I had a gas leak and was serviced by Catons Plumbing in short order. Alphonso did the job well, was personable, and the area was kept clean. The one issue I have, and I think it is serious, is the billing structure and processes used. \r
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Catons is trying a digital device to track and bill jobs, but someone decided they ALSO needed the paper copy, so I am on the clock while the technician is doing two forms of documentation. Here's the breakdown of my visit:\r
11:14 I notice the van pull up\r
11:21 Alphonso meets me on the porch and I show him where the problem is\r
11:24 He writes up a service order and has me sign and initial, verbally making note of the rate of $91/half hour. I make note of the time and start a stopwatch on my phone ""just in case"". \r
12:11 job complete. I look things over, assist Alphonso with carrying things out.\r
12:18 Alphonso has tools stowed and asks for my CC for payment. Since I handed him a form of payment I believe the clock has stopped and the bill will be less than $200. He then proceeds to write up the service order manually. And THEN has to poke around with a digital device (phone?) to duplicate what he just entered manually.\r
12:24 I stop my stopwatch at 59 minutes from when I signed the service order while he is doing his required duplicate documentation. this takes another 10 minutes for some reason.\r
12:35 he tells me my total is $281.\r
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Even though the time from when i signed the paper to when I handed him my payment method was under an hour I was charged for more. I was told that after 8 minutes into the next 30 minute segment you are billed for the whole 30 minutes. It wasn't Alphonso's fault-- someone in the front office of Catons has either poorly implemented a digital solution, or has a phobia about it and must cling to the paper copies, my time was wasted and Alphonso's expertise and productivity was wasted, but I guess its all good because the bean counters who need to cling to their paper copies AND make the techs use a second system for billing see the proper number at the bottom of the spreadsheet regardless of what productivity was actually accomplished.\r
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I would like to see Catons have a policy where billed paper pushing time is capped--this is built into the $3/minute rate already. The clock starts when the signature goes on the paper--not when the van rolls up to my house and then 7 minutes (that's $21) is spent doing who knows what, but getting paid-- and ends when the tech has his or her gear off the site. If I'm at 1:07 on the clock I don't want the tech to have ANY incentive to write slow to take it to 1:09 and get $60 out of me. The technology is here to bill me for 39 minutes. Why should I have to pay for 60? \r
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Nothing was mentioned up front verbally or written on the paperwork about the ""partial half hour"" rule being cut off at 8 minutes. So I got about 54 minutes of well done professional service work and then paid an extra $91 for clerical tasks which took ~25 minutes. That is $3.64/minute to write up a freaking bill! Oh yeah...TWICE! Great service on the gas line but really PISSED OFF about this secretarial rate that could pay for a stenographer to show up and take dictation.\r
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Just yank off the freaking band aid. If you are going to institute a digital solution to replace handwritten documents and ""improve efficiency"" then you need to do one or the other or, not both and still tout efficiency. The customer SHOULD NOT have to pay for such ridiculous administrative decisions. How about DON'T stick it to the customer, let the spreadsheets show any dip in revenue and then the bean counters can investigate why. ""Oh our workers in the field are having to spend 150% more unbilled time in the front and back end of a service call and it looks like its because they have to do everything twice."" Don't make the customers pay for your administrative experiments. \r
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JD in Baltimore
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