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Furler Installed - Got Hosed by the Rigger!!!

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GaryB
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
4303 Posts

Initially Posted - 05/23/2011 : 18:42:27

Well,

I got my new furler installed today. The written quote was for 4 hrs labor at $90.00/hr. That was an estimate and would be invoiced for actual time. That seemed a little high but not to bad.

The guys showed up on time between 8:15 - 8:30. I had the mast down and the headstay off so it wasn't long before they headed back to the shop to make the new headstay. After 20-30 minutes one of them shows back up to pickup the toggle they left on the dock. After another 20-30 minutes they were both back with the new headstay. Not long after that they discovered I didn't have a toggle at the top of the mast so one of them headed back to the shop to find a toggle. I asked the one that stayed behind if there was something we could be doing and he said no not really because they had to make sure the headstay would still work due to them not taking into account for the toggle. The other guy shows up 20-30 minutes later with a new toggle. Eventually they got finished building the furler and we got it installed and the mast back up.

After they were done and we were discussing the charges I asked the guy how many hours he had in it. It was 11:30am and he said he had 3 hours in it and I said at $90/hr? He said yes, times two since there were two guys. He said it would actually be 6 hours at $90/hr but he would knock off an hour to "keep it reasonable".

I said, that's not what I was quoted I was quoted $90/hr. Nothing was mentioned about doubling that for two people.

When I stopped by their office last Monday I even confirmed with the owner that the labor rate was $90.00/hr. Nothing was ever mentioned about the labor rate being doubled for 2 people. All that was mentoned is the $90/hr and he (the owner) said that he quoted it a little high in case they ran into something unusual.

Not wanting to get in an argument at the time with the guy in the field (not the guy that quoted me, supposedly) I thought I would wait until they actually sent the invoice.

I got the invoice a few minutes ago via email. They charged me for 5 hours labor @ $90.00/hr. Total price with new headstay, labor, and tax --- $686.00 dollars!!!!

That's to install a furler I paid a little over $1200.00 for back in October.

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GaryB
Andiamo
'89 SR/WK #5862
Kemah,TX

Edited by - on

Prospector
Master Marine Consultant

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Canada
3159 Posts

Response Posted - 05/23/2011 : 18:50:16

Did you learn how to install it yourself? Then make sure no one else in your marina ever has to call them. You become a hero while making them pay for taking advantage of you.

Edited by - on

GaryB
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
4303 Posts

Response Posted - 05/23/2011 : 19:20:55

Yeah, I could have installed it myself. Would have a taken me a lot longer but could have easily been done in a day.

My biggest concern was getting the new wire swaged. I thought they had to put the eye on the top of the wire then feed the wire down through the extrusions then swage the lower fitting all while at the shop. For some reason, in my mind I was thinking the lower fitting was just a stud with a toggle. I forgot you need a turnbuckle so you can adjust the headstay. And Duh, obviously they couldn't put all of the extrusions together at the shop and transport it to the boat. I don't know what I was thinking!

If I had read the instructions a little closer I would have done it myself. It wasn't difficult.

No business that I know of quotes an hourly labor rate and then multiplies it by the number of people they put on the job. Especially when it's never mentioned anywhere on the quote or at anytime during discussing having the work done. If it takes one or 5 people the labor rate is the labor rate per hour.

I've left a message for the owner so we can discuss the invoice.

Edited by - GaryB on 05/23/2011 19:41:16

Stinkpotter
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Djibouti
9080 Posts

Response Posted - 05/23/2011 : 19:40:08

How much of that job required two people? Certainly not the part where one was driving around town and the other was sitting around waiting for him... What else? If one guy can do a job, and the quote was for one guy doing the job, sending two and multiplying the bill is good material for your local Better Business Bureau and a posting on your marina's bulletin board. My rigger did it (installing new standing rigging which required re-installing the furler) by himself. If somebody helped him at any point (I wasn't aware of it), that was part of his rate. He did jobs like that, alone, on boats twice my size. But he was a well-known pro.

Edited by - Stinkpotter on 05/23/2011 19:43:12

GaryB
Master Marine Consultant

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Response Posted - 05/23/2011 : 19:57:14

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Stinkpotter
 How much of that job required two people? Certainly not the part where one was driving around town and the other was sitting around waiting for him... What else? If one guy can do a job, and the quote was for one guy doing the job, sending two and multiplying the bill is good material for your local Better Business Bureau and a posting on your marina's bulletin board. My rigger did it (installing new standing rigging which required re-installing the furler) by himself. If somebody helped him at any point (I wasn't aware of it), that was part of his rate. He did jobs like that, alone, on boats twice my size.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
This is a good point. I don't remember it ever being discussed that they were going to be sending two people and it for sure was never mentioned they would be charging effectively $180/hr.

I even told the owner last week I would be at the boat to help out if needed!

The only part that required two people as far as I'm concerned is actually attaching the furler and raising the mast. I helped them just to make it go faster.

I could have easily done everything else the helper was doing. I offered a couple of times to go get the parts they needed but was told it wasn't necessary.

I even had the mast down and the head-stay off when they got there. If I'd known this was going to go down like this I would have made them climb the freakin mast!

As I've mentioned before I got quotes from $150 up to this guys original quote of a little over $500 with a new head-stay. I know a couple of the other guys were going to be doing the job by themselves. That's probably why it never crossed my mind how many people this guy was going to send. And the fact they've been in business for 20+ years. I just never thought this would go down like this.

So much for my good judge of people!

Edited by - GaryB on 05/23/2011 20:06:39

Joe Diver
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Response Posted - 05/23/2011 : 21:34:29

Hopefully you can work something out with the owner. I'd be tempted to dispute it, especially if I had something in writing...tough call...might be best just to pay it and then trash them around the marina. Tell the truth of course, but in this case the truth is gonna hurt them.

Edited by - on

OLarryR
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 03:22:13

Gary,

Sorry about your experience but your posting serves as a good Heads Up for the rest of us if seeking similar services to be aware of scrutinizing the estimate.

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GaryB
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 03:35:11

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Joe Diver
 Hopefully you can work something out with the owner. I'd be tempted to dispute it, especially if I had something in writing...tough call...might be best just to pay it and then trash them around the marina. Tell the truth of course, but in this case the truth is gonna hurt them.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
I plan to have a calm conversation with the owner (if I can get him to call me back)and his response will answer all of the questions.

If we don't get it resolved I will pay him the full amount invoiced and lick my wounds.

Edited by - on

NautiC25
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USA
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 05:53:53

You stated you got the quote in writing. That's all you need IMO. And I certainly wouldn't pay for someone to stand around. I wouldn't pay it.

Edited by - on

John Russell
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 06:21:04

Call the Better Business Bureau before writing the check. I hope you haven't written it yet. Better yet, contact your state's Attorney General's office. I imagine they have a department that could advise you. It is certainly misleading, if not outright fraud, to quote a "cost per hour" and then charge "cost per hour per person".

BTW, was this the busy guy or the sloppy guy?

Edited by - on

DaveR
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 06:26:42

I wouldn't pay it either. If there was a change in plan and they thought they'd need 2 people and to double your rate you should have been informed prior to work being done. That's a good chunk of cash, I'd threaten to tell everyone I know, post it at the Marina and court as a last resort.

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Stinkpotter
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Djibouti
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 06:46:26

One more question: Were both guys qualified riggers, or was one guy a "helper" who was perhaps learning the profession or just providing a cheap pair of hands? If the former bills at $90/hr., the latter might be billable at $45 (if you've been told about him in advance) and probably gets paid only about a third of that. And it's a bit sleazy to charge time for both guys when one is getting parts they didn't have while the other is sitting around waiting. A "reasonable" bill might be (3 x $90) + (2 x $45) = $360 for labor. Coincidentally, that equals their written quote (4 x $90 = $360).

Edited by - on

piseas
Former Treasurer

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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 06:54:37

Gary, I would not pay for 2! I got a quote for my bimini and 2 guys showed up to install it. I got charged what I was quoted. NOT for 2 guys. I would only pay hourly rate for 1. Ask yourself, what would you pay if they sent out 5 guys!

Call back the other quotes you got or call other riggers out of your area and ask them if rate was for 1 guy or 2. Then make your decision. I can bet rate is for 1 guy. Good luck.
But stick to your guns.
Steve A

Edited by - piseas on 05/24/2011 07:41:45

Champipple
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 07:12:18

Every rigger I've seen brings the trailer with all the spares and swaging gear on site. Even though not quoted specifically, paying labor hours for two people if in fact they did the work could be argued. The fact that it wasn't quoted as per man hour or that you were billed for them being unprepared is a shady practice at best. We are looking into a racing roller furler for next year, including installation, recutting old sails, adding sunbrella cover, and changing all luffs from hanks to tape. All riggers/lofts we are dealing with have given us cafeteria style flat rates. Price for the hardware, price for the installation and a price for the sails. Plus a discount if we get all three.

Edited by - on

pfduffy
Captain

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USA
317 Posts

Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 07:52:08

I paid my sailmaker $350 to install a CDI furler which included hardware, line and cleats to lead the furling line back to the cockpit. He also installed my new sails and mainsail cover. It should be noted that he had to drive an hour each way to the boat as well and coordinate an insurance cert with the marina manager. He did this work alone - I was not even at the boat.

I will stipulate to the fact that installing a CDI furler is probably simpler and there was no requirement to replace the forestay as I had already replaced that this spring.

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John Russell
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 11:17:34

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by GaryB

. . . The guy I'm using strives to get the job done right the first time . . . if I have a problem he wants to hear from me, not one of my dock mates . . . <hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">This guy?

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pastmember
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 11:57:32

We have no marina/rigger services here, the more I hear about using "professionals" the gladder I am that we all have to do our own work.

Could you get several bids for the installation, (could be bids from anywhere), and then discuss the invoice with some "ammunition"?

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DaveR
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 17:24:29

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"> The written quote was for 4 hrs labor at $90.00/hr. <hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Here's the bottom line Gary. Do not pay this. The man quoted you a price and he's bound to it. I think they can get away with a 10% hike but that's all.

Edited by - on

calden
Navigator

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USA
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 18:10:12

Gary:
This is really a mystery to me. Either this rigger does this as a standard policy which seems unlikely because no biz does this, or they are trying to leverage a normal fee into double the amount as a scam. THAT seems unlikely because it is so blatantly usurious.

I have NEVER heard of a per-hour quote by a business being switched to a per-hour-per-man quote. If a biz stipulates an hourly rate, that is what is normally paid for the service. I have never, ever heard of this. I would call the owner and ask if this is the norm for them. If he says yes, tell him that you have never heard of a quote stated like that when doing business with a tradesman, were never told that it would be per-man when they arrived, and you would only pay for the time they were there based on the quoted rate. If he does not want to go this way, call the Better Business Bureau and see if they can intervene. Bottom line, I would pay nothing until it is resolved to your satisfaction. They should charge for the time they were there, maybe rounding upward to the nearest quarter hour at the most.

Let us know....

Carlos

Edited by - on

GaryB
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 20:13:19

Thanks everyone for your responses! I literally thought of all of these during the night last night as I laid awake getting madder and madder.

The guy called me bright and early at 7:20 this morning and I calmly explained the way things went down yesterday. I explained that his quote was listed as $90/hr period with no mention of doubling that for sending two people. I reminded him that when I came by his office a week ago I even questioned him on it and he confirmed $90/hr, again with no mention of doubling for additional people. I explained that in my business and in all others that I had EVER been involved in doing business with that no one charged per hour times the number of people sent to do the job. I also explained that nothing was ever mentioned about sending two people to do the job. His response to the last statement was he did it to speed up the job.

Now for his side!

After listening quietly, he calmly stated he should probably change the way he quotes customers to make it more clear. I wanted say, but didn't, "You've been in business for 20+ years and this is just now becoming an issue?" I'll be honest, I didn't really buy this line.

He also reminded me that they hadn't expected to help me re-step the mast. Since I had all the paperwork in front of me I checked out the quote and sure enough it stated the owner was to un-step and re-step the mast.

This is totally my fault! I didn't read the whole sentence, I only saw the part that said owner would un-step the mast. No excuses from me. I just flat didn't read the whole sentence and that's My Bad!!!

After stating my side and he stating his, he said he would drop the rate to a total of 4 hrs to match the original quote because of the misunderstanding on doubling the rate and he wanted me to be a happy customer.

I'm OK with the $360.00 for the labor portion. It's a little higher than most of the quotes by around $60.00 but they did do a good job, they showed up on time, and they did help me re-step the mast. They also tuned it for me! This was also the original quote.

I was so mad yesterday when I first posted this that I forgot to mention that while we waited for the other guy to show up with the parts I did get the guy to inspect my rigging from top to bottom and give me some good pointers on how to maintain the furler. A small part of me still thinks they should have knocked another hour off and billed for actual time on the job times one, but for the above "extras" I got I'm OK with the additional hour.

There were several other things said back and forth that would address some of your statements above but for the sake of keeping this somewhat short I won't discuss them here because they didn't change the outcome.

All in all it went very smoothly without any arguing. No one raised their voices and he conceded quickly on reducing the rate by an hour. Total conversation was probably less than 5 minutes and both sides (I think) left feeling good about the situation.

Edited by - GaryB on 05/24/2011 20:17:59

calden
Navigator

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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 22:13:43

Gary-

You did good. Sounds like a calm discussion got some resolution. He showed his good business sense in wanting you to be a happy customer.

I am still at a loss as to why he didn't understand that a per hour quote means only that, not multiplied by the number of workers, in the majority of business transactions.

Carlos

Edited by - on

Joe Diver
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Response Posted - 05/24/2011 : 22:16:55

Glad you got that worked out!

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redeye
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Response Posted - 05/25/2011 : 04:22:28

<< got my new furler installed today >>

Wow.. That's great. We had one on a Catalina 30 and it was sweet... just pull the little line and out it comes, pull another and it just rolls up. I've heard they are a bit of trouble to get rigged up but once you get over that they work great.

Sweet... You are a lucky man..

Edited by - on

dmpilc
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Response Posted - 05/25/2011 : 06:34:44

Glad the issues were resolved amicably, and you got the nmast re-stepped, and tuned, which was not in the original quote. That had to be worth the extra hour charge by itself.

Edited by - dmpilc on 05/25/2011 06:37:40

GaryB
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Response Posted - 05/25/2011 : 09:13:10

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by calden
 Gary-

You did good. Sounds like a calm discussion got some resolution. He showed his good business sense in wanting you to be a happy customer.

I am still at a loss as to why he didn't understand that a per hour quote means only that, not multiplied by the number of workers, in the majority of business transactions.

Carlos
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

That makes two of us!

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GaryB
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Response Posted - 05/25/2011 : 09:14:53

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by dmpilc
 Glad the issues were resolved amicably, and you got the nmast re-stepped, and tuned, which was not in the original quote. That had to be worth the extra hour charge by itself.

<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
Definitely! That's why I didn't push the subject. I thought it was fair the way it worked out.

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