Why C.O.D. Is Bad by Ken Secor - MasterPlumbers.com PlumbViews

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If travel time is billable, how does one bill for time as yet unknown? (the return leg back to the shop - or onto the next call) One can't - is the answer - unless of course, guessing is good enough.

My techs rarely know the cost of a Honeywell R832 relay. They definitely do not know the cost of a 1/7 hp oil burner motor or a 4" tridicator. A Sundstrand fuel unit can run from $38.00 at the supply house to $350 for a 100 GPH model - and all sorts of prices in between. There isn't a book large enough to carry all the controls we typically use. Huge pricing variations occur between vendors for identical parts. Convenience frequently overrides pure price shopping in these situations. Then too, the markup on a four-inch General 1A oil filter element will be much different than a $600 dollar Tekmar controller - or will it? Maybe we could have the tech call the office and tie up yet another person to answer a pricing question? This makes no sense whatsoever. Let techs be techs and do their job efficiently. Let the billing folks do billing. Let the tech be the tech. It's called the K.I.S.S. method. It works!

I pay my tech for being just that. I don't pay him to be a billing clerk. The office and its resources is where billing should occur, not in the cab of the truck when three "no heat" calls are backed up from a few hours ago.

A typewritten professional invoice/bill looks and reads easily. My tech's diagnostic skills and work ethic is everything. Their handwriting should not be an issue; at least not for the customer. My guys are repairmen, not English majors. I capitalize on their strengths - not their faults.

The abbreviated codes and symbols we use internally for tech diagnostics, labor and materials are all we need - to write the consummate invoice and record all the essential data in my accounting system. We write it once - and only once. In that effort we capture sales data, tax data, materials costs, profit margins, work hours, payroll data and every possible accounting nuance required by all agencies and our accountant. Duplicating that labor is wasteful and inefficient - not to mention a mess.

I do not want my techs wrestling with taxable collection issues and our state's wildly complicated taxable/non-taxable structure. I want them to know about "pumping away," "flame rectification", and "clocking a gas meter"; they don't need to be interpreting sales tax law in the field - subjecting us (and the client) to improper tax collection issues, which burdening the tech with yet another task.

Roughly 60% of our accounts are non-residential, and not going to even have access to a check book anyway.

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Ken Secor - [Intro] | [Articles] | [Email]

The views expressed in this article are those of the individual author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the management or staff of MasterPlumbers.com

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