$65 to adjust one damper?

[Farrell]

The key here is discussing the situation with the client before doing any work. I don't even ease a key bushing without telling the client what I am wanting to do - even if I don't charge them for it. If nothing else, it lets the client know that I'm a good guy and making their piano better. And definitely, never pull an action with consent from the customer.

Regarding a mis-diagnosis of a problem. IMHO, if you know what you are doing and follow a logical approach to evaluating the problem, you charge for all your efforts - even if some avenues you pursue are a dead-end. However, if you do a task, it doesn't work, and then realize that you should have gone another route in the first place - a more logical route - I wouldn't charge for my mistake.

For instance - you have a buzz on a bass string C1 - maybe even have some faint buzzing from C2 and C3 - but C1 buzzes loudly. So you replace C1 and find that all the buzzes are still there. Then you go sniffing around under the plate and find a handful of pennies on the soundboard. You remove the pennies and all the buzzing goes away. In such a case, the more logical approach would have been to search under the plate first - I would charge the customer for the time it took me to locate and remove the pennies, but not for replacing the bass string.

I have done work that I didn't charge for. If its my goof, I don't charge.

But if the problem is with an action - you will almost always spent time looking at the wrong thing - but that is the way you assess an action. You start at the key, work your way to the wippen, check that out, move to the hammer butt and flange, etc., etc. Even though you spend a couple minutes evaluating the key and wippen - which were operating just fine - you bill them for that time because it was the logical course to follow.

Yesterday I spent a half-hour diagnosing several sticking keys on an Aeolian spinet. I charged them for all my time. I feel I followed a logical path, and finally made my diagnosis - the felt on the bottom of the damper levers had deteriorated and the spoon was catching on it somehow. She chose to fix the problem (I advised her to junk the piano), I yanked the action, and low-and-behold found that the spoons were like little 80-grit boring machines that had bored little bomb craters into the damper lever felt - never seen anything like that before - these perfectly shaped pits were just big enough for the spoon and went all the way through the felt to the wood. Anyway, seems like 30 minutes is a long time to find a dent in a piece of felt, but it was unusual and I felt I followed a logical progression during my effort.

Hope some of that helps.

Terry Farrell
  ----- Original Message ----- 

      My first thought is- was it ringing before you tuned it?  I assume you were there to tune the piano.  Did you discuss the repair with the customer?  If not, and you expected the repair to be a "quickie", you just ate it.  Otherwise, I think you would be justified charging whatever you think was fair.  It wouldn't be fair to charge a customer for your learning curve, so I'd figure that into your charges, and adjust accordingly.  
      You know, it brings up a question.  If I'm struggling with a particular problem, and I can't seem to get it fixed right, is it ethical to charge for the mistakes I made in mis-diagnosis of the problem?  Like when you take your car in for repair, and they try this and that, replacing parts until the problem goes away.  And you pay for the whole thing.  It doesn't seem fair to me that way.  
      Better to charge for the job than by the hour.  Knowing what to charge for that job is the critical thing.  
      Food for thought...

      Paul McCloud
      San Diego


    ----- Original Message ----- 

     I'm sure something similar has happened to everyone on the list.  I noticed one damper had a long after-ring, so tried to bend it up, down, sideways, etc., to make it contact the strings better.  No dice.  Had to pull the action.  This is one of the dampers right against a plate strut, with the long right-angle bend before the damper wire goes down the guide hole.  Anyhow, pulled the damper, made what I thought was the necessary bend, and of course t! he damper head comes loose from the wire, even though I was holding it tightly in place with parallel pliers.  Had to plug the hole with a toothpick splinter and tap the wire back into the hole with a small punch, then add a drop of CA glue.  Then put the damper back in the underlever, regulated, re-installed the action and tried it.  Nope.  Still rings.  By now probably 15 or 20 minutes have elapsed.  Yes I have the tool that enables bending it side to side with the damper in place.   No dice.  Still rings.  Pull the action and damper again, try squeezing the felt to make it sett! le down farther into the strings, reinstall damper, reinstall action, try again.  Nope, still rings.  By now about a half hour has elapsed.  Pull action and damper again, try fluffing up the felt with a voicing tool on the one string that still rings.  Reinstall everything and try again.  Better, but now the 7th partial is too strong.  Try bending forward and back to kill the partial.  No dice.  This goes on and on for another half hour before I finally get the damper to satisfactorily dampen that note.  Do I now charge $65 just for adjusting one damper?  How do I explain this to the customer?  Certainly if I had let it ring, I would have gotten a call-back about it.

                --David Nereson, RPT  
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