Is this your opinion?:
- Greedy
- Would rather sell you a new machine than to fix the one you have
- Laughs when telling their compatriots how they screwed you
- All have unnumbered bank accounts in the Islands
The truth, in reality, is pretty much the opposite. I serviced these things for over 35 years, and I never got rich. Most of my contemporaries made a living, but no one got rich.
Sad to say there are some real shysters out there who are more interested in the almighty dollar, than repairing your appliance. They are easy enough to spot by their large yellow page advertisements.
However, not all of these people are dishonest, but almost all are overpriced, a victim themselves, because they have to pay for that huge yellow page ad out of what they receive from you.
If an ad states "FREE SERVICE CALL", read on. Somewhere in the ad will be the words "if repairs are made" (probably in small print), or something to that effect. No company can really give you a free service call, and stay in business, unless his rich relative passed on and left him financially independent, and he's just in the business because he loves to help people, and has nothing better to do. Good luck on finding that guy.
Hey, I could give you a "Free Service Call" if I charged you for the repairs that I made. In fact, that's exactly what I used to do. If you elected not to spend the money on a machine that I had diagnosed and gave you a cost estimate, then you would have been charged a minimum fee, which would probably be in the $70 range ( I haven't kept up with it). We have to. The cost of fuel and upkeep on the service vehicle demands it. The meter starts when we roll up to your door and it usually takes at least one-half hour to diagnose the problem and estimate repair costs. We are also saddled with our overhead of advertising, insurance premiums, and if it's an A/C or Heat problem, licensing, along with shop rent, phone service, etc. The list goes on and on. I hope you see my point, however.
Try to stay with small one or two-man air conditioning or appliance companies and very small yellow page listings. I realize that sounds an awful like me, but think about this....if you've ever placed a yellow page ad, then you know how proud Ma Bell is of her publication. THEY DO NOT GIVE THESE THINGS AWAY! It's you who winds up paying for it.
I once considered working for a company that was running a full-page ad, and rode with a company service tech for a day. His pay structure was based on, get this, the more in dollar amount he collected per job, the better his commission percentage was. So it was instinctive to collect from the customer every dime he could. To me, this was an incentive to steal. Who came out on the deal?
- Not the customer. He may have gotten his appliance repaired, which was his objective, but he paid through the nose for it.
