Would you believe me if I said plumbing and blind dates have something in common? Hear me out.
You mark your calendar for the big date. You spend time buying a new outfit (plumbing supplies) and mentally preparing for the date (the job). You arrive on time, if not a little early, but your date isn’t there yet. You find yourself watching the clock and checking your phone for an update, but you don’t hear from them. You finally decide to call them for an excuse or explanation, but they don’t pick up the phone.
Being stood up by a blind date is not a pleasant experience and messes with your entire day and mood.
Customers don’t do this all the time, but there are certainly times when a customer stands us up. Our plumber will arrive for a job only to discover that no one is home, and they don’t answer our phone calls. We find ourselves scratching our heads and questioning why they didn’t just call and cancel.
If you think we are overly excited when you call to cancel your plumbing service, it’s not that we don’t want your business. We are just extremely grateful that you called to tell us. We never want you to cancel your plumbing service call. Our business and schedule depend on the commitment of our customers and business partners. However, we realize that there are certain times you must re-schedule your plumbing service call.
Follow these 5 tips the next time you need to cancel with your plumber.
- Try to re-schedule first. We understand emergencies happen, children get sick, or your career requires you to travel. However, if your schedule is flexible, you’re always welcome to reschedule for a different day or time.
- Ask a neighbor to be available for a few hours. If you have a friendly neighbor, ask them if they can let our plumber into your home. We have worked with a handful of customers that travel or live in another state. These customers rely on their neighbors or family members to handle plumbing and home issues when they come up. We simply need your neighbor’s name and number so we can contact them when we are heading to your home.
- Call us the moment you need to cancel or reschedule. Oftentimes, our schedule fills up days in advance. Back to the blind date analogy, just let us know you’re not interested so we can quickly move on to someone else who wants to date us (plumbing: use our services). Please don’t wait five minutes until your appointment window begins to cancel your appointment. We’re already on our way to the “date” at that point.
- Be honest and explain why you’re canceling. We would much rather you tell us the truth about why you’re canceling so we can uncover any cancelation trends or discover any area of improvement.
- Buy us chocolates. Just kidding! We don’t need apology chocolates, but we wouldn’t turn them away.
If you promise to follow these tips, we promise to provide our loyal customers with the same level of courtesy and transparency. When our plumbers are running late or pushing the clock, we always call to give our customers a heads up. Most of the time they’re running late because a job is taking longer than expected and they still want to ensure the customer gets quality service.
Have you ever had to cancel a plumbing service call? Feel free to share any additional tips and advice with our readers.