So here's a new one I got today. Customer comes in to drop his truck off to have a deck, 4 speakers, and dynamatt put in. Do the paperwork and he asks me to call his cell when I'm done. I say ok and take his keys. Now the truck is a 01 Jeep cherokee, not a hard vehicle by any stretch of the imagintaion. I finish the install in a little over and hour. I call the guy tell him it's done, clean up my tools, and punch out for lunch. An hour later I come back and my boss asks me to come outside the shop cause he wants to talk to me.

He then proceeds to tell me that the guy with the cherokee came back to pick the truck up and was furious because I called him just as he got back home. The customer then proceeds to ask why he was charged to much money if the install was so easy. Mind you the only thing he was charged for was:

Radio install 35

4 Speaker install 81

Dynamatt install 26

No extra labor or anything funny. So he gets all huffy saying the salesguy said it would be 3 hours and how he would have just waited if the install was going to be so quick. The one thing I forgot to mention earlier is the guy didn't ask how long it would take and seemed to be in a huge rush to get out of the shop like he had somewhere important he had to be. So basically I had a customer complaint because it DIDN'T take long enough. The sad part my boss tells me is that appearantly the same thing happened the other day with a remote start I did in a toyota camry. So if anyone here ever ends up at the Circuit City where I work, if the install doesn't take the ungodly length of time the salesguys say it's going to take I'm sorry.

People Suck

simple solution... tell the customer you pulled out all the stops and put multiple installers on it, so in essence you worked extra hard for them.

I have a better solution!

Tell your boss to kiss your ass and find another job.

It sounds like your boss is a real assh@le who doesn't stand behind his employees the way he should. And who in the hell wants to work for someone like that?

But if you really must keep this job, then in the future give your customer a time range. Say 1-3 hours dependant upon how easy or difficult the install goes and tell them that labor will be charged accordingly.

But if it were me, I would walk. You don't need that kind of crap from your boss. I'm sure that you are more valuable to CC than you think. Good installers aren't easy to come by. It takes years to learn what you know. Don't take no shit. Stand up for yourself.

Cheers,

Kevin

Ironically I was at a Circuit City today, trying to get a bit of hands on play with a Nuvi660, and there were a couple groups of people waiting on there cars outside the bay, b!tching and complaining about the installs taking to long. You know the type you tell, we'll call you when its ready but they are checking in every 15mins asking "is it done yet?"

Also one of the customers got right up, and did the hover thing over the installers shoulder while he put front speakers in his Sunfire. Man that was one thing I always hated. To the customers defense, the shop didn't have a yellow chain up, but still.

Anyway, man, I feel for you. I miss installing, but not the customers.

Chris.

i hear ya on that! i work at best buy and i run the bay. ive had people get mad because i got done with their car way before it was quoted. "so i paid 50 dollars for 30 minutes of work?!" idiots. haah but its great when/if a manger gets mad at ya. one got upset at me the other day and i said "ok ill go home, im really tired anyways, but ya better find someone to work on all these cars." convo was over haha

oh yeah and i hate when customers keep trying to look over your shoulder and ask is it done yet? how much longer?

I think I have to clarify something. my boss wasn't upset with me, he was just telling me what happened. We both were joking about it most of the day yesterday. As for the customers hangin over your should yeah I'll stop working on the car if they do that. I don't mind watching from the waiting area, but if you're going to hover, I'm not working.

customers hanging over your shoulder is always a prompt for me to reiterate the pricing....$45 to install your stereo, $55 if you stand over me, and $100 if you help me install your stereo.

You know, you dont want to devalue your installation. That is what is going on with these customers complaining. So, either tell them you put more installers on the job, or work on more then one car at a time so that the time is used up accordingly.

customers hanging over your shoulder is always a prompt for me to reiterate the pricing....$45 to install your stereo, $55 if you stand over me, and $100 if you help me install your stereo.

Used to have a sign on my toolbox that said that. Some reactions to it were great

You know, you dont want to devalue your installation. That is what is going on with these customers complaining. So, either tell them you put more installers on the job, or work on more then one car at a time so that the time is used up accordingly.

Very true. Though when you're by yourself and you only have 1 car to work on it gets a little difficult. One can only work so slowly.

Hey cntrylvr79

I would hope that if anyone on here ends up at your Circuit City they'd get the install done for free!