Tractor Tire Tale

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Aug 19, 2010
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Champlain/Hudson Valley
A friend has an old Ford 8N gasoline tractor. The rear tires were new in 1972. They're checked severely and one just went flat.
He called the tractor tire place Wednesday and made an appointment for a week later. He asked for a call the day before they wanted to come.
He extended to them flexibility.
FYI: Two tires, mounting, weighting with modern fluid, removal of old tires and the old calcium weighting came to ~$1,000.
This is done in the field with a mobile tech driving out in an appropriate boom truck.
This is the company "everybody uses" as they are the closest.

Off my friends go for a long weekend visit with the grandchildren a hundred miles away.
The cellphone rang and it's the tire tech in his truck at their house with one tire and no idea of the details listed on the work order.

The tech was reported to have said he was, " ....just in the area".
The tractor was on the far side of a vulnerable leach field and my friend COULD NOT allow the guy to drive his heavy truck over it.
The tech in the truck says he owes the company the $115 per hour cost of transportation back to home base.
No mention was made of the cost of arriving there. A communication gap on their end totally.

My friend said the gal who took the info sounded like she was on the ball so he couldn't guess the source of the foul up.

He called me to vent. That's what friends are for. I listened.
He said he ain't gonna pay these people a dime for today's fiasco. I listened to more; then I took my turn.

I said, "The town they're in is one you go through VERY often. Shame on you for not going there in person from time to time to seek sales etc. and some more shame on you for allowing yourself to be surprised by a flat on a wretched, crispy 49 year old trash tire."

I added that expecting phone calls, "work every time" is a little too detached for reality.
$100 in-person deposit would've likely set scheduling in stone. Who spends $1,000 locally without going there?

Hey, that's what friends are for.
 
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Whoa-they were supposed to bring TWO tires, showed up with only ONE, didn’t call before coming out, tech didn’t know what to do with the one he had?? And they expect the customer to pay for their stupidity? I am a field tech, I work on equipment on location every day- I would be ashamed to even tell the customer he’s even paying a dime for that cluster!
 
Adding-if the customer has a signed proposal (estimate) of the cost, the company may be asking for the next call to be from the customer’s lawyer for breach of contract. What kind of company would even pull a stunt like that?
 
Unless he uses his 8N for actual field plowing, I would skip the fluid (calcium) in those rear tires. You don't need it for mowing. I have it in my rear tires on my 9N and wish I didn't.

It is difficult to follow everything in your "term paper" as far as what you are trying to say..
 
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What I was grousing about was that my pal contributed more than a tad to the loused up situation.

While the tire shop made an odd, sloppy mistake by lamely appearing unannounced with only one tire etc., he took an overly easy route by merely picking up the phone in an age where schedules, manpower and supplies have all been upended.
How completely avoidable and surprised about it he was was a little too much.
 
Yeah, I'm with your friend. I'm a general contractor and deal with deliveries regularly, vendors are supposed to call ahead of time to let us know a truck is on the way. If that truck shows up without a call and there's no one there to unload the driver has two choices, either take the load and come back another day or drop the trailer and pick it up when we tell them to. We do not pay additional delivery fees or lost time fees when they fail to coordinate their deliveries with us. These are loads of anything from a $50 lumber order to a $200,000 equipment delivery, no call, no unload, no pay.

Same goes for maintenance trucks fixing equipment, if they don't coordinate the schedule with us we are not paying them when they show up and can't get to the equipment.
 
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Based on what I could gather from the above, I'd tell this outfit to pound salt and go with another.
 
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