Anyone ever have a customer like this??

Scottwax said:
I've had to refuse to take care of a car in the past after meeting the customer. I was contacted by a construction firm about a Civic that had some cement overspray on it. I went out to look at the car and it was a mid 90s single stage, badly faded white Civic. I talked to the lady who owned the car and found her to be a very unpleasant person in general and had unrealistic expectations about what I was going to do vs what the construction firm was willing to pay for. Basically, she was expecting me to bring the finish to showroom condition. The construction firm was only paying for a wash, cement removal and rewaxing. I told them there was no way I was going to be able to do a good job because this woman had allowed her car to become so oxidized. Any waxing was going to leave streaks all over the car and there was a high likelyhood the chemical that TOL sells for concrete overspray would stain the paint since it contains a green dye for coloring.



The woman refused to pay to have the paint polished and was ranting and raving about the concrete (which I understood) and that the construction firm should pay for everything her car needed or I should take care of that on my own. I told her I am not employed by the construction firm, I was an independent contractor and I don't eat costs on jobs like this. I also told her if I did the work she would have to sign a waiver so that I would not be held liable for any staining the concrete removal product may cause. She got pissed off at me over that, but like I told her, it wasn't my fault she had let her paint deteriorate to the point it looked like chalk. She kept jawing at me, so I told her she needed to work it out with the construction firm and find someone else to do the work and walked away.



When the construction firm called me to find out what happened, I told them what she had said and that she wasn't the type of person I wanted to deal with. Never heard back from them or her.
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wow. Good for you, man!
 
Red flag one should of been that she had just had it cleaned by another shop and was not happy. The longer u r in business u will learn who u can please and who u can not. If the car looked good and u know it then do not let it get to u. Her friends all ready know how she is. Then it will not matter. But if it did not look good then u should worry.
 
Don't interupt or argue with someone while they are being unreasonable. Some people can never be satisfied unless they have something to complain about. Just let them vent(w/o interupting), ask exactly what you can do to make them satisfied and do your best to remediate the problem. If they still aren't happy, then you either really suck or they're crazy. :rofl Sometimes you need to go along to get along and know when to agree to disagree.....
 
Scottwax said:
I've had to refuse to take care of a car in the past after meeting the customer. I was contacted by a construction firm about a Civic that had some cement overspray on it. I went out to look at the car and it was a mid 90s single stage, badly faded white Civic. I talked to the lady who owned the car and found her to be a very unpleasant person in general and had unrealistic expectations about what I was going to do vs what the construction firm was willing to pay for. Basically, she was expecting me to bring the finish to showroom condition. The construction firm was only paying for a wash, cement removal and rewaxing. I told them there was no way I was going to be able to do a good job because this woman had allowed her car to become so oxidized. Any waxing was going to leave streaks all over the car and there was a high likelyhood the chemical that TOL sells for concrete overspray would stain the paint since it contains a green dye for coloring.



The woman refused to pay to have the paint polished and was ranting and raving about the concrete (which I understood) and that the construction firm should pay for everything her car needed or I should take care of that on my own. I told her I am not employed by the construction firm, I was an independent contractor and I don't eat costs on jobs like this. I also told her if I did the work she would have to sign a waiver so that I would not be held liable for any staining the concrete removal product may cause. She got pissed off at me over that, but like I told her, it wasn't my fault she had let her paint deteriorate to the point it looked like chalk. She kept jawing at me, so I told her she needed to work it out with the construction firm and find someone else to do the work and walked away.



When the construction firm called me to find out what happened, I told them what she had said and that she wasn't the type of person I wanted to deal with. Never heard back from them or her.
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We have dealt with the same thing way back. Had a roofing company sprinkle a guy's car with tar overspray and book it in for us to fix it. The car was a 10+ year old Pontiac Sunfire and the paint was extremely scratched up and neglected and I told the company and he customer beforehand. The company said go ahead and give it a polish after removing the tar to make the guy happy for our mistake and the hassle. We do the job, the car looks great and the customer comes back to get it and starts ranting and raving about how there was still tar in the channels between the windshield and rear window weatherstripping and he was a paralegal and he was going to sue their asses because they wrecked his car....blah blah blah. Problem with those scenarios is there are people that will never be happy and it really isn't worth the hassle.

Second funny one was a guy that came in and was badmouthing every other shop in our city saying they were all garbage etc... (my first red flag). We quoted him on the job, he agreed and brought the car in. Car was a crappy cavalier that his daughter had at university and had many problems and damage. Upon arrival to pick up the car he immediately goes to the back bumper and starts complaining that we "hit" the car car and had touched it up. Then he proceeded to pick apart the job complaining about bleach stains in the carpet that "we didn't get out" and so on. He said he wasn't going to pay and was leaving with his car because we had damaged it. At this point I brought up the fact that his car had sat the entire time in front of our security camera and if he chose to not pay I would be using the footage when I sued him for non-payment. He just stood there blinking then paid and left without saying a word. Once in a while getting an idiot customer is inevitable. All you can do is try and do what you can to make them happy and move on. Pre-screening while inspecting the vehicle and making sure you carefully explain what you can and can't do and gauging their expectations is key in avoiding bad situations like that.
 
I would have to think that everyone has come across someone like this...as have I. in this case, if she paid for the service from the dealership, I would have directed her back to the dealership to have it corrected (makes perfect sense that if you pay for something and are not happy with it, you take it back until they make good on it) , however, there is a slight twist to this story. It is important to keep in mind that no matter what you do or how good you are, there are just some people you are never going to be able to please.
 
Wow, I am not a detailer, but as a consumer, I rely heavily on Yelp reviews and other reviews that are listed on Google. It's always unfortunate that your reputation to new potential customers can be ruined with a single review from a bad customer.



The good news is that as long as the bad review appears to be a fluke, I can often overlook it!
 
Obviously, those of you who are professional detailers have learned the "art" of customer relations and how to resolve them OR how to avoid them in the first place.

Your "unhappy" customer horror stories are intriguing to me.



Perhaps a bit off-topic on this issue is the "bad mouthing" that these customers can do, and it's no longer limited to conversations at their local bar or workplace. Social networks and Internet forums allow anyone to give their impressions, right or wrong, about someone or their business to the entire world-wide web with total anonymity and without the fear of repercussion to their personal reputation. This is an extremely disturbing trend in our society today.



This leads to another question about determining who is a potential "bad customer". They can do a "background" check (Internet search) on you and your business, but who has time to do one on a customer who shows up at your detailing shop?? Is it worthwhile to invest in, say, something like a credit score check on someone?? Probably not. I know I've seen list on the cash register of local small businesses in my area of people who they will not accept checks or credit cards from, OR they simply will not allow them to make purchases of any type because of past "problems". I sometimes wonder who collects this information and generates these list other that banks and credit bureaus.



That being said, a far better tip-off might be the car's condition when they drive into your shop. I know it may be pre-judging someone before I actually know them, but many of you have aready stated that sometimes it is best just to say "No" and avoid the hassles it can lead to.
 
i had a customer like this, and he was supposed to be a friend of mine. i hooked him up on a detail for $120 including interior shampoo. he was pissed because i didnt perform a full paint correction. i told him exactly what he was gunna get for the $120 and he agreed. next thing you know i get calls from people sayin that he is bad mouthing me to everyone he talks to. he was telling people that im a hack detailer and that im a theif. i got pretty upset, but i just let it go.
 
Lonnie said:
Obviously, those of you who are professional detailers have learned the "art" of customer relations and how to resolve them OR how to avoid them in the first place.

Your "unhappy" customer horror stories are intriguing to me.



Perhaps a bit off-topic on this issue is the "bad mouthing" that these customers can do, and it's no longer limited to conversations at their local bar or workplace. Social networks and Internet forums allow anyone to give their impressions, right or wrong, about someone or their business to the entire world-wide web with total anonymity and without the fear of repercussion to their personal reputation. This is an extremely disturbing trend in our society today.



This leads to another question about determining who is a potential "bad customer". They can do a "background" check (Internet search) on you and your business, but who has time to do one on a customer who shows up at your detailing shop?? Is it worthwhile to invest in, say, something like a credit score check on someone?? Probably not. I know I've seen list on the cash register of local small businesses in my area of people who they will not accept checks or credit cards from, OR they simply will not allow them to make purchases of any type because of past "problems". I sometimes wonder who collects this information and generates these list other that banks and credit bureaus.



That being said, a far better tip-off might be the car's condition when they drive into your shop. I know it may be pre-judging someone before I actually know them, but many of you have aready stated that sometimes it is best just to say "No" and avoid the hassles it can lead to.
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Those register lists are simply made in-store to avoid customers that have burned them before. They're not paying a credit agency for that.



You can't legally check credit scores of potential customers for a number of reasons. Besides the legal reasons, finding out someone's credit score isn't going to indicate how picky they are about their car.
 
LS1-MEX said:
i had a customer like this, and he was supposed to be a friend of mine. i hooked him up on a detail for $120 including interior shampoo. he was pissed because i didnt perform a full paint correction. i told him exactly what he was gunna get for the $120 and he agreed. next thing you know i get calls from people sayin that he is bad mouthing me to everyone he talks to. he was telling people that im a hack detailer and that im a theif. i got pretty upset, but i just let it go.
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Ummmmmmm, is this person still your friend ?
 
I nip these things in the bud before I even start. When someone comes to me for any job I always explain to them, especially about paint correction, that there are some things that just can't be corrected (deep scratches, faded leather, stains in the carpets, etc.). This way, when it comes to the end and they see the car in tip-top shape with perhaps slight remnants of a deeper scratch or a ghost of "that stain" is still there, they don't say a thing because I've already given them the "detailing disclaimer". With customers that come to me to correct someone else's work, I always establish with them in the beginning what it is that they weren't happy with and how they expected it to be. By doing this, I can tell them almost straight away or within a few minutes of working on a test area if their expectations can be met or if that's as good as it's going to get. If you do this with every customer, your "happy rate" will stay at its peak because in the end they will know that you've done your best.
 
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