Careful -- there are "leaches" out there who will try as they might to get you to come back time and time again over and over to take care of "this little thing" or "that little problem" ... and oh, there's a new one that "just happened" the day after you left. Technicians new to the field are their favorite prey. I've known some people who deliberately strive to get as much free service as is possible, be this from the piano technician, car mechanic, or whatever. "Well I'm not satisfied ... you need to come back and fix it for free until I am satisfied." The only freebie call-back I'll do is to fix a stupid oversight on my part. First line of defense -- find out while you are setting up the initial appointment what other concerns the customer may have with the piano. Ask them point-blank if there have been any problems with sticking keys or whatever. If they mention that there is an intermittent problem, ask them to identify the key(s) whether or not the problem has acted up recently. Tell them that because the piano had been neglected for so long, there may be problems waiting to happen when people start to play it again. Encourage them to do as much playing as possible in the meantime so keys can be identified and the problems described in greater detail by the time you arrive. If that doesn't "produce results" yet, then make notes of whatever problems you encounter as you're going about tuning the piano. It could be that there is a problem of sluggishness that could eventually result in sticky keys. Or, it could be that you're faced with brittle action parts that will cause keys to not work when they break. These should be pointed out to the customer as soon as you find them. Or, it could be something so simple as debris laying across the backs of the keys that would cause some binding as soon as something fell between a couple of keys. Obviously some fixes take a lot less time than others. Even in the case of something as simple as cleaning out the debris, you might warn the customer that there is a small chance that something may be caught between the keys that may cause problems later on ... ... Would they like to spend a little extra money now and have all the keys removed and the keybed cleaned, or would they be willing to take a chance and foot the bill for a service call should the need arise? Extra time demands extra money. Sometimes it helps to be able to explain things through the use of analogies. Since metro Detroit is "car country" I've come up with numerous analogies between pianos and cars. It's all very well to give the engine a nice tune-up after many years of neglect -- starts right away, runs nice while idling, revs up smoothly when you hit the accelerator, but does this mean that you can get it shifted into gear, or that you can steer it, or that the brakes work at all? No. Tune-ups usually don't include any other work on the car unless it is part of a much larger maintenance package. Even then, when problems requiring parts replacement arise, there are always charges to cover for the extras. As you're packing up your tools, ask the customer to sit down and play the piano. Tell them this is their last chance to bring concerns to your attention before it becomes a separate service call. Good luck -- Z! Reinhardt RPT Ann Arbor MI diskladame@provide.net ----- Original Message ----- From: "Sherry" <swidmer@rochester.rr.com> To: "Pianotech" <pianotech@ptg.org> Sent: Monday, December 30, 2002 1:35 PM Subject: Customer question : I could use some input on the following situation. I did a pitch raise on a : Baldwin Acrosonic the other day and also replaced a broken spring. The : customer just called back and said she had a sticking key and wanted me to : come fix it (without charge). Obviously I have not been clear enough about : what is "included" in a tuning call and what should be considered a new : service call request. I have a feeling this lady will have a lot of things : go wrong with this piano since it was not maintained properly for many years : and just keep calling pretty much forever asking me to stop by without : charge for "little things" that are wrong. : : 1) Any suggestions for this particular situation. : : 2) How can I delineate what is and what is not included in a regular tuning : appointment (re: repairs, etc) : : Thanks for the help. Sherry : : _______________________________________________ : pianotech list info: https://www.moypiano.com/resources/#archives
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