Ever felt okay 'bout losing a customer?

Hey All -
Wondering? Your “ego” ‘n feelings ever play a part in your losing a customer?
‘While back, I wrote ‘bout a situation where I had erred ever so slightly in engraving ‘bunch of stainless tumblers for an Outfit. I naturally deleted my engraving charge: the customer, then, insisting that I pay his cost of the 100+ tumblers.


Naively, my posted “Not responsible for mishaps” policy made sense to me at the time. You all set me straight in a HURRY! - smart business-wise, my policy wasn’t worth a grain of salt! (‘though I should tell you, it had never been applied.) Then, ‘couple of you wisely suggested that I ‘least get the tumblers back from the customer, as I would’ve paid for ‘em. Made sense! I e-mailed, informing this customer I would pay for the cups, once returned. Anyway, I never received the tumblers, never heard back, so, I’ve obviously lost this customer!


But, you know what? I’m happier for it! - thinkin’ back to this fella’s uncalled for abrasive ‘n threatening approach to the issue! Guess I’ve decided, sometimes, my ego ‘n feelings trump sales! Do want’ a add: I learned key lessons from you all! - was dumb of me to be figuring my engraving charges based upon the (cheap) selling price of a customer’s item(s). - and, that I should always try, first, to look at my policies from a customers’ viewpoint! Will miss the sales, but sleepin’ easier, now! - BILL

Thumbs up, if the customer is the problem... then its good bye. You do not need to take verbal abuse from anyone.

I had a customer I was happy to be rid of. His drawings were bad with no lines joined up. I suggested he used snaps but he insisted he did and "it was the fault of the CAD program". He'd bend my ear for hours then order small quantities. Never paid me for his last order either but I didn't bother pursuing it as that would mean having to talk to him again.

I'm going to be happy when my last laser engraver finally gives up the ghost!
Then I won't have to worry about customers, period!

But, yes, there have been a few customers I should have ran from.

Bruce

I assume a lot of you engraver folks are self employed. If you wanted to work for someone you didn't get along with, you could go to work for someone else :). What I mean is, if a customer is a pain, I wouldn't want to do work for them. An unhappy situation is when a customer is such a large part of your income that you can't afford to lose them. I hope none of you ever end up in that situation.

We have a client that we keep getting rid of. They always seem to be able to find one thing or another that they need us to do for them or assist them with. It's an endless roller coaster of massive relief at their departure and angst and trepidation at their return. I've finally decided that they will never be gone for good until I retire.

Sounds like you made the right decision for you. Thanks for the follow-up Bill. I'd wondered how that all came out.
Fred

I almost always proof my work, and in the case of graphics, sometimes twice- Y'all notice how I've always got pictures? My trusty F707 is always at the ready... :)

In the case of jobs like tumblers, I take a pic of the tumbler, crop it, put it in Corel at actual size, then superimpose the actual size engraving onto it, best I can taking into account the radius, make a PDF and have them okay it. Then I'll make a blue-tape test run. If to my eyes it's the same as the proof I'll run the job. If there's any question, I'll send them a pic of the test part.

If they okayed what I proofed and the work matches the proof, I've upheld my end of the deal....

Had a lady stand behind me one day while I typed out double-line script onto a photo of the tray she brought in, from a paper she wrote the text on, a 'happy anniversary' deal.. Got it all spaced and fit, I asked her to check it to make sure I did everything right. she looked it over, then said it looked 'wonderful!'... When she picked it up, she was pleased as punch, paid and left. A minute later she was at the door, in total attitude-adjusted mode... "you put the wrong date on this!!" Checked it against the paper-- yup, I sure did-- which is EXACTLY why I asked you to check it out to make sure it was correct, which you did, and gave me your blessing... She wanted me to buy her a new $85 tray. Sorry, but no... Since it was an aluminum alloy tray, I spent a half hour sanding, polishing and re-engraving it at no charge, totally invisible repair, looked good as the first run. She still seemed to feel cheated...

SO Bill, if you offered to pay and they failed to reciprocate-- rest easy :)

I have a customer who I charged a premium because I really didn't want to do the work. They paid. Next time, I charged even more... they cam back. I've raised their price 4 times, and now I don't mind working for them.... much.
Another customer just plain --- me off trying to make me believe HIS business would be all I need to make a very good living & no other customers mattered. It was an interesting project, but sometimes you have to look for the warning lights & he had them in spades. He was beside himself (angry) when I finally told him I wasn't interested in his work.

My worst experience was a bedframe headboard project I took on....
The customer showed up wanting to "help", so as to
reduce the cost ..... He had no woodworking experience
but, could learn "as he goes" .....
I was as nice as I could be, explaining I couldn't risk him getting
hurt ....
He told me it was the only way he could afford it....
In the end, he paid for the material, and we parted company....

I've had similar approaches and I squelch them without further discussion. The same goes for people who want to rent my machine. These typically come from what I call retail customers and long ago I decided I would try to avoid that business.

If I had reaped the rewards of all the "We're going to be rich together" promises, then I'd be a multimillionaire from the engraving business. We had 2 customers come in recently with rush jobs. We did them and did them very cost effectively. Both wanted to see our machines because they were going to buy lasers to do them themselves in the future. You'd have to do 5 years worth to pay for a machine. Neither got to see our machines.

"Hey, I need you to bail me out of a situation I got myself into, but just know that once you bail me out, I'm going to repay the favor by buying a machine just like yours so that you never get another job from me in the future". Nothing gets me more excited about doing your work than you promising to never give me another job and becoming my competition.

KEV -
Helps to know, I’m not the only one who’s had to try ‘n placate an unhappy customer over an engraving error!
Guess I failed to mention, I do “pre-proof” my work, best I can. I use a CorelDraw “template/layout” showing the sizes of logos ‘n images I’ve successfully engraved on tumblers of various sizes. (using Cermark spray.) Figuring ‘long as I stay within the width of those past images, I’ll be okay. Then, I run a “blue-tape” test.


With that particular project everything looked like it was going fine. I had hand-washed ‘couple, early on, to be sure. All of ‘em appeared to mark nicely. It was in the handwashing stage that, surprisingly, a tiny smidgen of the image washed off on 100+ tumblers! (In retrospect, I should’ve been washing ‘few throughout the job; lesson learned!)


Anyway, from this experience: I’m thinking, now, I’ll no longer take-on large quantities of expensive YETI-style tumblers: a benefits versus risk kinda thing. (In that one case, paying for those items would’ve cost me $800, or so!) To quote Bob Dylan ... “Times, they are a changing!” From here on out, I’ll weigh the cost of paying for mis-engraving a customer's item v.s. the cost of losing that particular customers' business! But, ‘least, thanks to you all, I feel better having ‘least offered to pay for those tumblers! The ball was, then, in my customers’court! (Gone,for good,I suspect ... but, way I was treated ... no love lost!) - BILL

if the defect was as minuscule as you say and he wouldn't let you buy them back, I bet a dollar to a doughnut he sold them at a discount and still made money. Thats why he would not let you buy them back JMO

>>if the defect was as minuscule as you say and he wouldn't let you buy them back, I bet a dollar to a doughnut he sold them at a discount and still made money. Thats why he would not let you buy them back<<

I was guessing something like that too.

In my experience, if Cermark washes off in one spot it won't be long until the rest of the image is degraded to the point of not being acceptable.