Missed appointments

[Kenneth W. Burton]

	Ted,

	This is a perennial problem. It happened to me yesterday. The lady
said, "Right after I set up the appointment with you, I realized that they
time we arranged was exactly when my baby is sleeping." THEN WHY DIDN'T
SHE CALL ME AND CHANGE THE APPOINTMENT! I think there are some things
involved in dealing with the public that you can never solve.
	However, I do take one further step to avoid this occurence. At
about 8:15 am, I phone the people who have appointments during the day.
Lots of times, they respond by saying, "I'm glad you phone. I had
forgotten the appointment." So this helps a lot but there are always a few
no shows.
	I haven't had the courage to charge them a penalty for a missed
appointment. Perhaps some of the fellows and gals do and they could tell
us whether it works or not.

	Ken Burton "Doctor Piano" Calgary Alberta

On Mon, 16 Sep 1996, Ted Simmons wrote:

> Dear List:
>    You have all been helpful to me in the past and I know most of you are
> University Techs and maybe don't do house-to-house tunings.  Anyhow, I'd
> like to pose this problem with you:  How do you handle no-shows?  I arrive
> at the appointed time and the customer is not home.  I leave my card in the
> door and leave after waiting 10 minutes.  Later that evening I get an
> apologetic call from the customer who wants to re-schedule.  I've lost the
> price of a tuning that day because of the customer's forgetfulness.  Do I
> passively comply and give the customer a new date or do I tell him there
> will be an extra charge? I'm talking mostly about first time customers. I
> readily comply for customers whom I have tuned for for years and this is
> their first violation.  Any comments?
>
>    Ted Simmons
>    Merritt Island, FL
>
>
>