Very interesting question!

[piannaman at aol.com]

Jesse,
 
You're right, the percentage of people who just need a tuning is tiny.
 
People use "tuning" or "tune-up" as a catch-all phrase that in their minds includes fixing sticky keys (as in "how do you fix a sticky key, anyway...?"), gluing on cabinet parts, adjusting anything and everything, replacing a hammer, restringing, or welding the plate...  :-)
 
My tuning charge is a 1 1/2 hour service call for a specified amount of money.  If the piano doesn't need a pitch adjustment, a tuning doesn't take much more than an hour.  If they are regular customers, they are rewarded by having regulation or voicing on their piano with the leftover time that might have been spent on a pitch raise.  If they are "irregular," aka infrequent customers, they get dinged a pitch adjustment fee regardless of whether I finish within the 1 1/2 hour time frame.
 
All other repairs and regulation charges are based on my hourly rate.  
 
With this type of rate schedule, I don't worry so much about what they expect or don't expect.  And if I run out of time to do the tasks they have asked for, I schedule another appointment with them for when I have time. 
Dave Stahl

Dave Stahl Piano Service
650-224-3560
dstahlpiano at sbcglobal.net
http://dstahlpiano.net/




 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: PIANOTECHNICIAN at aol.com
To: pianotech at ptg.org
Sent: Mon, 19 Feb 2007 6:42 PM
Subject: Very interesting question!


If you get a call from a new customer who says the piano needs "tuning," what percentage of the time does it turn out to be just a straight tuning and nothing else, with no pitch adjustment, sticking keys, sluggish hammers, loose flange screws, lost motion, pedal squeaks, etc. For me, it's been probably somewhere between one per cent and five per cent of the time. In fact, one time I remember someone calling me for "tuning.", and half the keys were "down" due to "peanut brittle" elbows.
 
Jesse Gitnik
NYC
Since 1980
 
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