Electronics > Repair
Charging by the hour is unfair!
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tooki:

--- Quote from: SteveThackery on July 03, 2024, 10:57:34 am ---If you aren't competent enough to find and fix the fault, why should you still get your $200 per hour reward?  Can't you see how wrong that is?  What other business rewards incompetence and failure as generously as competence and success?  That is why it is so wrong to send the customer home with a still-broken appliance and a few hundred bucks less in their wallet.

And one last time: if you aren't smart enough to fix my appliance, why the heck do you expect me to pay you? If you aren't smart enough, your time is worth nothing.  No fix/no fee is a moral imperative.

--- End quote ---
The ability to fix the device is not predicated solely on the technician's competence! Even a highly skilled technician can run into things that cannot be repaired at all, or that cannot be repaired at a cost that makes any sense to do.

And with most electronics these days having no schematics or service manuals, and with more and more of the "secret sauce" tied up in the code of a microcontroller, even the most skilled of technicians will encounter faults they categorically cannot repair. MCUs are a great example: if one of them dies, that's it, the device is toast. Even if you can identify and replace the MCU, the device won't work because your replacement MCU is blank. Without the code, which you don't have, you cannot restore functionality.

What a more experienced (not just skilled) technician will have is a larger bank of experience to identify faults they've seen before, such that they can say "I know this problem, and it can't be fixed for less than the cost of a new device". The experienced people also know where to source obscure parts, and where to look for information resources. All this is why more experienced technicians can command higher rates than novices, even with the same level of training and inherent skill.
SteveThackery:

--- Quote from: tooki on July 03, 2024, 06:35:34 pm ---
I would say you're delusional.

I get it, that from a customer POV, you want a quick, fixed-price transaction. [...]

Having worked as a computer technician, think of it from the technician's point of view: you don't know what's wrong with the thing. It might be simple, or it might be something completely unexpected that takes hours just to diagnose. If you don't charge for diagnostics, then with every repair, you're gambling. You have no idea what the issue is and whether you'll be able to fix it. And the nature of the fault is something you have zero control over!

Would you gamble with YOUR income, based on a factor that's outside of your control? How is that fair to the technician?

Sometimes repairs are complex, and success can only be determined after doing a lot of work. Is it fair for the technician to invest lots of time and parts (which could be expensive) only to discover that it cannot be repaired, meaning that all the parts and labor are donated for free?

Some technicians/companies choose to offer free estimates/diagnostics and/or "no fix, no fee". But what that means is that the cost of those services is baked into a higher price for all the services that do get performed: paying customers are then subsidizing those free services. Is that fair to them? [...]

Imagine if a customer came into a repair shop with one of those things, which they'd never seen before, with the same broken resistor. Is it fair to the technician to spend 6 hours on diagnostics, and then only be able to bill the customer the 10 minutes it takes to open the housing, replace the resistor, clean the board, and close it back up? Plus the one cent for parts? Certainly not. Would a typical customer be willing to pay you to spend 6h to fix it, when that is more than the unit cost new? Likely not. So in practice, you'd take only a quick look at it and declare it unrepairable. [...]

Fixed-price repairs are sometimes offered. But because of the unpredictability, they tend to cost more than the average for that type of repair might cost on a per-hour basis. Or they are moderately priced but come with VERY strict prerequisites. (Ever wonder why Apple won't perform a battery replacement, which they offer as a fixed-price repair, on a phone that has any visible damage whatsoever? It's because you don't know what unexpected problems that damage might cause. For example, and I have had this happen when attempting to do a repair on a device, if the screen bezel is deformed even a tiny bit, then once you get the screen out, you won't be able to get it back in, at the risk of causing the screen to shatter.) [...]

Anyhow, this is just scratching the surface of the topic. There are many ways to price technical services. But one thing I can tell you: consumer tech support and repairs are the worst business. Consumers need support that is ultimately often just as difficult and time-consuming as business stuff, but they aren't willing and/or able to pay for it. This is why e.g. computer tech support services come in exactly two price categories: high-schoolers charging $15-40/h doing it as a hobby, and professionals charging $100-500/h. What doesn't exist is a middle ground. I tried it. What happens is that consumers penny-pinch every minute. Business customers are happy to pay your $200/h. [...]

I kept the business customers only.

--- End quote ---

OK, well that is basically a comprehensive review of all the arguments against my position in this thread. I don't think I need to reiterate any part of my argument - I've done it to death by now.  Nobody has convinced me to drop my "no fix/no fee" position, but the other arguments, about different charging models, are interesting and instructive, and I appreciate the time taken by all the contributors to this thread.

In parting, there is one thing I would respectfully but vigorously beg of you:

If there is any chance that the customer might have to pay for a non-repair (regardless of the reason), please warn them in advance!  That way they can choose whether to take the risk or not.  Surely that is entirely reasonable.
SteveThackery:
By the way, and not really a continuation of the argument... In the world of horology (clock and watch repairs), practitioners are so scarce that anyone, with the most limited skills and knowledge, can set themselves up in the trade.  Their crap work means they rarely get repeat business, but they don't need it. Even if nobody ever comes back, there is enough latent demand out there to keep them in food and beer for years.

Unlike electronics, in horology it is easy to get away with rubbish workmanship. So long as the damn thing ticks, it goes out the door. The customer can't tell if it's a fine job or a bodge.

Thank goodness being an electronics technician is so much more demanding!  The standard of practitioners is vastly higher.
David_AVD:

--- Quote from: SteveThackery on July 03, 2024, 03:52:49 pm ---
--- Quote from: David_AVD on July 03, 2024, 11:48:35 am ---I've had a few instances in the last 30 odd years where I've accepted a repair only to realise that I either didn't know enough to do the job or I could foresee the train wreck it would become due to the combination of customer and item / fault. In those cases I did no work on the item and refunded the upfront fee. Some of them were referred to other repairers with more specialist knowledge in the item concerned.

--- End quote ---

Excellent! Good for you - you did exactly what I'm arguing for: no fix, no fee.

--- End quote ---

No, this was not the "no fix, no fee" you keep talking about. It was a "declined to work on it, refunded fee" situation and a very rare one.

You are also seem convinced that every customer is only interested in the fixed result with no regard for the diagnosis. I have plenty of customers who will ask for me to assess the issues and let them know what I find. They know that diagnosing things costs money. Sometimes that's accompanied by a agreement that if the total repair price is in a certain range then I am ok to proceed without consulting them.
janoc:

--- Quote from: SteveThackery on July 03, 2024, 10:57:34 am ---
And yet again you ignore the point.  I'll have one more go.  If you aren't competent enough to find and fix the fault, why should you still get your $200 per hour reward?  Can't you see how wrong that is?  What other business rewards incompetence and failure as generously as competence and success?  That is why it is so wrong to send the customer home with a still-broken appliance and a few hundred bucks less in their wallet.


--- End quote ---

And who are you to judge my competence? You have agreed to my contractual conditions beforehand, when I took your device for repair. If you don't like the conditions of my contract you are free to go elsewhere with your gadget. Or to repair it yourself. You are obviously sufficiently competent yourself since you are able to judge the competence of the repair shop merely based on that they are being honest with you.

That I can't fix something in the first 2 hours and tell you that no, this can't be fixed in two hours because I have discovered the problem is more serious, how is that incompetence?

If there is such contract, that means that it is either very likely it will be not worth fixing the device - and in that case I am actually saving you money.  Or that the problem could be much more expensive to fix than originally estimated because of  problems that couldn't be seen before actually opening it and spending time diagnosing it. Then I call you and it is your choice to either say OK, continue - or you pay me only for the spent time and get your gizmo back.

Some people have no fix no fee policy, some don't - go to any car mechanic and see whether they will spend 2-3 hours working on your car for free if the problem can't be fixed in two hours because e.g. it turns out the engine is shot after they took it apart. Good luck!
 
Or do you think you could determine what needs to be fixed by looking at the box of the broken device your client brings you?


--- Quote from: SteveThackery on July 03, 2024, 10:57:34 am ---A light-hearted analogy would be to walk into a shop and ask for a can of tomato soup.  The proprietor says "I'm sorry, we're out of stock.  That'll be $1.20 please."

--- End quote ---

Sorry mate, but this argument is complete bollocks. Unlike that proprietor that can see whether the soup is on the shelf outright, I don't have Superman's x-ray vision to determine what's the fault is by merely looking at the unopened case and without doing any diagnostics. Which takes time, effort and in some cases also consumables (and also the overheads for the shop). That you don't understand that the time isn't free and I am not able to work on another job while I am busy with your gadget doesn't change anything on that.


--- Quote from: SteveThackery on July 03, 2024, 10:57:34 am ---It seems like you cannot put yourself in the customer's shoes, even for a moment.  But try, please. 

And one last time: if you aren't smart enough to fix my appliance, why the heck do you expect me to pay you? If you aren't smart enough, your time is worth nothing.  No fix/no fee is a moral imperative.

--- End quote ---

If you are so smart as to determine that the repairman is incompetent because they can't fix your device by merely looking at it then you will save a lot of money - and me trouble because I would never accept your business. Simply not worth the trouble. You can preach about moral imperatives only once you are paying my bills. Not before.

And with that I am done here because it is obviously a complete waste of time trying to explain you something this elementary.
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