atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums Wiring - Telecom Carriers - Trunks & Services Cabling Telephones Systems Wiring It never ends

Damn - I remember Arcnet! Wasn't it RG62A/U coax? 93 ohms, same as IBM 327X terminals but bus topology.

Arthur what you did for them was not give them a proposal. This was consulting work. If it was a proposal you would have given it prior to the work being done. I hope you charged them for your consulting.

Mike

Yep ARCNET, still got a roll of 1000ft, i got caught with.
No application these days unless i could use a balun for some use.

Did you charge them?

I had the exact same situation some years back with a client that ran a network of community shelters and non-profit housing. We had a pretty good relationship with this client, but they were a charity, and were under a lot of pressure to save money where they could.

During a reno at one of their properties, the EC was able to undercut our quote significantly. We warned them about this, but they had to watch the bottom line. We got a compromise with them though, that we would spec what was to be installed, sparkie would pull the cable, we'd inspect before the drywall went up, and then we would terminate and test.

Of course, through the telephone game (no pun intended) from us -> GC -> EC, "1 4pr Cat3 and 1 4pr Cat5e with pull string in 1" conduit" got translated into "1 phone and 1 internet", which then got translated into "1 Cat5 and 1 RG6, no conduit, stapled to the studs".

Questioned about this, sparkie thought he was doing us a favour, since "cable internet is faster, isn't it?"

Oh, did I mention that they forgot to call us before the drywallers came in?

Fortunately, the client learned from this lesson, and held the GC to our original specs. They had sparkie rip out all of his cabling and install just the conduit, then backcharged him for my T&M to do it right. Oh, and he got the bill for re-doing the drywall, too.

I really liked that client.

Needless to say, the next time they reno'd a property, we got called first for all the LV.

I know Skip, and a lot of what I do is cleaning up other people's work. It still would be nice to call us to do it right the first time.

Are you saying that I'm just supposed to turn the other cheek? I've run out of cheeks.

I'd be happy to straighten out the mess, but they are already my customer (I thought) and to straighten it out is going to take more money than they originally thought would be enough to do the whole job.

I can't go around educating and correcting forever. Just once, I'd like to be called first.

interesting choice of words , Its business . they should have called you but they chose to try to save some ,money and went elsewhere. lesson learned ...or not

you give them a quote (they may get others ) and they call you or they call someone else. that's how business works

why take it so personally and get wrapped up in it ?

a customer isn't a wife or SO , they are only "your customer " until the next time they need something ...


my response was to the concept of

"Call me first, or don't call me at all.""

for me its

"call whomever you like first , but call me last "

I like that Skip, but I'd add "to have it done right".

"You've called the rest, now call the best!"