Rot Behind the Boards

Dear friend,

The riddle first, as ever. Your century today, and the difficulty is found on a Tuesday, behind something that had to be opened up.

Two firms find rot behind the boards,
Same job, same day, same hidden cost.
One carries on and bills at the end,
One stops, and telephones at noon.
Same money owed on either job.
Which bill was paid without a word?

Hold your answer. Story time.

The Story

Two firms in the same trade, and the work, all together now, was equally good. Each opened something up on a Tuesday morning and found a further fortnight's work that nobody could have seen from outside.

The first pressed on. He was busy, the customer was at work, and it seemed sensible to get the thing done rather than stand about telephoning. He would explain at the end, when he could show her exactly what had been necessary.

Three weeks later she opened an invoice half as large again as the figure she had agreed to.

Everything on it was honest, and every hour of it had been worked, and none of that mattered in the least. What she experienced was not a fair charge for necessary work. It was the discovery that decisions about her money had been taken in her absence, over three weeks, by somebody who had chosen not to tell her, and once a person has thought that thought they cannot easily be talked out of it.

She paid, slowly, and argued about two items on principle, and never used him again. And the reason she gave to her friends was not that the work was poor, which it was not, but that you never know what it will end up costing with him.

He had taken a piece of ordinary bad luck, which happens in every trade, and converted it into a story about his character.

The second firm stopped, photographed what had been found, and telephoned at noon.

The account was short. Here is what we found and here is why it cannot be left. It adds this much and this many days. Here is what happens if we do the minimum instead, and here is what happens if we leave it entirely, which I would not advise but you may prefer. I need an answer today because the men are standing.

The customer chose the middle option, which cost less than the full remedy, and thanked him, and told two people that year that he had rung her the moment he found something rather than presenting her with it afterwards.

The extra work was the same work. The money was similar. What differed was that one customer was informed while there was still a decision to make, and the other was informed when all that remained was a bill.

The Lesson, Since You've Earned It

A surprise on the final invoice is not a charge, it is a discovery, and people do not forgive discoveries. The money is rarely the offence. The offence is learning, after the fact, that choices about their own money were made without them, and the longer the gap between the finding and the telling, the more it looks like something that was hoped to pass unnoticed rather than something that was found.

So the rule is the same one that governs every other piece of bad news in trade, and it is about speed. Tell them the day you find it, before you do the work, while there is still a decision available to them. A customer offered a choice on Tuesday is a participant. The same customer shown the same figure in three weeks is a victim of it, however carefully the invoice is itemised.

And give them the choices rather than the conclusion, since that is what turns the call from an announcement into a consultation. The full remedy, the minimum, and leaving it, each with its price and its consequence, and your recommendation stated plainly at the end. That way the decision is theirs, which it is, and the eventual figure is one they chose rather than one they received.

Two things make this easier than it sounds. Say at the outset, in the quote, that this sort of thing may be found and that you will stop and ring if it is, so the possibility is established before anybody is invested in a number. And show them what you found, in a photograph, because a person looking at rot is having a different conversation from a person listening to a description of rot.

Then there is the harder discipline, which is to eat the ones that are your own fault. If the extra work arises because you measured wrong or missed something you should have seen, say so and absorb it, and say that you are absorbing it. That sentence buys more than it costs, and its absence is what makes every genuine variation sound like an excuse.

Three questions, and use a job that overran:

1. How long between finding and telling? Count the hours. Anything past the same day has already changed what the conversation is about.
2. Did they get a choice or a total? Look at what you actually offered. Three options with prices is a decision; one figure at the end is a demand.
3. What does your quote say about the unknown? If it says nothing, every surprise will arrive as a broken promise rather than as the thing you warned might happen.

The Answer to the Riddle

Which bill was paid without a word?

The one that had been agreed on a Tuesday at noon. Both firms found the same rot and both charged fairly for dealing with it, and one of them made the decision on the customer's behalf and presented the result three weeks later. He was not dishonest and did not overcharge by a penny. He simply took away her chance to choose, and then handed her the consequence, which is a thing people remember far longer than money.

The verse:

Find it at ten, and ring at noon,
With three ways out and what they cost.
Or say it in the bill next moon,
And find the customer is lost.

Until next time. Go and add one line to your quote about what happens if something is found, and ring the same day the next time it is.

P.S. This is the opposite failing to the one in the while-you're-here letter, and a good many trades manage both at once: they absorb the small extras nobody asked them to absorb, and then surprise the customer with the large one. Price the small ones out loud and telephone about the large ones, and you will find the whole business of variations stops being a source of grief.

Also in the archive: While You're Here, The Parted Seam and Unless I Hear Otherwise.