heating update
Nov. 29th, 2006 12:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mamajoanHere's an update on the whole situation with Andy, the plumber/contractor guy who never showed up for our appointment last Monday nor called, etc.
Last night, Isaac was in bed and I was nursing Ruthie to sleep (after a fairly traumatic evening for her, bad diaper rash, poor baby) when the phone rings at 9pm. It was the owner of the company Andy works for, i.e., Andy's boss. I can't remember the guy's name so I'll call him Tony.
Tony was of course calling to do damage control. He apologized for Andy's fecklessness and said that he would have an estimator call me tomorrow (today) to make an appointment to come out to my house and get "the rest of the information" to do the estimate. I was very confused by this and said so. After a bit of talking at cross-purposes, I finally figured what Tony was saying. Andy is not an estimator and is not authorized or qualified to go to people's houses and look at their jobs and write up estimates for them. So, in coming to my house and promising me an estimate, Andy was out of bounds. Of course, partly this is because I had (via my mom) called him directly, as you may recall -- because I had left two messages for the actual estimators at the company and not gotten a call back. But, when my mom called Andy's cellphone on my behalf, apparently, what he should have said was "I'm sorry about that, I'll talk to the estimators and make sure they call you back to make an appointment."
Anyway, so Tony sort-of explained all this, and I said that that was nice and all but that the estimate wasn't even the point any more, the point being that Andy had said he would come by and didn't, and I waited around for him, and I called and left messages, and he never called, etc., yadda yadda. And Tony sort of said, "tell me what I can do to make it right." At which point I explained to him about the oil and not wanting to buy more, and that I had explained this to Andy, and that I had just had to spend $250 on more oil which was exactly what I didn't want to do. So I said, if he wanted to have his estimator come out again and do the estimate properly and then knock off $250, that would be appreciated. This was my response to "what could [he] do to make it right."
Well, Tony nixed that idea. He said basically that $250 was too much to knock off and he couldn't do it. Frankly, I was pretty surprised that he said that, so I didn't quite know what to say. I went into a bit of a ramble about how, although I appreciated Andy trying to "sell" the company to me, the fact is that the city will make the final decision based on the two estimates that I give them. My point in saying this -- although I don't at all know whether it was clear to Tony since, like I said, I was a bit flustered -- was that, if his estimators gave me their estimate and it was too high and the city didn't choose it, then he might regret not knocking off the $250. I was kind of trying to say "Whatever, you jerk, just give me your estimate so I can submit it and pick the other guy."
So at that point Tony basically said that he thought there was no more point in pursuing this and we should just call it a day and I should get my other estimate from somewhere else. He said it a bit more gracefully than that, but that was the gist. So I, again rather surprised, just said "okay, thank you" and he hung up.
...
I honestly am not sure how I feel about this. I can see how, from Tony's point of view, it probably seemed like a good business move to just drop the whole thing and move on. From his POV, I probably sounded like a totally unreasonably, completely pissed-off customer who wasn't going to be satisfied with anything he offered me. (This isn't true, and if he had said "okay" to knocking off the $250, I would have been quite satisfied!) He probably also felt that since it would be the city, not me, making the decision, that this was too much red tape, and why try to sell the homeowner on your company when she isn't even the one making the decision? There may even have been some anti-poor-people prejudice in there somewhere (this chick doesn't have any money, she needs the city to pay for her repairs, so she won't be giving us any repeat business). I don't know. But it did feel quite peremptory. Partly I feel like I regret giving him the impression (if I did) that I was just cranky and wouldn't be satisfied with anything he said. OTOH, I DID offer him a perfectly good suggestion for something he could do to satisfy me!
Truly, dear reader, do you think I was out of line/unreasonable to ask him to take $250 off the price? We're talking at least a $6000 job, so $250 doesn't seem like much to me; and when your employee fucks up the way Andy did, sometimes you have to eat that, especially when you're talking about the daughter of another paying customer (my mom has already had them do a LOT more than $6000 worth of work at her place). And $250 seems like a small price to pay for all of that. IMO. But maybe I'm wrong. Am I?
Anyway, good riddance, I guess? I still wish Andy would call me and apologize himself, but I doubt that will happen.
Another company just came to give another estimate while I was typing this. Theirs is WAY higher, and I'm a little confused about that. I have to take another look at it. Meanwhile, I have yet another one coming later today, and then we'll see what's what.
Whew! So that's the update on that. I also have to update about Ruthie's stint as a guinea pig, but that's another post.
Last night, Isaac was in bed and I was nursing Ruthie to sleep (after a fairly traumatic evening for her, bad diaper rash, poor baby) when the phone rings at 9pm. It was the owner of the company Andy works for, i.e., Andy's boss. I can't remember the guy's name so I'll call him Tony.
Tony was of course calling to do damage control. He apologized for Andy's fecklessness and said that he would have an estimator call me tomorrow (today) to make an appointment to come out to my house and get "the rest of the information" to do the estimate. I was very confused by this and said so. After a bit of talking at cross-purposes, I finally figured what Tony was saying. Andy is not an estimator and is not authorized or qualified to go to people's houses and look at their jobs and write up estimates for them. So, in coming to my house and promising me an estimate, Andy was out of bounds. Of course, partly this is because I had (via my mom) called him directly, as you may recall -- because I had left two messages for the actual estimators at the company and not gotten a call back. But, when my mom called Andy's cellphone on my behalf, apparently, what he should have said was "I'm sorry about that, I'll talk to the estimators and make sure they call you back to make an appointment."
Anyway, so Tony sort-of explained all this, and I said that that was nice and all but that the estimate wasn't even the point any more, the point being that Andy had said he would come by and didn't, and I waited around for him, and I called and left messages, and he never called, etc., yadda yadda. And Tony sort of said, "tell me what I can do to make it right." At which point I explained to him about the oil and not wanting to buy more, and that I had explained this to Andy, and that I had just had to spend $250 on more oil which was exactly what I didn't want to do. So I said, if he wanted to have his estimator come out again and do the estimate properly and then knock off $250, that would be appreciated. This was my response to "what could [he] do to make it right."
Well, Tony nixed that idea. He said basically that $250 was too much to knock off and he couldn't do it. Frankly, I was pretty surprised that he said that, so I didn't quite know what to say. I went into a bit of a ramble about how, although I appreciated Andy trying to "sell" the company to me, the fact is that the city will make the final decision based on the two estimates that I give them. My point in saying this -- although I don't at all know whether it was clear to Tony since, like I said, I was a bit flustered -- was that, if his estimators gave me their estimate and it was too high and the city didn't choose it, then he might regret not knocking off the $250. I was kind of trying to say "Whatever, you jerk, just give me your estimate so I can submit it and pick the other guy."
So at that point Tony basically said that he thought there was no more point in pursuing this and we should just call it a day and I should get my other estimate from somewhere else. He said it a bit more gracefully than that, but that was the gist. So I, again rather surprised, just said "okay, thank you" and he hung up.
...
I honestly am not sure how I feel about this. I can see how, from Tony's point of view, it probably seemed like a good business move to just drop the whole thing and move on. From his POV, I probably sounded like a totally unreasonably, completely pissed-off customer who wasn't going to be satisfied with anything he offered me. (This isn't true, and if he had said "okay" to knocking off the $250, I would have been quite satisfied!) He probably also felt that since it would be the city, not me, making the decision, that this was too much red tape, and why try to sell the homeowner on your company when she isn't even the one making the decision? There may even have been some anti-poor-people prejudice in there somewhere (this chick doesn't have any money, she needs the city to pay for her repairs, so she won't be giving us any repeat business). I don't know. But it did feel quite peremptory. Partly I feel like I regret giving him the impression (if I did) that I was just cranky and wouldn't be satisfied with anything he said. OTOH, I DID offer him a perfectly good suggestion for something he could do to satisfy me!
Truly, dear reader, do you think I was out of line/unreasonable to ask him to take $250 off the price? We're talking at least a $6000 job, so $250 doesn't seem like much to me; and when your employee fucks up the way Andy did, sometimes you have to eat that, especially when you're talking about the daughter of another paying customer (my mom has already had them do a LOT more than $6000 worth of work at her place). And $250 seems like a small price to pay for all of that. IMO. But maybe I'm wrong. Am I?
Anyway, good riddance, I guess? I still wish Andy would call me and apologize himself, but I doubt that will happen.
Another company just came to give another estimate while I was typing this. Theirs is WAY higher, and I'm a little confused about that. I have to take another look at it. Meanwhile, I have yet another one coming later today, and then we'll see what's what.
Whew! So that's the update on that. I also have to update about Ruthie's stint as a guinea pig, but that's another post.
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no subject
Date: 2006-11-29 05:50 pm (UTC)I think you started the "casualness" of Andy's approach by getting him directly instead of through his company. From what you've said, it seems that Andy came over as a "favor" to your mom, and I'm speculating that when he went back to the company ran into some problems there -- either none of their estimators are free currently, or whatever. And then he ducked, because he wasn't sure what else he could do, having already gone beyond what he's supposed to do. Or maybe he just got too busy with his real work, and the favor fell to the wayside. Not great, and yeah, annoying, but I think you share at least equal blame with him.
I also think asking the contractor to shoulder the whole cost of this fiasco ($250 for heating oil) was excessive and likely what scared him. It sucks that you had to buy the oil, but it's a huge red flag that say "customer refuses to accept any 'fault' in this situation, probably difficult to deal with, bail bail bail" to me. I think knocking anything off would have been generous, because he didn't cause the situation (he may have contributed, though I'm not sure because it sounds like even if you'd gotten the estimates, you still would've run out of oil before anyone could've done the work ... aren't we only talking about a 2 week period, here?).
Anyway, my take. It's still incredibly frustrating and I'm sorry you're having to deal with it all.
no subject
Date: 2006-12-02 02:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-12-04 04:53 pm (UTC)Nope, I've got to make a preamble. I have the impression that the idea is that the city is going to pay for replacing the furnace, because the new one will, I don't know, create less carbon dioxide?
If that impression is right, I'm wondering why his knocking off $250 would be of any benefit to you, since it would only change the price the city pays and wouldn't repay you for the oil-tank refill at all.
Or is it something like the city will pay for half, or some other percentage, of the full cost of the new furnace?
no subject
Date: 2006-12-04 05:00 pm (UTC)As for why the city does this program at all: upgrading furnaces -- especially really old ones like mine -- increases the efficiency and thus decreases the fuel consumption thereof, which is good for everyone. And it's in the city's interest to help lower-income people who otherwise wouldn't be able to afford the repairs, because it decreases the risk of other problems (like, hypothermia) which can then become the city's or the state's problem.
no subject
Date: 2006-12-05 09:47 am (UTC)How very far-sighted of them.