cleaned a house recently underpriced and a 40 min round trip to do ontop of the job and the story goes like this ..
cleaned the house wfp i was putting the hose and trolly away when the lady comes out
her "i'll pay you now before you do the porch"
me "ive finished"
her "no you hav'nt the porch isnt wet"
me "no they have dried already"
her "oh well i dont think you have done them"
i could see her looking at a dried on mark which i proved was on the inside
me "thats on the inside and here look there are a few water spots still on the glass - here and here and here"
her "ok dont keep on at me"
me "sorry but im just pointing out i have cleaned them"
her "DO YOU WANT TO COME BACK OR NOT"?
and bretheren your answer would be?
How would you have broached the situation if the job was well paid and did not involve so much travel? Did the woman actually say..."i dont think you have done them?" or "i didn't think you'd done them?"
Actually to be dead honest with you, it just sounds like you had/have a cob on because it was a long hike for an underpriced job.
We've all been there, underpriced, done favours etc etc and 9 times out of 10 it will be for people who inhindsight, aren't the best custies to have, but that is our fault not the custies.
In all honesty if someone had been doing some work for me and I offered to pay before what I thought was completion of the job and I got a 2 word answer "i've finished", i wouldn't be particularly impressed either! If that really is the way the conversation went, I can quite understand that she may have felt uneasy about the service, therefore why she questioned if you wanted to return or not.
I think we can all jump too quickly, when someone questions us and our work.
If the custie is winding us up then equally we could have wound them up.
At the end of the day, we are being invited to provide a service to what is more often than not complete strangers. They have put their trust in us and we have to earn that, as do they with us.
In this instance I would have said, thanks for the payment. I have done the outsides of the porch area, but noticed whilst I was doing them you have some marks on the inside, did you want the insides cleaned next time, I could do it for............. therefore re-couping some of your underpricing
