<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> <HTML><HEAD> <META http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII"> <META content="MSHTML 6.00.6000.16481" name=GENERATOR></HEAD> <BODY id=role_body style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; COLOR: #000000; FONT-FAMILY: Arial" bottomMargin=7 leftMargin=7 topMargin=7 rightMargin=7><FONT id=role_document face=Arial color=#000000 size=2> <DIV>Hey Steven.  Stores are slow right now and cutting service costs.  Not a new thing.   Here's my story - A month after starting at  a store, I realized the store was selling 2 or 3 pre-paid tunings with each piano sold.  Worse yet, the store was giving customers a hard time when they would call to schedule  the pre-paid warranty tunings.  Customers would complain to me they had to call 1/2 dozen times before the store finally sent me out to tune their piano.   Customers would leave messages that were not returned, customers were told a tech would call them, and no one gave me the tunings.  One complaint after another, too many to be just errors on the store's part.  The store grossed an extra $150,000 per year selling these pre-paid tunings, and was doing all that it could to get out of tuning the customers pianos. They wanted to pocket the money.    People continue to call me for their 2nd or 3rd pre-paid tuning, and I've been billing  the store, although I haven't taken new customers for a year now.  Recently the store has been slow to pay my bill, and I've put them on credit hold till they pay up.  Customers are being told the store hasn't paid me, so I can't tune their piano.  Crappy situation for me and them.  Some stores just plain suck.   </DIV></FONT><BR><BR><BR><DIV><FONT style="color: black; font: normal 10pt ARIAL, SAN-SERIF;"><HR style="MARGIN-TOP: 10px">Get a sneak peek of the all-new <A title="http://discover.aol.com/memed/aolcom30tour/?ncid=AOLAOF00020000000982" href="http://discover.aol.com/memed/aolcom30tour/?ncid=AOLAOF00020000000982" target="_blank">AOL.com</A>.</FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>