"Fire" Your Bad CustomersWritten by Dave Balch
Here's a concept to consider: some customers just aren't worth trouble. We work so hard to get customers, and then work so hard to keep them, it's hard to grasp idea that we are better of WITHOUT some of them!Let's face it; some people just don't "get it". They won't be nice or reasonable, they need too much 'hand-holding', or they haggle over everything. Lose 'em! Tell them politely that they will be better off getting your product or service elsewhere. A local auto repair shop diagnosed a clutch problem and did approximately $300 worth of repairs. About 2 weeks later clutch failed when I was 80 miles from home, and I had to take it to a local Nissan dealer. They told me that problem was one of parts that had just been replaced. When I took paperwork and bad part into local repair shop, he looked it over and took position that he had no way of knowing whether part in question was really bad or whether part they gave me was, in fact, part they had put in. I told him that I understood that but I didn't think that dealer would have tried a blatant lie and, dealer's factory part cost less than theirs. He mulled it over and decided to give me $150 credit because it certainly looked like something wasn't kosher and, besides, I was being reasonable and they didn't want to lose me as a customer. Just previous week they had had a "screamer"; someone who had a problem and came in there yelling and screaming about it.
| | Don't Panic!Written by Dave Balch
We can learn a lot from horses; I sure did. Before my wife got me interested in them, I couldn't even spell hoarse (!); now I am learning from them while learning about them.Today's lesson was learned when Kelly, our mare, found her way into breezeway of barn. The breezeway is area where we humans walk when we feed or visit horses, and also serves as a storage area for horse-related supplies. It runs alongside two stalls, which are on left as you walk in. (We get into stalls from breezeway, horses enter and exit through doorways on opposite side.) The breezeway is full of horsey temptations and dangers, including bags of food, treats, and medications that, if ingested in large quantities could make them seriously ill: think of it as a candy store for horses. A very narrow candy store for horses. Kelly got in there when I carelessly left a gate open that should have been closed. There she was, sniffing away and looking for goodies in a fairly confined space, considering she weighs in at about 1100 pounds. Uh-oh! She can't be in there! She could get sick or hurt! What should I do?!? I remembered being told once that when a horse is in a dangerous situation, you must remain calm. After all, what do you think she would have done had I run in there yelling at her? She would have bolted, perhaps further into breezeway, perhaps towards me trying to get out. Getting run over by an upset horse is not my idea of a good time. Who knows what she would have bumped into, broken, stepped on, or??? Causing her to panic could have easily caused 10 times more damage than I was trying to prevent.
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