What is wrong with plumbers?

I think that sort or scenario happens most often when a price is given for a pretty standard job, like replacing a fixture, then when the contractor begins work, he discovers other issues that may complicate the job and cost him more than he bargained for.

My guess is that they realized they were unqualified to do the job, but embarrassed to tell you that face to face. So, they vanished. If you can't get the name of a good plumber from a friend, or from someone at work, open the yellow pages and find a plumbing COMPANY - one that has several plumbers on its staff. That should (hopefully) lower your chances of having an amateur arrive to do the work.

Of course, it's also possible that YOU are the problem.

- Is your house filthy?

- Do you chatter to repair people endlessly about stuff they have no interest in, like your kids and grandchildren and your dog that just died blah blah blah?

Why do guys do this? It's an instinct. You just know that the job isn't going to go the way it's supposed to and you are never going to satisfy the customer. What better time is there to leave than in the beginning of the job?

Bill

Good tradesmen are to be treasured. Over the years, we find it best to work with a business that has several plumbers although we may request favorite individuals. If they have problems, they can bring in helpers.

May cost a little more, but we can rely on them. Neighbor uses one of these jack-of-all-trades individuals, who will come back, but he is often left hanging for several days while jack gets his act together on a job a little complex for him.

Frank

talking a lot about previous troubles and sueing a previous plumber would no doubt cause troubles.

filthy home a real turn off...

asmoking stinky cigars might do it for a non smoker

a cat when your allergic

when you find a GOOD plumber etc stick with them even if they arent the cheapest price.

the lowest price often comes with a bad job:(

In every profession, a few professionals and a lot of amateurs.

snipped-for-privacy@msn.com wrote:

I have ditched a few customers over the years because I didn't like them or their house was gross. I never left in the middle of a repair, although I may not have finished their list of repairs. I also never got paid for those jobs. No regrets.

cm

I don't blame you, although it would probably be good to explain why you're leaving. My dentist said he occasionally gets a patient who doesn't brush their teeth before coming to his office. Their logic is "Hey...I'm here for cleaning anyway". Wrong. Probably the same kinds of people who don't clean under the kitchen sink before they expect a plumber to work under there.

I contracted with Lowes to install a kitchen sink. They quoted a "flat-fee" for "normal installation". Knowing that the salesman was not clairvoyant,nor a plumber, I paid ($50) to have an on site estimate done by their contract plumber. He produced a figure that was about $250 higher than Lowes "flat-rate". I agreed to the price but he never showed back up. Called a local plumber who came and charged $50 less because they were in the neighborhood. I figured Lowes guy was a "flat-rate" plumber and saw the job as over his head. McM

Translation: He wasn't a plumber. :-) He was more like me. I can handle

"A man's got to know his limitations".

-Dirty Harry

I agree with you. I had an experience with my sister-in-law. Got an emergency call, she had hired a painter to paint her apartment. He left 2 weeks ago and never came back half way through the job. Would I please help her out.

To keep the wife happy, I agreed. When I got there, I saw why he never came back. She had done NOTHING to the place in preparation for the painter, and she had lots of glass and china junk all over the place. I said I would finish painting but she would have to do some work.

I did the painting, and some repairs and other things to make her apartment nice. But, it took both myself and my wife constant haggling with her to get her backside out of her chair. I went to move the fridge, and asked her to empty it. She didn't do anything and said it wasn't necessary as it would move OK. So I lifted it on the 2 wheeled cart and tilted it back to move it through the door and everything spilled out onto the floor, eggs, drinks and whatnot all over the place. I parked the fridge and made her clean up. To move a bookshelf, she whined and grumbled about moving the books. I passed them to her to take to the finished bedroom, when I turned around she had only walked 5 feet and put them on a table that was also to be moved. The grumbling changed to bitching when I insisted she move them out of the room that I was about to paint. This went on for weeks, the job took over twice as long because we had to browbeat her everyday to do her share of looking after her stuff.

When it was all over, I think she hated me, and certainly complained of everything including the paint splatter on her dishes that she was too lazy to move from the cabinet that I painted.

I see why the painter walked out on her, I would have also if she wasn't my wife's sister. I am sure that is why many tradespeople will refuse to return to some jobs.

I agree with the "troublesome customer don't bother to show up" thing.

Some people are *never* satisfied with your work and will complain about anything and everything. They want you to do the work for below cost, then expect perfection and top quality.

I know a couple of women that I will never do any work for. I have seen these people complain about every single bit of work *anyone* has ever done for them.

If I have to do any work in these situations, the price goes WAY up! (Additional stress and grief fees!)

The opposite is true. If someone is nice to me, offers me water/soda, use of their bathroom, maybe a snack, the price goes down. With some of these people, they get free or reduced price service.

Another situation I will avoid is doing any work on manufactured houses. Always a royal pain. So I am too busy when anyone wants work on their manufactured home done.

Aaaaaaack! It must be a trend! A few years back, a female acquaintance began offering to play frequent rounds of hide the salami with me. Two weeks later, she announced she was moving to a new apartment in a week, and asked if I would help. I agreed, but noticing the unbelievable amount of crap she owned, I suggested that she go get boxes immediately, and start packing. She said that could wait because she had a dozen friends who'd also agreed to help on the day of the move. I pointed out that this was less than ideal, but she was unmoved.

The morning of the event, I got there about the same time as her other friends. She had done absolutely NOTHING. She hadn't even washed the dishes that needed to be packed. She assigned someone to go get the U-Haul truck and boxes, but that didn't fly because she didn't have cash to cover their credit card charges, and nobody trusted that she actually had the money in the bank. It was 90 degrees outside, no breeze, and the house was even worse. She had nothing for people to drink. Several people suggested that she stop at a store after getting the u-haul truck, and pick up at least a gallon of water and/or juice per person, and a shitload of cups. She did neither. Things did not go well. Around early afternoon, she also pointed out that she was expected to clean the place before vacating, and "if someone could help with that, it would be great". Too bad she'd packed all the sponges & cleaning products. I left around that time, along with about half the other people. No salami game is worth that kind of inconsideration.

None of the above, but I've certainly had plumbers and repair people yakking away at me. It drives me crazy. :-)

Cheri

If a repair person wipes their feet in sloppy weather AND does good work, I send a letter to their boss. If they teach me something about maintenance and can (and should) do myself, I try and nominate them for sainthood. I've never managed to find the right web link for doing that, though. Otherwise, there would be a Saint Bud, from the HVAC company I've had for 20+ years. :-)

Then, there was Saint Sonny, the garbage man. When my son was 3, he had a brief fascination with how garbage trucks worked. When he heard the truck coming, he'd tear through the house to the front window to watch. One day, he wanted to see more detail. We went out. Sonny told the driver he needed to do a demo, told my son to cover his ears against the noise, and threw some stuff in. He was there a good 5 minutes, answering kid questions. :-)

Consider the opposite: The ones that just grunt.

I had a similar problem with my mother-in-law over painting the interior of her house. It was October of '77 and a group of us who played baseball together were going to help paint each other's houses. Mine had been painted two years ago and my mil's hadn't been painted in 20 years.

Two of us sat down with her on a Sunday to explain what she needed to do to be ready for us. Upon her first argument how something was unnecessary, my friend told her she was getting free labor and if she did not do what she was asked to do, the house would not be painted. She stared at me and asked if I was going to allow him to talk to her like that. My response was that I was so grateful that he had that I was going to split a bottle of brandy with him.

While we were finishing the last of the four houses, I told my now ex-wife that if her mother didn't make her house ready for painting, we were going to paint some apartments in a "project" in the inner-city for my share of the work. [I know how to jack up bigots! LoL] All of a sudden it was ready. Then we added that she could not be there while we painted.

The other houses took a Sat/Sun for cleaning/painting walls & ceilings and part of a Sat for the trim. We put in a 12 hour Saturday and an 8 hour Sunday so we would not have to come back.

One of my friends after meeting my mil said "Next time - we do the projects."

Dick

In other words, they choose not to honor their contract.

Correct, they choose not to honor their agreement, because to do so would cost them money. Not every contractor can calculate, estimate, and articulate what they will do and for what price, and I think this scenario occurs often under those circumstances. I'm not trying to legitimize it, just my theory on why it happens