[gwrightson]

Im a little confused  ,
I had a call from a custy asking me if I could remove a red wine spill from an expensive wool rug,
My reply was I would visit, and tell her the possible results and the possibility of the stain not been removed completly.
I was then told over the phone , " you will get it out using Red rx " !!!!!!!!!!!  bit surprised, hearing this info from a custy   after explaing it was not quite as simple as that, I asked where she had got this info from. her reply .
Another local c/c ,  had told her , even to the point of where to buy red rx , and it would be far cheaper than him coming out .  I would suggest more likely didnt fancy the task  
However a couple of points niggled me,
Why on earth would a c/c pro suggest a product like red rx to a  potentialy damaging situation, and secondly if the custy indeed had of gone ahead with the c/c suggestons , would their have been any come back on the c/c giving out the info?

Geoff.

 

[Straker Cleaning]

Not likely as CC would simply say that he mentioned product as the one he would remove stain with ..................... telling them where he gets it is still not going to make him liable.

I had trouble years back with a woman who badgered me to come to area i do not cover when i was extremely busy ....... upshot was, that i mentioned that waiting would not be the end of the world as i could use an 'oxidising' solution and rinse away. When i got to job 2 days later...... she had left a bleached patch on this dark blue carpet. Her argument was that i told her bleach could be rinsed out but i never mentioned bleach. She said she knew what oxidisation was and did it for me !! When i explained that it was something i used and neutralised in one operation, she became funny and said she would sue me. Alarm bells as she is a yank married to a solicitor 
I simply stood my ground and disputed the fact that i said i can bleach a carpet............. my word against hers. When letter came from husbands firm, i simply told them what terms i had used and that the fault was with HER interpretation. She was going to take it further till i threw in that i used to be in Military Police and was used to giving evidence in court 
Was only in TA and never got further than guided tour of courts and explanation of proceedures ........ but she never knew that 

[carpet guy]

Todays world.!...........never thought we would import litigation from the U S, but it's growing into a huge industry.

We have recently found it necessary to change our policies and all documentation, including employees, because of data protection rules / potential for litigation.

More unpaid hours and a considerable number of hours, at that.

[JS2]

It's a shame that in business we now have to accommodate the possibility of frivolous action being taken against us just because someone is dissappointed.  In the cases Geoff and Chris mention the accusation is even dafter, since nothing was actually worked upon and only a feasible option, to be carried out by the professional, was informally mentioned (when loosely enquired about !).  Having worked in fairly high risk businesses I simply can't see how a proper case involving anything along there lines, or similar, can ever materialise in court - hollow threats as they're known.

However I'm sure more details of similar experiences would (hopefully) be of comfort to those who are concerned about these sort of things.

Regards

Pete (JS2)

[Ian Gourlay]

Its a common occurance with stains for customers to phone up and ask for advise how to remove them

One thin you could do if they do not want to pay your callout charge is to refer them to NCCA web site.

I always tell customers there is a call out charge for stais s I do not want to go and waste my time looking at them.

I sometimes Run into problems as i will not give them 100% certainty the stain will be removed.

I could work on a no Win no FEE basis  and invrease call out charge £95


What do you do?

[COLIN BRIGHT]

i NEVER
 quarantee to remove any stains, no matter what they are
i always explain that we will try our very best on the stain and if it does all come out, then the custy is over the moon
its a great time to also upsell them protector to guard against future problems but also tell them that it will help but is not a quarranteed stain resister.

[Kev Loomes]

Colin's right. We would never tell a custy what product/s we would use, especially if there were just enquiring. Its too dangerous for a start, as we all know that a little bit of info can lead to big problems for people who, lets face it dont understand.

I feel sorry for Chris & Jeff, none of us need custy's like those. Im sure they have/will be taking steps to prevent this in the future. Like Colin says, we never ever guarantee to remove anything and state this on our survey forms - which they sign.

We often refer people to the NCCA website aswell. If they are too far away, and you really want to help them, then thats what we do rather than mentioning YP etc due to poss cowboys (I know most aren't before anyone jumps down my throat :, but there's more chance of better service IMO if they have been properly trained etc).

Kev

[Mike Osbourne]

I've had people demand I guarantee a stain will come out OVER THE PHONE. When I say i need to see it and even then can't guarantee they get shirty. :

These I don't want.

[gwrightson]

I think some of you may have misenterped my post

The custy was actually very pleasant, she did indeed want a pro c/c to come out and attempt removal, she was not expecting miracles, but after phoning a pro and the pro telling her she would be better off buying some red rx and doing it herself she was quite shocked to his reply. In her words, she was never ever going to attempt herself, just wanted a job doing .

 I have just got back in from the job, complete removal ,initialy extracting all the homemade cures, ie white wine , salt  soda water etc that the revellers had tried, then a application of nemesis at 50 to 1
dwell 15 mins  a great improvment  but still  a stain , next line of attack was Chempspecs red stain remover, mixed equal parts as instuctions ,applied and extracted  and the results were excellent.
another happy custy.
geoff