Dealing with an unhappy customer...

I just walk away from customers like that, don't matter what one does for them, their always not happy. Some of them are looking for a freebie and i'm one that say have a good day and goodbye.
 
Sometimes you've just got to cut one loose and forget about it, Ferrari or not....



Don't keep chasing him cause he has a Ferrari, I would have done like you with one final follow up to see if there's anyway at all you can possibly make him happy, but doesn't seem like it.
 
I guess me being a part-timer allows me to be more selective on my jobs. It's tough making people happy; just do the best you can and thats all you can do.
 
^lol I'm not begging guys. :LOLOL



Ferrari's look good for the image, but a car is a car when it comes to detailing. The processes are generally the same. I started detailing for profit around May so I wouldn't mind having an exotic to do. But all in good time. I just didn't realize how nuts this guy was until the emails started being exchanged. No more communication with this guy, I don't want his, or his brothers' business, as he was so determined to point out.



Thanks for the responses!
 
I would do what i could to make the customer happy, within reason. And after that tell them to go somewhere else. Cause business like that is not worth the headache imo. But since you're just starting up it might be worth it to go a little further in trying to make them happy. But you got to know where to draw the line with people like that.
 
Yeah I see what you mean. But I think it's obvious that this sort of business relationship will not last. While I am young and just starting out, I want to build good rapports with clients but at the same time I will not foster the growth of this relationship if it's clear that it is going nowhere.



He'll get no thank you card from me at Christmas. He's fired!
 
kaval said:
He'll get no thank you card from me at Christmas. He's fired!
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Smart move, anything he gets from you is just going to remind him of experience with you and he'll probably start telling people around his house about it and complaining, no need you to remember him or him to remember you if you don't have too.



If you are good and do quality work, the exotics will come sooner or later. I remember when I had my first Ferrari to do and I was a little nervous but once I started working on it I didn't even realize it was a F car anymore, just another job to perfect and another customer to satify. :bigups
 
chas.007 said:
the car should have been done right the first time ,,,,so you would not have those problems
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Did you look at the condition the car was in before he worked on it? If the scratches are too deep to come out completely, it will take refinishing, not detailing to get it right.
 
Kaval,



After reading this thread for the past few days, it really does not sound like you want to accept full responsibility for what has happened. Let's face it, you accepted the job and when you do that, it is entirely up to you to satisfy the customer. No excuses.



From a business standpoint it is up to you to figure out the difference between being in the re-conditioning detailing business a being in the maintenance detailing business. That is a business choice we all must make in order to satisfy our clients. Some of us, like myself choose to do only maintenance details, where the same clients vehicles are maintained on a regular basis, such as three to four times a year. Other detailing business owners have chosen to be all things to all people and provide both re-conditioning and maintenance detailing services. Still others only do re-conditioning work, such as car dealer and rental car detailings.



It looks like you were trying to provide one thing and the client was expecting something else. That is your problem, not the client's. The first tip off to you was the fact that the car did not appear to be taken care of on a regular basis and that it was being cleaned up so that it could be sold. That makes it clearly a re-conditioning job. It was your choice from the beginning to handle it or walk away. It was no fault of the client's. Again, your responsibility.



The part about the windows fogging up was also your total responsibility. Let's face it, although no one commented in this thread, we all can suspect why this happened. Hey, moisture does not accumulate on its own. Maybe getting the carpets a bit too wet caused this fogging problem? Hey, only you know the answer. Either way, that too was totally your responsibility, not the client's.



And one last thing. It was your choice to go to work for this client and that makes this client your boss. And contrary to the unprofessional advice given by others, you can't fire your own boss.



In summary, it is totally up to you to choose your clients more carefully. That responsibility is totally up to you.



Just some well intentioned thoughts.
 
Frank you made good points all the way up to your last point about firing your own boss. Yes you absoutly with out a doubt can fire your own boss anytime you want. There's nothing saying anywhere that he should continue to work for this guy. Obviously skill levels were not up to the customers expecations. Not a problem there. We all learn and most of us are not at the top of the mountain just yet. Don't ever feel your cornered into something beyond your expertiese. That's when mistakes happen trying to do something you really shouldn't be doing yet all in the name of trying to make some blow hard happy. Just be completely upfront about things and always keep the customers up to date on the process if you run across anything like that. I never garuantee I can get every single scratch out or every stain out. It's just not going to happen. And I let my customers know that up front.
 
Jakerooni said:
Frank you made good points all the way up to your last point about firing your own boss. Yes you absoutly with out a doubt can fire your own boss anytime you want. There's nothing saying anywhere that he should continue to work for this guy.
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Thanks Jake. I would just like to make one thing clear. I never said that he should continue to work for that client. That is basically up to him. What I did say is that it was his choice to work for the client in the first place. He could clearly see what he was getting into and decided to go for it. And once he accepted the job, that makes the client his boss. And he can't fire someone he agreed to go to work for. That just doesn't make any sense. It was totally his responsibility to choose his client more carefully.



Once again, this type of thinking clearly shows the basic difference between being a detailer and becoming a good business person. A business person who can make sound business decisions. Telling someone to fire their own boss only suggests that the responsibility for this situation be shifted to the client. And in this case that is still unprofessional advice that appears to come from detailers, not true business professionals.



Before anyone can begin to learn from their mistakes, they must first accept full responsibility. In this case it didn't sound like anything was being learned.
 
I think maybe some people are reading too much into this. It sounds to me like Kaval told the customer some defects would remain before he took the job. I think this is just a customer that expects too much.
 
Frito Bandito said:
I think maybe some people are reading too much into this. It sounds to me like Kaval told the customer some defects would remain before he took the job. I think this is just a customer that expects too much.
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+1



That's what I felt was happening as well.
 
mirrorfinishman said:
What I did say is that it was his choice to work for the client in the first place. He could clearly see what he was getting into and decided to go for it.
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He said he went over the car prior to the detail and explained what areas he did not feel he could restore 100%. That the customer allowed him to do the work would make it appear the customer was aware some areas of the car would not end up perfect.



When I am faced with a car like that, I will do a couple of panels and then ask the customer to see if he will be satisfied with that level of work. No sense wasting my time or their money if the paint or interior is so bad I can't make enough improvement to warrant charging for the work.



And yes, you can fire your customers. I had one that constantly disappeared before I finished his car without paying me (he was a twice monthly customer) so I either had to wait until the next time I was out at his house or he'd leave it under his front door mat for me, which meant a return trip. Not to mention he had a boat that he trashed every time he took it out, plus it was oxidized and he kept asking me to wax it even though I explained several times that it needed heavy polishing and waxing it without removing the oxidation won't make it look any better, in fact, odds are the wax would cause streaking all over the boat.



Anyway, he got a new girlfriend and wanted to take her out on his boat and expected me to cancel my afternoon appointment (Expidition detail) and get right out to his house and clean up the boat. Told him I was not cancelling the appointment for someone who would pay me that day for someone who will take off before paying me. He cussed at me and I told him he needed to find another detailer and not to call me anymore.
 
mirrorfinishman said:
Kaval,



After reading this thread for the past few days, it really does not sound like you want to accept full responsibility for what has happened. Let's face it, you accepted the job and when you do that, it is entirely up to you to satisfy the customer. No excuses.



From a business standpoint it is up to you to figure out the difference between being in the re-conditioning detailing business a being in the maintenance detailing business. That is a business choice we all must make in order to satisfy our clients. Some of us, like myself choose to do only maintenance details, where the same clients vehicles are maintained on a regular basis, such as three to four times a year. Other detailing business owners have chosen to be all things to all people and provide both re-conditioning and maintenance detailing services. Still others only do re-conditioning work, such as car dealer and rental car detailings.



It looks like you were trying to provide one thing and the client was expecting something else. That is your problem, not the client's. The first tip off to you was the fact that the car did not appear to be taken care of on a regular basis and that it was being cleaned up so that it could be sold. That makes it clearly a re-conditioning job. It was your choice from the beginning to handle it or walk away. It was no fault of the client's. Again, your responsibility.



The part about the windows fogging up was also your total responsibility. Let's face it, although no one commented in this thread, we all can suspect why this happened. Hey, moisture does not accumulate on its own. Maybe getting the carpets a bit too wet caused this fogging problem? Hey, only you know the answer. Either way, that too was totally your responsibility, not the client's.



And one last thing. It was your choice to go to work for this client and that makes this client your boss. And contrary to the unprofessional advice given by others, you can't fire your own boss.



In summary, it is totally up to you to choose your clients more carefully. That responsibility is totally up to you.



Just some well intentioned thoughts.
Click to expand...



Thank you for taking the time to write out a well articulated reply.



I made it very clear to the client that some defects will remain, and why that was the case. The client assured me that it was not a problem. As far as that goes, I'm not quite sure what else I could have done. I went over it with him the day I saw the car, and then the day of the detail; before and after. Nothing was said after he came to pick up the car and checked it over, until after I called him the next day to find out how things were.



The fogged up windows...no idea. The class was cleaned properly, the same way I have cleaned glass before. Moisture could have been from anything. I didn't shampoo anything inside the car except Lexol shampoo the leather seats and condition them after with Lexol conditioner. The interior could have gotten wet since it was raining that day which brought on the moisture. I can't accept responsibility for that.



As for being a reconditioning detailer or a maintenance detailer, I'd like to be both. It's a nice feeling when you've done a full detail on a car, and it comes back for a wash and you can admire how well the products are working, and how well the car looks as a result of your hard work.



As for firing him, I like to look at it as more of a figurative way of saying I will not make any effort to market myself to him again. He has already decided not to do business with me again, and quite frankly I am looking at it as a blessing in disguise because I did everything I could, even in retrospect, to make this client aware of the outcome(s) and make him happy but the only reason he gave me the job was because I'm a young Sikh (same religion as him). As much of a well intentioned gesture that is, it's also like saying I'm a charity case.



Again, thanks for the response...I appreciate the time and thoughts. You do make good points, but I feel that it's a bit out of context to this situation. The only way I could have seen this coming was if I was psychic.



Kaval
 
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