Am I the only one who thinks we're too quick to tell people to just buy new?

I was at a job in a small town called Millerton last year, fixing a twenty year old dryer for an older lady. It was a simple belt and idler pulley. She asked me, 'Is it even worth fixing?' I told her for about eighty bucks in parts and my hour, she'd get another five years easy. She said the last guy she called told her to just get a new one because 'they don't make parts for these anymore.' That stuck with me. We all know that's often not true. I found the parts in ten minutes online. I think sometimes we say that because the job is small or we don't want the hassle, but it hurts our trade's reputation. It makes us look like we're just pushing for big sales. How do you handle those small repair calls when the customer is already being told to replace?

2 comments

2 Comments

emmag403d ago

Yeah, that "just replace it" attitude is everywhere now. I see it with phones, laptops, even small kitchen gadgets. My buddy was told his coffee maker was junk when it just needed a new $8 gasket. It feels like a lot of people just don't want to bother figuring things out anymore.

jordanm193d ago

Man, that drives me nuts. I had a guy last week with a ten year old fridge not cooling. Another company quoted him a grand for a new sealed system. It was just a bad start relay, a twenty dollar part. Took me fifteen minutes. People get told to replace stuff way too fast.