Have you fallen into the bell box trap? Many companies are going this route and it’s not always the saving you might think. To explain – in recent years the bell box manufacturers have hit on a nice little scheme to help sell their boxes: “If you buy 50 boxes from us we will screen print your logo on them for you free of charge.”
On the face of it the idea seems a good one, and to all intents and purposes it is done with the very best intentions. There are, however, several drawbacks to this apparently good idea.
1. If you find another bell box that you like better you are stuck with fitting the existing, less-desirable, boxes until you have used your quota.
2. Same again if you have agreed to buy a batch of boxes and then discover that they have an inbuilt fault (it sometimes happens, even to the best of manufacturers). In the meantime, here you are wasting your time replacing boxes with others that you are unsure of until the manufacturer sorts out the problem. You then have to face up to the fact that you are stuck with a deal that may be less of a bargain than you thought.
No cure, no problem?
The subject of manufacturing faults brings up another question – why do manufacturers always deny any problems until they have found a cure? Is it for legal reasons? Do they think the installers will try to take them to court for lost time etc?
One thing is certain, the installers are not fooled and not impressed by the manufacturers’ responses. I have had my ear bent many times by installers and also heard them discuss the problems among themselves and it is always the same. Two or more installers get talking (often at the trade counters) and they discover that they are having the same problems with the same piece of kit. They complain to the manufacturer who tells each of them that it is the first time they have heard of the problem.
They can’t all be the ‘only ones’ to have the problem … so why can’t the manufacturer just be open and say: “Yes, we have a problem and we are working flat out on it. Please bear with us until we can find the cure…”?
I would be more impressed with a company that was open and honest instead of trying to treat me like an idiot by denying what I know.
To take it a stage further, some of the lads out there love a good problem to solve and many of them are very clever and very clued up on electronics. So why don’t the manufacturers start grilling the lads for as much info as they can to help find that elusive cure? I still can’t get my head round the idea of “deny now – cure later”. It doesn’t impress me and it doesn’t impress the lads out in the field.
All a matter of taste
Back to the bell box scheme.
3. What if the box that you thought was smart and stylish is not liked by your customers? I can well remember one customer saying to me, “I am not having that ugly thing on my wall, get it off and find me something better or you can take the whole system out”.
4. What will you do when it comes to taking over an alarm fitted by someone else? Take down a perfectly good box to fit one of your own? No self-respecting installer would look after a system or add a new customer to their books and then use it to advertise a rival company (unless the system is in such a poor shape that they do not wish to put their name or reputation on it). This is specifically a problem when taking over a system that is on police response. They are certainly not happy about companies who take over systems and leave another company’s name on show.
5. What happens when you find you have a rogue customer that you want to be rid of? Say, one that is always setting the alarm off and tries to repair or re-program the system himself because he is too daft or too tight-fisted to pay you to do it properly. He is bringing your company into disrepute and you have displayed your name and logo on the bell box. How long before you get a reputation for being the supplier of bad systems?
As I stated earlier, on the face of it having your box lids screen printed in batches may not be the good deal you first think it is but, if you can get them at the right price and you are shifting the numbers fast enough, don’t let me put you off.
All you need to do is be aware of the full implications before you make up your mind. My own advice would be to have your labels printed separately, and then you can put them on a variety of boxes within a pre-determined size range. You can put them over the top of someone else’s label if you take over a system and you can rip the label off if you need to disassociate yourself with a rogue customer. It is also a good idea to have it written into your terms and conditions when you sell a system that you retain ownership of the box labels or any other label or piece of paperwork that bears your company logo. It’s all about protecting your reputation.
And whilst we are on the subject, you will also need to write into your terms and conditions a clause where the customer agrees to let you have access to remove your company name and logo in case of dispute. Once again, DO NOT try to write your own terms and conditions. Get an expert to do it properly – that way you will avoid an expensive confrontation with the Trading Standards office in court.
One final word on bell box labels: don’t buy cheap or you will get non-colourfast inks that will fade before the end of the first year (in my experience, red is particularly prone to fade). After you have changed a label a few times you will realise that there is no such thing as a cheap one.
A useful tip about labels is try not to get one printed on a clear plastic background because if you touch the adhesive whilst peeling off the backing paper you will leave a fingerprint that will show through. If you have them printed on a white backing the fingermarks will not show and you can put labels with any colour print on any colour box and still retain your company’s corporate logo and colour scheme. Don’t forget – always specify colourfast inks.
Answer that phone!
I am constantly trying to get smaller companies to get their phones answered properly and the problem came to light again recently when I was talking to Tony Bush of DSC. Tony is currently doing the rounds of smaller but reputable companies demonstrating his excellent new range of control panels, and he is experiencing a great deal of trouble getting in contact with some of them.
The phone rings and rings – in some cases without answer because they have forgotten to switch on the answering machine. In others he will leave a message and no-one rings him back. As he points out : “If I can’t get to talk to them, then neither can the prospective customer, and that is business lost.”
Lost business is one thing but in our trade it is worse. Just because you were daft enough to forget to switch on the answering machine you have lost the initial business, plus the ongoing servicing, AND you have lost all the referrals that you would have got because you did a good job. On top of that, your rival down the road who did answer his phone has now got the sale, the service and the referrals.
To put it very bluntly, your poor memory is costing you a lot of lost business. However did you get to where you are now, and how do you stay there? OK, it’s easy for me to sit at my computer writing condemnation of other people’s shortcomings … but I can suggest a couple of ways to rectify things.
First, for a modest cost, you can set up TWO answering machines. Number one is the normal machine that you can buy at the local phone shop, (once again, don’t buy cheap). Set it to answer after only 8-10 rings, say. Leave it switched on night and day then it will not get forgotten and it will answer even if you are in the bathroom for a couple of minutes. Make sure it’s the type of machine where you can listen in to the message, then you can interrupt if you wish to.
BT provides your second or back-up machine at the exchange. This one will take messages whilst you are already talking on the phone, and it will also grab a call if the first answering machine is busy.
Whatever you do, it doesn’t replace having the phone answered correctly by a real person during the day, but if you have to go out and work you have little choice.
Makes a change
We all make mistakes and over the years I have had my share. There are some installers who will regularly change their products for the sake of a few bob saved … totally disregarding the fact that much time (and profit) is lost trying to learn the ways of programming a new control panel every other week.
On the other hand, some of us are like ostriches with our heads buried in the sand – we refuse to change because we believe that our best interests lie in sticking religiously to one control panel or one bell box.
There are some good arguments against change. Ranges of control panels, particularly, tend to use the same family programming traits, so once you have learned one you have learned them all. There is also less variety of stock to hold for spares etc, and that means less dead cash laid out in stock and spares. Whichever way you go – think carefully.
Husbands blow a fuse
I have every sympathy for a guy who can pull off a little harmless scam that doesn’t hurt anybody and makes him the odd bob or two at the same time. So when I heard about the man on Barnsley market passing off blue sweets as Viagra tablets I had to smile, knowing the type of lad that is born and bred in Barnsley … hard working, hard drinking and hard playing. The last thing on earth a Barnsley lad needs is a Viagra tablet to keep up his end of the bargain.
On the other hand, the lunatic who was selling unblowable fuses should be shot. Whilst some housewives may have thought that unblowable fuses were a good buy, their safety-conscious coalmine-trained husbands were not of the same mind and a deputation was raised to “explain” to the trader the error of his ways. Fortunately for him, he made his escape before they arrived, otherwise Barnsley General Hospital would have had a tricky problem extracting the rest of the ‘unblowable’ fuses from a certain part of the trader’s anatomy.
