job fails, and Randy88 gets the job to fix it, he can then show the client that he has the expertise to have done the job right in the first place by modifying the job to work right. You don't even have to make any comment about the previous contractors ability and if you do bag the guy it could make the client feel a fool for using him and you don't want to do that. Just to do the job correctly will say it all.
Ok guys, nice in therory and yes I agree to a certain extent, lets approach this from still another angle, I make money and yes I know I make a living doing this but when does it come to the point where you step in and say something when carelessness is getting to the point of when I go to do the repairs or someone I know will go and one of us may be injured due to someones neglect or the way things are going its leading up to that and if someone would get hurt and I held my tongue am I partly responsible for the accident? As of yet it hasn't gotten to that point but maybe headed there, I always ask when the project was done to know where along the line this guy touched the project to know how things have progressed, money is money and can be made any day of the week, time is priceless and so if human life and bodily injury, I"ve even gone as far as to ask my attorney this very same question and who's responsible if something would or will happen, and as he put it, its a grey area. Am I concerned if this guy's replaced, I'd actually love it if he were because its getting to be a pain to go and take care of these issues on my part but I don't like to turn work down from paying customers but what I'm seeing is this idiots part of the whole project is so small the whole overall project was a success so the work they get continues which is fine by me, I'd have thought someone along the line would have informed his boss that hey I had to get someone else to come and take care of this for me because your guy dropped the ball but apparently not. Everyone has jobs they specialize in do and I'm not in the kind of work these guys do as a whole but the part that gets messed up is under my expertise so I do know about it. If he got canned and they hired someone else I wouldn't loose enough work to lose sleep over and since I do other kinds of work for the same customers they call me into troubleshoot these things for them, I can't turn them down and even made comment to the owners, maybe you need to have a chat with the boss about this issue and show them whats gone wrong and how I fixed it and why but apparently nobody has, its more of a curtosy repair than a money maker for me and to keep my client happy its what we do. As for confronting the owner of shoddy work without running someone down heres the problem I've had time and time again, a large crew comes in and does major work where a lot of entities are involved and as a whole they do a good job and only a few things are wrong and the same people I work for doing other kinds of jobs have me come and take care of the small portion thats not right, I'm not getting the whole job anyhow or ever will so thats a mute point, now the problem lies iin the help end of it and when you show the owners what your doing and how it was done wrong and how to correct it they become offended in some way and I've been told I'm too critical and condembing the guys whole operation or trying to, no, just explaining how and what went wrong but I've been told I'm publically condembing the guys whole operation, I don't like negativity and misinturputation but apparently thats how I'm coming across and can't figure out how to make things clear and still remain positive, I know its sounds stupid but I've apparently got the wrong approach or something and can't get the point across without saying on this part of the whole project you got screwed and the one doing the work should have been lined up and shot but the rest are a good bunch to get and I"d highly recommend the others in the crew or something I'm not sure what I"m doing wrong, so lately I just do the fix and say nothing but its eating up time I don't have, I can make a lot more money elsewhere doing other things for the same customers and haven't figured out how to turn one job down and still keep the other work that I do make money off of coming. I"ve tried to turn this work down but that didn't work at all, I can't say I didn't get the job in the first place so I"m not fixing it now, I don't do the whole large projects to start with and don't want to so thats not an option for me to say. Any ideas on these problems?
Seems pretty simple to me.......if client B is thinking of having you do a similar job then that is our chance to prove to client A how and why the job should have been done differently.. only been doing this a short while but I have had a few chances at just such a thing. let your work speak for it's self. go that extra mile for client B and show by example how things should have been done. Quality work and fair days work for fair days pay sort of thing..... When quality work comes out of you and the job lasts a long time people will talk.....the message will get around......no need to say anything. Best of luck to ya but would deffinatly recomend staying off the he said, she said merry go round unless safety is compromised. It's just not worth bad PR in times of recession.
As I stated earlier, when it comes to safety you do speak up, or if a project is done in such a way that it could up end up hurting someone. Here is an example of when things go wrong http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/...-in-mclaren-vale/story-e6frea83-1225941788130 Sounds to me like they where cutting corners by not replacing the slab. Anyone involved with construction knows that concrete has it's limits and unless you know 100% that the slab can take the weight of what's on top of it, you don't build. Anyway your original question was in regards to the work performance of someone else's employee, not safety issues. Far as i can see you have three options, either tell the contractor with the dodgy worker that you are sick and tired of cleaning up his mess, do the remedial work but charge extra to take into account your lack of enthusiasm for doing this kind of work or lastly, refuse to do remedial work. End of the day the decision is yours to make. I can see your frustration if it comes to the point where other projects get behind because you are fixing up someones mess. You sound like a decent, straight up fella and want to do the right thing but consider how the owner of the business with the dodgy worker is going to feel if you come along and tell him that one of his employees is doing the wrong thing, he may thank you or tell you to mind your own business. The thing to also consider is that if the owner of the business is not going to check on his employees and see what sort of work they are doing, should he even be in business?
I sure like Hendrik's suggestion of just asking questions instead of "telling" anyone anything.:notworthy I'm going to try to incorporate more questions in my "sales process", rather than trying do my quick sales sermon about why my products/services are better. It's good to be reminded of good techniques!!:drinkup
Has anyone ever had a client ask to have someone else mess redone and you refused to do it and still got to do similar work for the client? We've long discussed this as an option to eliminate the wasted time spent to just basically retain the clients business and keep other work from the same client, we've also hashed over the idea of charging double or even triple the going rate for cleaning up after a certain persons lousy work but didn't think it would ever fly, has anyone ever done that and made it work also. I too like the idea of asking questions instead of making statements, that's an excellent suggestion and I do appreciate it, thanks. It takes a lifetime to gain all the knowledge one needs to know to be able to look back and say I should have done things a different way instead of making the mistakes they did as they went along, there's thousands of lifetimes worth of ideas here on this site and to be able to ask for advice on what works and what doesn't is truly priceless.
Obviously it is a tricky situation, you don't really want to spend time cleaning up someone else's mess and would rather do a project from go to whoa. I can understand this, you also do not want to put off clients by refusing to fix the mess and also don't want to charge extra to take into account your lack of enthusiasm for re-doing crappy work. So that only leaves you the option of fixing the problem by telling the other contractor that you are sick of cleaning up after him or just keep going as you are. If you do decide to talk to the other contractor you will have to very tactful, as essentially you are telling him that he is incompetent. Yes, asking questions is one of the most important parts of my business, I need to know exactly what is required in order to get the job right the first time. I do tell people about what I can and can't do and I do blow my own horn by saying that I am the smallest earthmover in town and the next size down from me is a couple of blokes with shovels and a wheelbarrow but I aim not to treat my customers with arrogance.
I agree with Hendrik on this one also. If you are put in a position where you have to put your employees or equipment under unnecessary stress due to having to redo a job that could have been done easily had it been doe the right way from the start then I think you are justifies in charging a higher rate, however, if it is just a matter of having to redo the job that involves normal wear and tear type machine work, then I think if you are happy to do the work and it fits in with your work schedule, then just treat it like a normal job at the normal rate, other wise you would just come off as being opportunistic, arrogant, and vindictive if you charge a higher rate. If you have to come and fix someone elses work and you don't get to do the next project from the start there is something wrong as it is always cheaper to do the job once and do it right. I would have thought that fixing another contractors stuff up is the best advertisement you could have through word of mouth.
I never made a clear defination of the projects mentioned and thought afterwards about it, these are two seperate issues and I never stated that, the lousy job and now the issue of not wanting to do the clean up of the mess are not the same issue at alll, one just leads to the other, so bear that in mind. As to why the boss hires him and keeps him, well its a case of the boss has never operated that piece of machinery ever, not to even sit on it or drive it, and thats a direct quote from the owner, but its needed to keep other machines running so they hire someone to operate the one nobody else wants to do. I've found over the years that when the boss or owner has no knowledge of actually doing the work personally ever or run the machines themselves things are done different or of less quality than if the boss or owner knows something about the work being done, but that maybe my own bias opinon. As to why it still happens, everyone likes the overall work thats done with a few excepetions and those someone else can fix and others lack in other areas so its ok as long as the vast majority of work they do as a whole is up to par, nobodys perfect and thats what I'm told everyday by clients who ask me to fix the stuff, you can't hold one mistake against them when they do 99 other things right. I can see that as well but its beyond getting on my nerves, I cringe ever time I meet him and see him doing work I know someone else will have to go back and do again and I know its not just me, others have made comment that they do the same things, clean up and spend time figuring out how to repair it and make it work which takes more time and energy and theres no way to charge enough for that so like I told one other who mentioned it, misery loves company. I've also been told this by an older gentleman several years ago, one thing to remember in life, the pulpil will only get slightly smarter than the smartest teacher they ever had unless they have to keep redoing their own mistakes and learn on there own or their reputation is on the line, but when your paid a few bucks an hour the learning curve will never go up, it doens't have to, the pays the same no matter how smart or good you are. Baz, your right to a certain extent, but when your dealing with large jobs, which you don't do yourself and you can repair screwups, word does get out and thats all you do is repair screwups and it consumes all your time, my option is to either get big enough to do the entire job, which I don't want to do, or else figure out how not to advertise that I can repair others screwups or charge like no other and make money off it or expand to keep what I do going and still repair screwups that make nothing. Its a no win deal for me and its getting worse, there are weeks thats all I do is screwup repair and make pennies when I should be concentrating on things that make more money but don't have the time. As one put it, do what theres a demand for and people call for, thats nice, how about driving my own business in the direction where I want it to go instead of haivng others direct it for me, basically due to poor workers, this guy is directing my business and doesn't have to do it himself, its a win win for him and an idiot [me] takes care of it and its my problem. As they say word of mouth isn't always a good thing, even if its to pass along good work and quality work. We've wrestled with several ideas as how to overcome this problem and not come up with a solution yet, maybe I am too soft at heart and feel sorry for these that call and give them too good of a deal, maybe my business is headed in the right direction and just need to make it worth my while or just say no and move on or say when I have nothing else to do then maybe, or even I'll do it but I need 5,000 guaranteed other work first and when I'm there doing that work I'll do the repairs then, I"m not sure how to end it, but my crew is tellling me to end it soon and get some descent work that pays good or expand and do the entire project start to finish and compete them out of business so we can eliminate this headache once and for all, thats nice but it'll create other more expensive headaches that I will have to deal with, not them, but they are right, drive my business in the direction I want it to go, not out of necessaty of others neglect or else make it into a viable business and draw from it.
Two thoughts. 1 Find a small operator that you could recommend or use as a sub to fix the screw ups. 2 Say it ONE time to the owner and just the facts. Not what you think, not how it effects you, not how you feel about it and not why. Just a statement that x action/method causes repair work later. Learned that from a heck of a dozer guy. During a conversation he will say something in one sentence like "there's a soft spot on that property". After knowing him for years I really listen for those and know to bring my waders or avoid that spot like the plague.
The planning and thinking you refer to and say you can't bill for is called "engineering". Whether you have a stamp or not, if you're planning a solution, you're doing the engineer's job. Engineers charge for their work. You should, too. What I got out of your last post is that money is the number one complaint you have. Charge what you need to charge to make the job worth while. I'm not saying hammer the customers with inflated charges, but you've got overhead, payroll and your time to be compensated for. If you're on a job with your crew, you should be billing 8 hr days for each man and each machine whether you're moving 1,000 cy a day or if you're problem solving and only completing 40 ft of trench a day. For every operator on the job, there should be 8 hrs of billed machine time a day. Even though it's repair work, it's not your work you're repairing. To you, it's new work. Put a price on it that makes you happy to do the work.
your machines cost a certain amount to run no matter what the job, just because it is repairs of a previous job does not entitle the client to get out of the second repair bills. Either bid the repairs high enough to cover your costs, or repair the jobs on a per hr basis. If you and your crew require x dollars per hr to operate then charge it. I still feel that saying something to the client or the owner of the firm is counterproductive. It's my belief that any work is good work but you just need to cover your costs or go broke trying. On a second note, if you are actively bidding on other jobs with deadlines then do them first and the repairs should come second, assuming of course there is not a safety issue with the job that needed to be repaired. This solves the problem of wether or not you are known for fixin or being the general contractor. I'm glad to hear that you have other work to be doing, It's a testament to your ability to do the job right in the first place. you care about the work you do and the way it reflects on you as a contractor and that speaks loads for you as well. Keep up the good work but don't go home empty handed either.
Nice discussion to read, and many lessons to be learned by all... and its fun to hash and rehash seemingly complicated situations... to me joispoi summed it up for you... As I get busier, the price for the work that I don't care to do... creeps up.
" Even though it's repair work, it's not your work you're repairing. To you, it's new work. Put a price on it that makes you happy to do the work. " All the replies on this page are great advice, but this sums it up beautifully. Just approach it as a job and what it costs is what you feel it is worth to you for your time and expenses, politics don't come in to it. As long as the job doesn't have extra risk associated with it because of what was done by the previous contractor, you should just be able to charge your normal hourly rate if you choose to work on hourly, and you should charge compensation for any design work you need to do on or off site.