We have all heard the phrase, “The customer is always right.”
In customer service, especially in the hospitality and service industries, that phrase has been a steadfast cornerstone of repeat customers, effective word-of-mouth marketing and glowing Yelp reviews or the like. Even if, as those who work in these industries or in customer service may fully know, in a particular situation a customer may be wrong, it doesn’t matter. The customer is always right.
However, sometimes a customer or a potential client is not only wrong, he or she is simply not living on the same planet as the rest of us. It’s because of this some businesses shouldn’t be afraid to “fire” a client.
The most recent example I came across having to fire a client was a few weeks ago in Frisco, Colorado, near Breckenridge. I’ve worked in roofing sales for over a decade and the company who employs me presently has three satellite office locations in the mountains near ski resort towns. So on occasion, I’ll be asked to drive up to the mountains and perform a roof inspection.
On this particular trip, I was asked to answer a call for inspecting a leak on a home in Frisco, a split-level rancher with a standing-seam metal roof. After driving almost two hours, with traffic, from our Denver office, I arrived at the property and knocked on the door.
After a few barks from his dogs in the backyard, the homeowner answered the door. He was a short man who reminded me of musician Paul Simon, which I’ll call him for the sake of the story. Paul was very polite and invited me into his home to show me where the roof leak had been located from the interior.
I took two steps into the home and immediately I had a bad feeling about my visit. As I walked into the living room, sitting on the sofa was Paul’s wife whom I will call Greta. Greta appeared to be in her late 60’s, as did Paul, and was watching television.
However, Greta was wearing only a brassiere and panties. At first, I was embarrassed for her, thinking maybe I showed up at the wrong time. Maybe they weren’t prepared for me and she wasn’t “decent” as my mother used to say. I asked Paul if I should come back another time, and Paul said as nonchalant as could be that everything was fine.
Since Paul was so relaxed about the situation, I then had the thought the home’s air conditioning may be out and that was her way of trying to stay cool. Greta proceeded to tell me where the leak was coming in through the ceiling, but before she could finish her sentence, Paul became angered and verbally assaulted Greta, suggesting she “stay out of his business.”
Now embarrassment had quickly turned to discomfort for me. Paul soon led me to an upstairs bathroom and showed me where the leak was coming from an exhaust fan in the ceiling. Now knowing where to begin looking once I got atop the dwelling, I told Paul I would be about 20 minutes on the roof and would find him when I came back down to let him know what I discovered and a possible solution.
When I came back down stairs from the bathroom and made an exiting pass through the living room, Greta was no longer alone on the sofa as we left her. Now, beside her was another man, whom I will call John. John was a much younger man in his 30s with hair in dreadlocks and wearing a poncho-style sweater. John now sat beside Greta, hip to hip, with his arm around her. Greta was resting her hand on John’s inner thigh.
By this point, I thought I must be reading the situation inaccurately. I now was confused about who Greta’s husband was and what role Paul even had there. For a moment, I thought maybe Paul owned the property but Greta and John lived there as his tenants.
As I unloaded and set up my ladder, climbed on the roof and searched for the source of their leak, I kept assessing the odd setting I walked through inside the home and laughed to myself for even getting nervous. Paul was obviously the landlord who met me for the inspection and was also looking into the broken central air system. But wait, if the air conditioning was broken, why was John wearing a wool poncho?
I located the source of the leak and returned to the front door to inform Paul of his repair options. Once again, Paul had me enter the home, which in hindsight I wish I stayed on the front stoop. Upon entering the living room once again, John and Greta had gone from cuddle-sitting on the sofa to laying horizontally, he on top of her, John’s poncho now on the floor, in the middle of an impromptu make out session. I call it impromptu, because if it wasn’t then it means it was planned for either my or Paul’s benefit. If I had to describe the level of their necking, I would say it was easily Defcon 2.
I was so uncomfortable standing there, I couldn’t communicate my repair solutions to Paul. I kept getting tripped up on my words. My only thought was to get out and get out at that very moment. Clearly I had stepped into some sort of lifestyle thing where no one had a single filter for professional or at least polite society.
And none of it seemed to affect Paul. Landlord or husband, his lack of acknowledgement of what was happening on the sofa five feet from us completely made things worse for me. Having seen plenty of scary movies, images of me ending up in their basement in my underwear chained to a leaking water pipe began to flash in my head.
I gave up. I simply told Paul I would be in touch, turned on my heel and barreled out of the home. I got in my truck and put the three of them in my rear view mirror; Paul, Greta and her lead singer from Counting Crows side hustle.
I informed our office of what had happened and that I wasn’t comfortable going back to the property, nor was I comfortable with sending any of our repair technicians to it as well. It was agreed by those of us in management that we were going to have to “fire” Paul as a potential client.
Our office manager called him the next day and told him we would not be able to help him with the repair and apologized. However, Paul would not accept this given what information I was able to communicate during my visit. I eventually had to call Paul myself and told him specifically and honestly we were not returning to the property because of their lack of professional courtesy.
I understand this is a pretty extreme example of “firing” a prospective client, but my point is, sometimes it has to be done. At the very least, I feel the age-old phase of “The customer is always right” should be modified to be something along the lines of “The customer is always right…unless they are half-naked and frightening the hell out of you.”