Customer dis-service

Ken C.

... for an oil-fired hot water boiler. The homeowner said she frequently had to hit the reset button on the primary control to get the burner going again. The boiler was only five years old, but three years had passed since its last service. Of course, the boiler was sooted up (including the cad cell eye, the cause of the reset problem). It's bad enough the homeowner neglected the boiler, but the company that had last serviced it used the wrong nozzle. The flame was dirty and the boiler was backdrafting. The kicker is, the previous company never did a combustion test on the boiler, because we had to drill a test hole in the smoke pipe. We couldn't believe that a professional oil company would consider a boiler serviced without doing a combustion test.

Robert O'Connor_7

Oil.....

They did make more than a few $$ on selling that oil though...Robert O'Connor/NJ

Leo

Why do you say they were professional? I work for a small to medium size oil company. We pick up a lot of customers from the local large company, it's like they play numbers and don't care if some drop off. Their work is some of the least professional that we see.

Leo

Ken C.

Wrong term

I guess instead of calling the other company "professional," I should have written "well-known locally."

Firedragon_4

If there's one thing I've learned is don't blame a

company (ANY) for bad employees. Employers pay people to do their jobs and trust them to do it, guess that may be stupid on their part. If the customer had called higher up a lot of people might have learned a thing or two.

Ranger

Not 4 nuthin' but this is why I dislike oil...

...ya gotta understand I started out with f/o (In the military)I bathed in the stuff for christ sake (not literally).Anyway,I was working for a pretty prominent contractor from Monmouth County at the time.We picked up
a contract with approx.400 oil fired pieces of equipment at all of there locations.I promptly started the cleanings on August 1st.Well much to my dismay the last outfit (more like the last 10 outfits) did nothing more than replace the filter and nozzel (correct or not) and move on.Well,when the cleanings started taking four hours each (or more,each one was now packed with what was now charcoal) I got called into the owners office.I explained myself and the situation.Unfortunatly for me we had two different opinions as to how to remedy this situation (I was told to continue to do n-o-t the right thing,was he afraid of makeing money?!)ah,well..we went toe to toe.I would have bailed right there and then but being young,married and my wife carring child number two I bit my lip.WHAT A MISERABLE FALL that year.The good news was I ultimately got my way and did the right thing a-n-d only about half were pin boilers.Two years later I left to work for another company and guess what company got the the contract that year?!But now everything was straitened up and squared away so there were no worries.I s-t-i-l-l see oil company's advertising $39.95 cleanings...IMPOSSIBLE!(unless you sell oil I guess....)Not to say similar things don't go on on the gas side.It's just a shame to see it out there.Unfortunately we all have I guess.

Joe_51

Service contracts

I've seen where a company bids a service contract so low that when it is time to do the scheduled maintanance there isn't any time to do a job properly and still make a profit. The employees are pressured to do the job in "x" amount of time. Combined with the fact that the employees are nothing more than warm bodies with a couple of training classes under there belts makes for a customer getting poor service.What I hate is going in behind these guys and explaining to the customer why I/we have to do this or that to get him "up to par". This senerio applies not just to the heating trade.......

Ken_8

And...

If you ever read the "fine" print in these so-called contracts, little or nothing of substance is covered.

But to many oil companies, the service contract is a "loss leader" to keep the accounts they already have - and becomes a sales tool to get even more. The purpose?

To sell oil at 10-50 cents a gallon more than the competitors who do NOT offer service contracts. Ever wonder how oil companies, that are former coal purveyors from the 40's and 50's - managed to stay in business for over 50 years? They know how to market that "service agreement" in spades, lose a few bucks on the service or barely break even - and make a killing on # 2 oil.

Business 101. Make money! It works, and works very well. Ever seen a "poor" oil company? Ever seen an oil company go out of business because of poor profits?

I haven't either. They either sell to Petro - or head to the banks with wheelbarrows filled to brimming.

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Steamhead

Gas side is just as bad in my area

years ago you could count on decent service from our gas company. Then they split their service organization into a separate company and decent service went straight down the toilet. I've seen customers who were told by the gas company "service" techs that they needed a whole new boiler, when the problem was a bird's nest that fell down the chimney and blocked the flue.

Oh, and a certain major catalog/department store company's service organization is just as bad, if my experience with their frustrated customers is any indication. So was their chief competitor who went out of business several years ago.

These people, whether they work for oil or gas companies, make us all look bad.

I posted a couple of things last winter that this thread reminds me of. Unfortunately the Wall's search function is not working at the moment, but I'll add the links when it starts working again.

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Firedragon_4

Amen to that and

another example of 'model employees.

Friend of mine from out-of-state had unit condemned by gas tech for 'faulty and obsolete' gas valve. I told them to call for a supervisor. He showed up, had thermocouple replaced and it's still there, perking away, (DHW heater).

When in doubt, call upstairs! If they don't move, go somewhere else.

clammy

oil service tech

I have to say you all may have hit the nail on the head i am in the oil bussiness i do service but the truth be told it's not all the tech or the owners it's just the way alot of things are people will get by doing the least they can people are basically lazy i know i follow up after 2 guys i work with at this point i don't speak with either of them i have nothing to say to them when 8 out of 10 service calls i get are there re calls from the prior day or better yet one that they been to 4 to 5 times not spending enough time to really find what the promblem is there are bad apples in every bunch and yes alot of companies enforce that keepem dirty high stack temp but it is all up to each induval to do the right thing and just remenber to get black and really clean some one boiler ,pull the burner vacume the chamber,clean the smoke pipe and the chimmey base if need be gets no pat on the back just a what took ya so long .It's a total picture of how things are in the real world just look around and compare to other things in life people in general are lazy and as for service contracts the one the company offers is not a rip with a cleaning 160 cover all burners parts and get you 24 /7 service i would love and pay to see the gas company show up within 1 hour of a no heat call good luck and set up a appointmentfor a few days around here and how come gas ulities can advertise for 24/7 service and take your money yet make ya wait days for service i've yet to leave a custemer go for more then 4 hours peace