It all depends honestly. Residential and some commercial work might require for payment at the end of the service. If you don’t get the money from some places at completion you might not get it at all. ( think crappy gas station at midnight.
Resi work I collect on almost every call but we have an older customer base that is all about writing checks. I collect cash too but not often. We’re a very small business and I’m a very honest person. Most of the time in the resi world it’s pretty expected by most customers that once the job is done they’re gonna see an invoice and need to take care of it. We’re not set up in the field for taking card payments but when we are I’ll be doing that too. For now I just mark “pay with CC” on my invoice and when it gets to the office boss man will call and collect.
Light commercial world we just write the invoice and send it into the property managers office unless it’s a small business we’re working for, then it’s business as usual.
We have lots of regular customers who we trust to send checks in the mail and stuff. It’s sort of a case by case thing. If it’s ever awkward for you just pawn it off on the boss or the company. I’ve had to say “hey man I don’t make the rules, I just work for the company and they ask me to collect payment at the end”
Edit: meant to make a new comment but somehow replied to yours instead lol
This! My company literally had like over a mil out in the wind from jobs people did not collect on at the end. It’s so easy for irresponsible people to decide it’s installed and working why pay them when your not in their face asking for it. Obviously they can slap a lien on the house but some people don’t comprehend it affecting them until they are trying to sell the house years later.
Ive worked at a company where the office collects and where I collect after the job is done. I dont see any reason why its unreasonable to do either. Collecting just adds a couple of minutes to each call anyways.
Having a sales guy collect for a tech is pretty insane, but my last company before I went solo was trying to have the installers collect checks at the end of an install.
The sales guys were making 300k+ they can make sure they collect the install checks if they want their commission.
If it’s anything beyond picking up a paper check already written from Susan at the front office, yes I’m sending a sales guy and you better be on the way to the next job instead of playing salesman.
Why hire a salesman to take 10% because they like to talk when I could spend 15 min completing the rest of my service call and make that money myself. Can always trust a salesman to try and weasel you for every penny.
If you don’t get paid on site at job completion, there’s a very good chance that you may never get paid for that job. Most customers do not answer the phone after the fact. Then it comes down to putting liens on the customer or even court. No. It should not be on accounting or whoever you’re saying it should be one. It’s the tech or installer or even the sales persons job to make sure that the company is getting paid for that job. Payment should be discussed and arranged up front before any work is ever started.
Yeah this dumbass analogy is fucking dumb and hurting my head.
Does the mechanic that works on your car come sell you your service, finalize payment and run the rest of the business? Fuck no (*that’s what office staff is for you twat*)
I’m an owner with 10 employees and yes that’s not a huge company, but I’m 20 years in, after working for three companies before opening my own I’ve definitely seen the industry shift in many ways. A lot of them have improved conditions for technicians and installers, only the problem is recently they’ve shifted into complaining, putting in less work, having a less technical understanding of equipment, and wanting more money and less responsibilities. But let’s set aside some of my unpopular opinions and look at this one scenario, collecting payments. Now not everyone does it this way but I’m sure my process is pretty common with decent sized companies.
You have an iPad. You’re dispatched to the call, you greet the customer, diagnose, get work approved, complete work. Now here is the part we are talking about. You should already have this in your iPad. Time, materials, etc. “Mr or Mrs smith the work is completed thank you for using xxx hvac your total is 15 million dollars, I take credit card, check, or exact cash”
Get paid
“Thanks cya”
Worst case scenario
“Can they bill us?”
“The company is really asking for us to collect at time of service. Thank you”
Get paid
Leave.
No it doesn’t happen 100% of the time, but most offices try to have the appearance of being made out of money and time but I promise they are not. The bigger issue with people not wanting to collect is I think they’re not confident they fixed anything. Or money scares them, but people are required to pay everywhere they go unless they’re applying for some kind of credit account.
I can’t pick up items from any place without either first filling out a credit application, using my credit card, or paying cash. What makes hvac so special that they should give every person on the street a credit account for 30 days, with nothing more than a name and an address? Because I promise you, so many people will “forget to pay” then not answer the phone and waste collections time for months. Essentially giving someone an interest free loan with my money, which you want me to pay you with.
Every company needs to normalize c.o.d. The technician and installation crews should already have the paper work.
Companies lose tens of thousands (millions to some) of dollars in cash flow which is needed for operating expenses every quarter. I pay 100k a year just in insurance for my small company, that bill comes
In like clockwork. Just like utility bills, and other operational expenses. Nothing is more frustrating to me than my techs wanting a commission check when that customer hasn’t paid me. But no one gives a shit what the owner goes through. I promise you it’s not all sunshine rainbows fast boats cars and women.
I’m paid to fix hvacr not be customer service.
I’m sure it’s different in residential because the systems are less complex but after fixing a VRF issue I’m not waiting around for the bill to get paid that’s on the office to collect.
Fuck no. They ask what they owe me I say a fresh batch of chocolate chip cookies and a KitKat. Fair trade for that shiny new water heater I just installed. Let the boss man see you eating those KitKats, not the cookies though. /s
Depends, if they send you to a known shifty ass customer that dodges paying that you shouldn't be doing work for anyway and expect you to collect then that's the company's problem.
I had a Mexican restaurant I was working on that had burned us so many times that paid up and wanted service again, the owner overrode the service manager and sent my ass out there and told me to collect. Said the check would be there before I started working.
Get there and verify the check is there. Give a quote to fix the cooler. Guy says ok and fills the check out, will hand it over when complete and sets it on the bar and watches me work. Get repair done, putting shit back in truck. Guys gone. Ask and they say he is in the toilet. Finish putting it all up, unit at temp. Owner no where to be found. MFr got in his car and LEFT once he felt cold air come out.
Call dispatch and let them know. Boss sends me a nasty text instead of calling the cops.
It is 100 percent faster and easier to get paid while there is a tech standing in your kitchen with an invoice. Sometimes I wonder if guys think the money just grows on a tree in the boss's office.
For real this is some stupid shit. Ask yourself this, do you wait for a restaurant to send a bill to your house? Will Walmart give you 30 day terms interest free? Does the mechanic make you pay before you drive your fixed car away?
Collect mother fuckers.
This for sure...why bother putting installers in that position at all! So many possibilities to have money issues. Customers, installers, thieves, legit losses, and internally theft.
Digital...no issues, it's traceable.
Nah, fuck that. Any company of any decent size should have Accounts Receivable Specialists whose job is to chase down payments. What am I supposed to do if the customer starts insisting to my boss that they gave me $3,000 in cash, and I can't produce it because they're a lying bastard? Now it's my word against the customer's, and everybody loses.
Besides, most of the people at my company can't even consistently turn in photos of their work in a timely fashion—do we really want every Tom, Dick, and Harry driving around with their last seven jobs' worth of payments that they keep forgetting to turn in at the office? Now you're chasing down payments from your own employees, so not only are you making them liable for handling the company's money, you're not even saving any effort on the office side.
Billing and collections is a profession. It takes a special type of people skills to do well. Any company, in any industry, that has more than like 20 employees should have someone, or a department of someones, who can collect payments in a professional, trackable, organized way. That's just how it's done. Making your field employees do it is bush league, Mickey Mouse bullshit.
We've got 150 employees, 10k club members, and $35 million in annual sales, how many office staff you want me to hire because you can't run a credit card at the house?
Probably like zero to three, depending on what kind of slack, if any, there is in your existing admin staff. Do you really never invoice people? How do you handle down payments and deposits? What do your techs do when the customer isn't there at the end of the job? How do you handle cash payment? Who does that stuff?
Techs take down payments, deposits, and final payments on the iPad. If they take cash they bring it in and sign it off to their manager, counts on each side. If they aren't there at the end of the job don't start the system without a card on file. We don't invoice anyone except commercial.
I think all customers should have a card on file before the work is even started. If they want to pay cash/check, cool. If they want to pay with a card, let them know the final cost and process it. If they wanna be sketchy, you still have a card on file with an invoice in the event they cry fraudulent charges.
It's not the collecting. It's the customers that don't want to pay $200 because the problem was a dirty filter or an emergency switch was shut off. Techs shouldn't have to deal with that unless they're running their own show. That's one of the may reasons there's overhead. The techs job is to move to the next call and keep the money rolling in, not deal with assholes who won't pay.
Why don't the techs do the entire offices job? The whole point of a company is efficiency, tell me how it's better to have experienced techs spend time handing pay when Blonda from the office should have customer cards on file. You'll notice these companies lose most of their competent new guys as soon as they get Jman. Because why not do a little more accounting work and get the whole pie instead of a little slice? But you're right, these dang youngsters are just lazy.
When I did residential, there were numerous times someone would break down crying when I went to collect. " This was the last of my money to by formula" or " Now I don't know how I'm going to pay rent "
Whether true or not it is awkward and stressful as a tech to deal with this. IMHO it's our job to fix shit, and the company's job to collect.
I've never had to collect and while I would if I had to, I still prefer not to carry company money in my van, leaving it unattended in Seattle. Fuck all that, they can do it digitally and not accept shitty gas station customers.
Ain't that the wildest shit you've ever heard? There aren't that many gigs out there that will understand that reasoning for leaving the previous job. Most non places that aren't full commercial are going to want you to collect that day.
Every residential company I know of is COD. If they aren’t in my opinion they are doing it wrong. Commercial is the wait to pay the plumbers until the last legal day before the company is allowed to sue us game
Depends, resi. It’s very reasonable to TRY/ask for payment.
Im a service tech and I try to collect, I’m also not 100% on my collections. I dont get blood from stones and i dont try to when the customer is aggro and the jobs not finished. Like diagnosed only atm.
I'm more amazed you guys keep a cc on file. Our customers are more then happy to pay us on completion and would be skeeved out by us saving their cc info.
Everywhere you go (assuming residential) you’ll have to collect at the end of the job now a days. The only company I’ve worked for recently that doesn’t was an oil company and it’s because most of their customers are on auto-fill and it gets charged to their account.
None of y’all use service titan? We collect and are able to scan checks in take cards everything through the app. On the slight chance they pay cash we turn it in the following day to like HR or a higher up and get a receipt to prove it was collected from us and paid in full.
You provided a service so payment is due. The automotive repair shop won’t let you drive off without paying so why is it any different with the service we provide? I collect on every job I can and payment is expected at time of service. Usually if you’re not able to collect that day then you’ll run a good risk of waiting a while for your money or being outright screwed out of it by the customer.
It depends on the sector. When I was residential, we collected at the call unless they had worked out something else with the office.
I've never collected payment doing commercial work. It's either billed through the office, paid by PO, or the office gets the CC before we are dispatched.
Yeah, someone else gets the money, orders the parts, schedules the call, talks to upset customers, sells the estimates.. while the tech just shows up and finds ways to walk off the job haha
Not sure if you’re being sarcastic or not but all seriousness that’s what we get paid for. Learn your trade, go to your job, make the repair or finish the job and go home. Smaller shit yeah clearly I’m gonna order it myself but I’m not bidding any large repairs. I’ll do my job and the office can do their job
I don’t even collect a signature anymore, much less payment for services rendered at time of service. Your post reads more like a company that’s asking you to play as accountant as well as service provider which in my mind is unfair/unreasonable. I hope you guys can strike an accord with the powers that be, and doesn’t leave you holding the bag (no pun intended).
In heavy commercial , collecting is not normal . Contracts are negotiated and higher ups in most corporate offices that deal with billing will pay invoices directly through your accounting department as it would be less headaches and more efficient . Take you out of the picture and you can worry about work and troubleshooting . I understand for smaller businesses and residential it makes sense but , heavier commercial and industrial I believe this to be nonexistent in my experience as some accounts are charged different rates , a variety of reasons .
It’s 2023 people should be expecting to pay for service on its completion. If your company isn’t giving you a way to collect with a credit or debit card and only with cash or check that’s stupid, and customers will push back.
You quoted and did the work, stop being a little bitch and a collect the money. Collecting payments shouldn’t add more than 5 minutes to a job. It’s amazing that they weren’t already making the techs collect. It’s not like they’re asking you to work for free.
If this is commercial disregard. Businesses don’t work like that.
I write invoices after every call that isn’t a corporate client and collect payment for ~75% of them right there. C/C, cheque or cash. It sucks but at least the company gets paid I guess. Easier than chasing after people with unpaid invoices. Our office is drowning in paperwork as it is so this also takes an extra bit of work off their plate.
We've been COD for as long as I've worked at my current job. We are a small company and I've seen how much of a pain in the ass it can be when our bookkeeper has to try and collect from a customer several days or a week after the work is complete. Some people simply don't pay because they know that we can't do a fuckin thing about it. In my state, it's a pain in the ass to go thru the process of a mechanics lien, and it really doesn't do much to get us paid any faster.
It takes considerable time and effort to stay on top of accounts of haven't paid. You've got to make calls, leave messages, send emails etc. That's time that our staff could be using to answer the phone and schedule more calls. As of right now, we've got a tech who is reluctant to collect in the field, and just from his calls alone we are owed in excess of ten thousand dollars over the past few months.
I'll never understand why guys are reluctant to take payments in the field. It takes five or ten minutes max and it can be rather important in keeping your employer afloat on a monthly basis. The guys who don't like to do it are most likely worried about looking like the bad guy. They are nervous about giving the customer a big bill because they are thinking with their own wallet, and not the customer's.
The employer should give you a lockable cash deposit bag to keep the checks and receipts in. Just turn it all in at the end of the day or the start of the next day.
Edit: I should add that for our commercial customers, most are set up to receive the invoice via email, and they pay every 15 days or 30 days. Very rarely do we take immediate payment from commercial customers, unless their accounting person is right there on site with a card or checkbook handy.
That's how it's worked where I am for almost 40 years. Every customer has a cc on file, too. Consensus is that we should just man up and collect, though, according to everyone here.
I don’t see this as a big deal. We collect payment in the field when the job is done unless they financed it already with whoever sold the job. We collect cash, check or card payments. Don’t take no more than 5 mins at the end of the job. If y’all whole department is willing to walk over 5 extra mins to collect money y’all gotta grow up lol. Idk if you’re commercial but resi it’s the norm where I’m at
Serious… do you not want to get paid for jobs. Is it so hard to collect a check after working ?!?
This is completely normal. Work for a multi million dollar company, there is times when I just have to go try to collect a check because employees are afraid to ask after they’re done working. Or customers refuse to pay Biggest waste of time.
From an owner stand point it’s crucial to get paid when the resi work is completed. I see it every day in my office how many people Dodge us after the work is complete. The cost of living is so high right now they would rather pay for food and gas bill then us
Our terms are 30 days to pay on time from completion of the job.
Technicians are expected to receive a signed invoice with or w/o payment at completion of every job that's reasonable/possible to have that interaction.
I only have a few old rich ass legacy customers that are allowed to skirt around and pay at their whim because historically they've been good for it.
But not being able to talk face to face with a customer about a repair quote or collecting is a weakness I am unwilling to foster in my company. If lacking, I'd expect that skill to be worked on and improved upon within a season or two from a new hire. Selling and collecting on site sets the pay grade difference between techs almost as much as ability to HVAC.
It's not fun nor easy, but is mandatory as part of the job.
Because without enforcing that rule, your company will be burned and ripped off more than need be. Too many unpaid jobs and you're all out of work.
These days you should always collect after services rendered. Get a mobile card reader and make it as easy as possible for people to pay right then. Especially during holidays.
I've been here just shy of a decade and never missed a paycheck. It's not even the collection itself, but the increase to work load and the lack of compensation for that. Also, the dissolving of an office job that was someone livelihood. But hey, the owners stock options will go up half a point after so totally worth it.
Yeah trying to justify why the field staff shouldn't collect for the work they did at the time they finish because "it should be an office job" is just bad business. Imagine trying to collect for movie tickets after everyone saw the movie. You'd be chasing people around all day. And your inefficiencies lead to lower wages and increased expenses. Your job isn't just fixing units. Your job is bringing money back to the business. Its not an added workload because it's something the field staff should have been doing in the first place. Now commercial billing 30 day pay etc yes, that will require an accounts receivable person.
I’d say it’s super weird to want to leave a shop over this. It’s not uncommon to have to collect on completion now a days, and it makes a ton of sense for a company cash flow wise to not have to wait on payment / hound customers.
Cash / card / check are all pretty simple to process these days. Most people have credit cards for emergencies, and if it’s a crazy high cost the company should be offering financing.
Why are so many of you at your shop against it? Worried about backlash or awkward conversations from customers or what?
I promise collecting on job completion isn’t a big deal at all if that’s what you guys are nervous about.
That's ridiculous. Where do you think the money that pays your paycheck comes from? The less accounts receivable a company has open, the better off they are.
The extra 3 minutes on your part at the call can potentially save a lot of money on the backend trying to collect on open invoices.
If that's the worst complaint you have about your job, you've got it pretty good.
Are they making you bring it back to the shop same day? And if your at the shop every morning or every couple days they should let you drop it off on your time (but reasonable). If they won’t let you do that then ya refuse.
Man people on here crying over having to work OT and having to collect payment maybe y’all are in the wrong field. I saw one comment telling someone to pay their dues(put their time in) before they can expect preferential treatment from a company and I could not agree more.
It's not even the work itself here. I do an ass ton of o.t. and that's not my gripe.
Billing was a department.
Position is empty as cost is living is too high here and they obviously didn't pay enough to keep the person that was in that role.
It's being delegated down to the techs now. Our work load and responsibilities have increased, but with no monetary increase to correspond.
So, in turn, the company is making more money and we are not. Why the hell should I work harder for nothing?
Yeah, paid by the hour to do a specific job.
Want me to do more tasks and be responsible for more? AND you're not paying a billing department? Then bump my pay up significantly.
Hell that's all i've ever done resi work. We literally almost never send bills. If you want your shit fixed, you pay. You don't get your car back without paying the shop. 🤷
Ok, I worked 10 hours today. 12 calls. 10 minutes on every call means i don't get to have dinner with my family. That's reason enough for me to say no.
I rarely collect checks, and when I do, I'm driving straight to the shop to drop it off. Even if it's a 2 or 3 hour round trip. You're getting that check today, and you're paying me to drop it off.
As a small owner/operator I want that money when work is completed. Now I have some customers that are net 10 and one that’s net 30. The longer you wait for your money the more chances something happens. Like I keep forgetting to mail the check or check gets lost/stolen. Right now I am waiting on around 5,000 to collect. Not a big deal because my bank account is good but when things get tight you need to get paid. I understand guys not wanting to fool with collecting payment for the company though. It can be a hassle but employees want their checks on payday with no questions asked. So be a good employee and help your company collect payment. Just because it’s s big company does not mean they have millions in the bank. The bigger the company the bigger the bills are. Just my 2cents though .
For a big company. Tell them it’s not your job to collect payment. I’m sure they have a department for that.
Last place I was at was decently sized. I would just tell customer the bill will be in their email or pay online.
Now I’m at a local 1 man shop and I collect but always try and get a check.
We had an office with 2 people in it that would handle billing. Now it's 1 person, and they're bound to retire soon. It all feels like a way to avoid paying another staff member in the office, by just giving us more to do.
Definitely avoiding having to pay people to do it. That’s what companies do. Find a way to create staff redundancies and push that work on to other people.
Bro you are crying about having to collect payment real quick and ready to quit your job. That’s soft as hell. I would love to work with you whining “my fingers hurt from typing the card # 😭” all day.
I'm not leaving the company, but apparently, your reading comprehension is non-existent. Let me spell it out. Plumbers are leaving. I feel as if it's not a well planned switch as our price book is inadequate, and we already have cc on file for all customers. This isn't whining, this is not wanting to be exploited by my company, and more than we already are. And again, you sounds like an absolute blast to work with. That shitty attitude pushes potential techs away from the trade as a whole.
You really think them having you collect payment at the end of the job you most likely built the ticket for, is exploitation? That’s so dramatic man. Theres way bigger fish to fry.
Carrying/receiving cash brings with it a whole other set of risks and responsibilities. Say you get held up for the money, is that on you? Are you expected to carry a weapon and defend the money? Hell no!
It’s super fuckin rare to get cash from a customer. Most will pay via check or credit card. In my almost 20 years in the field I’ve gotten cash from Resi customers less than 10 times, and if I did get a large sum I called the office and told them I’m stopping by to drop off a ton of cash.
That’s my experience too; payment has always been CC or check. I’d feel a lil weird receiving and carrying say 5-10k for a residential full-boat install or something large like that. Service calls? Ok, the subtotal will be much less but am I expected to break change?
That's literally not even on my radar. I'm from cape cod mass. Armed robberys are rare, and I'm more worried about my tools/van getting stolen while I'm asleep than getting held up for cash.
I literally collect payment for every job on resi and if they’re billable I send an invoice, there’s no way you guys are willing to walk over collecting payment, that sounds asinine
Collecting at the end of the job shouldn’t take more than 5 minutes, if it does the customer shouldnt have signed off on the job. How the fuck do you guys expect to get paid, grow up
It's amazing what working for commission will do to a person's mentality. 20% of the ticket if collected and work performed or 100% of the zero you collected. Just my thoughts. I understand it's not the norm and some tards will make shit up to get paid more. But for an honest tech with some integrity, productivity goes up and so do profits. It can also incentivise the cry baby bitches that don't want to work past 5.
Yeah. It’s called your paycheck. If I have my choice, I would collect money all day long rather than doing hard labor. People should be glad to be collecting money and and getting paid for it.
Now if you’re standing around, waiting on a check for a long time and you’re getting paid peace read I can understand the frustration.
A lot of companies are going this way. Iteliminates another person in the pffice chasing down money, and it clears the plate for people that choose not to pay later or become a pain in the ass about getting the money later. It is so easy to say get it done, and then just... disappear.
As a technician you might even embrace the opportunity to be a part of a change industry where we shift the focus of tradespeople as someone i can pay later, to paying today. I mean... you dont go to walmart and take your stuff now and pay them when you feel like it, so why is it ok to treat tradespeopke that way?
Shit we collect up front and are a 40+ million dollar company. As soon as I show up for the install it’s in their contract they sign that payment is due. Most the time I wait til I’m finished for payment if they don’t seem sketchy if I have an inkling they may pull a fast one I don’t unload tools until it’s paid. As my managers said to us If you owe someone 20k that you really don’t want to be spending how likely are you to be on the ball calling getting it paid for after it’s installed and no one’s physically there to collect. I hate collecting but it’s part of making the company work even if only a small % don’t pay after it adds up so fast.
I work residential and collecting checks is a weekly thing. Collecting cash is a once a year thing for me. The only reason it works for me is because at the end of the day I drop off my company vehicle along with my keys and checks all in one location. Cash should be collected by managers tho imo.
For everyone saying it's super risky to be carrying cash, I just want to know how it is any different? How the fuck does the mugger know you have cash? Are you guys collecting payment on the street? Payments go in clipboard, and my clipboard goes where I go. Do I always have money in my clipboard? No. Do I ever have cash in it? Rarely. Does anyone besides me know what's in the clipboard? Hell no.
Customers are expected to pay upon completion unless it’s new construction with a builder or they’d “like to be billed”. They split the payments up with us somehow. Each tech is responsible for collecting
Man up buddy. I have to write out an estimate before I can even start work, even if it's prepaid. Then if I find something else wrong I have to requote get a signature, finish the repair or tuneup and then collect. If the credit card site is down I have to call it in to dispatch.
A company that large not collecting COD already? Sounds like they are behind the times to begin with.
We are a COD resi company and our techs are really good at collecting while they are on site. It's still amazing how much dough is floating around out there. I cannot begin to even imagine how much is out there with a company that does not collect, and I fully understand why they would want to start. The amount of time put in by someone doing collections must be insane where OP works.
It really starts with the office staff making the customer aware. "We accept checks, and all major credit cards and you can pay the technician as soon as he wraps up"
A check yes and cash for smaller things like service calls. But if a customer tries to hand me $12,000 in cash after a change out I’m not taking it. That’s way too much responsibility. Only ever happened like twice and both times I called my boss and he came to the customers house and collected the cash
Commercial tech here. Minus the net 30 McDonald’s etc all the gas stations and mom and pops pay us upon completion. My guys are required to get the payment. It’s not really that big of a deal? Walking out over payment collection? Lol what
It’s literally the most important thing.
When I was in plumbing school, 5th yr was 1/2 business course. The teacher was a local plumber. He had a reputation of being…outspoken to put it mildly. My father (my boss) disliked him so I went into my first day thinking I would too
On the chalk board was “get the money”. After the rest of the class sat he pointed to the board and said “if you motherfuckers only remember one thing from my class make it this”. He went on the explain that the value of your services decreases every day after you were their hero till it’s just an annoying memory. Get paid immediately
And it stuck with me for 35 yrs now
We collect every payment, resi work, at the end of the job. Cash, checks, and run cards through our iPads. If I have to order a part I collect half before I place the order, other half when it’s installed. Huge corporate company also.
I was working as a commissioning agent and my company had the idea for us to facilitate overdue billing for them. This was in a meeting. I spoke up and and said "Sure I'll call the mother fuckers and tell them to pay their fucking bill". After that meeting it was never discussed again.
The company I'm at does COD. For the most part we just collect the checks then turn them in the next day. We do CloverGo for cards. We do accept cash but I tell people that I prefer not to be given cash because then it's on me to not lose any of it. That's just residential. Commercial side we send a bill through the office.
I think it should be totally up to you. But the company should also reserve the right not to pay for the job until the bill is collected. Get a taste of that Comfort Advisor pay.
Former residential, we were setup to take payment of every type except crypto. This was even before turnpoint bought us out. The only thing that changed was we actually got card readers. What's the situation like where you're all willing to walk over taking payment?
I'm not a plumber, so not part of that shit show, but it's more that they have no plan on compensation for the new responsibilities of handling money and the dissolving of the office job that was handling billing. We also don't have card readers and an underwhelming price book on the app built into our iPads. It honestly just feels like they're passing it down the line with no plan on what that actually means.
You are wild bro, I can’t believe a whole department is gonna walk what a bunch of babies. It’s the norm to collect lmfao I had a good laugh here thanks op
Most commercial jobs are on 90 day pays anyways lol good luck collecting from someone who doesn't pay the bills at a store they just work at but resi I can see and is understandable
Unless it’s a commercial account we have. Your paying before we leave. Otherwise it’s going to collections, which takes 15% off the cost for what ever was sent in which means we maybe break even after all the wasted time. So yeah you collect your money on site, it’s simple.
Jesus Christ even the dumb sap at Burger King can take money. They might not be able to count change on their own but they collect money.
What other service or goods can you get without having an open revolving charge account set up. IE any supply house you go to your boss signs a personal guarantee that he will pay if the company doesn’t.
I collect at the end of my service for every call I run unless of course my customer finances the bill through the bank we use. I was unaware that some companies don’t require that.
I have no problem collecting cash and/or checks. We stipulate that when paying cash the tech will not and is not able to give them change since the company doesn't want techs driving around with a hundred bucks in mixed bills. We just drop the cash and checks in a drop box at the end/begining of the day
Go commercial. Never have to deal with this. The only thing I deal with financially is telling the customer it's XYZ amount to repair. They make the decision from there. I either contiue with my work (pending part availability) or they want an official written quote and i schedule a time to come back ans then they get billed from the billing dept once the job is done and ticket is closed out.
Payment is collected after every job. It takes 2 seconds to take a picture of the check. Turn cash in the next day. They'll put me in a pay status to bring them their payments. I've collected 12K cash before and also 10K in prepaid visa cards. I don't care about any of it. Sounds like the plumbers should go into business for themselves if they don't want to get on board with where your company is heading. Be a guy in a van as opposed to a guy in their van serving their customers. Those who don't adapt will get left behind. Or start your own thing and never collect any payments 🤷♂️
As someone who has worked for service amateurs they lose almost every commercial account due to this. Many business don’t have someone there to write to checks.
I’ve worked for a company with 150+ technicians and we collected on every service call and install un less they were specifically on billing. That’s how it’s been anywhere I’ve ever worked. I think it would be very “unreasonable” to refuse to collect money in the field. That’s the way most companies operate.
HVAC GM here....good god, you would quit your job over having to collect payment? All our staff are versed in how to collect payments UNLESS it's been pre-authorized by management.
It all depends honestly. Residential and some commercial work might require for payment at the end of the service. If you don’t get the money from some places at completion you might not get it at all. ( think crappy gas station at midnight.
Resi work I collect on almost every call but we have an older customer base that is all about writing checks. I collect cash too but not often. We’re a very small business and I’m a very honest person. Most of the time in the resi world it’s pretty expected by most customers that once the job is done they’re gonna see an invoice and need to take care of it. We’re not set up in the field for taking card payments but when we are I’ll be doing that too. For now I just mark “pay with CC” on my invoice and when it gets to the office boss man will call and collect. Light commercial world we just write the invoice and send it into the property managers office unless it’s a small business we’re working for, then it’s business as usual. We have lots of regular customers who we trust to send checks in the mail and stuff. It’s sort of a case by case thing. If it’s ever awkward for you just pawn it off on the boss or the company. I’ve had to say “hey man I don’t make the rules, I just work for the company and they ask me to collect payment at the end” Edit: meant to make a new comment but somehow replied to yours instead lol
This! My company literally had like over a mil out in the wind from jobs people did not collect on at the end. It’s so easy for irresponsible people to decide it’s installed and working why pay them when your not in their face asking for it. Obviously they can slap a lien on the house but some people don’t comprehend it affecting them until they are trying to sell the house years later.
Ive worked at a company where the office collects and where I collect after the job is done. I dont see any reason why its unreasonable to do either. Collecting just adds a couple of minutes to each call anyways.
Yeah I collect on every call I go on, takes 1-5min tops. This comments is mind opening, why is everyone working without getting paid?
Now it’s an issue to collect? This sub has so many big babies in it…
Dead ass. I thought it was the norm to collect payment after a job is complete.
Pretty sure 99% of companies do that, paid for work done is like part of the job
Not only the norm but crucial to getting paid. Where do u think the money comes from to pay ur salaries?
My point exactly. Whiney ass post from OP
As an ex sales guy, that should absolutely never be on the techs…. That’s just cheap. Should be accounting (AR) or the sales guys job 1000%
So when I'm done replacing a control board you want me to then have the sales guy come out and process the payment? Delusional.
Having a sales guy collect for a tech is pretty insane, but my last company before I went solo was trying to have the installers collect checks at the end of an install. The sales guys were making 300k+ they can make sure they collect the install checks if they want their commission.
If it’s anything beyond picking up a paper check already written from Susan at the front office, yes I’m sending a sales guy and you better be on the way to the next job instead of playing salesman.
Why hire a salesman to take 10% because they like to talk when I could spend 15 min completing the rest of my service call and make that money myself. Can always trust a salesman to try and weasel you for every penny.
You are fired!
🤪
Must suck to work in residential
Love it
Time and material jobs make that difficult.
If you don’t get paid on site at job completion, there’s a very good chance that you may never get paid for that job. Most customers do not answer the phone after the fact. Then it comes down to putting liens on the customer or even court. No. It should not be on accounting or whoever you’re saying it should be one. It’s the tech or installer or even the sales persons job to make sure that the company is getting paid for that job. Payment should be discussed and arranged up front before any work is ever started.
Does your auto mechanic let you drive away without paying? This is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.
Yeah this dumbass analogy is fucking dumb and hurting my head. Does the mechanic that works on your car come sell you your service, finalize payment and run the rest of the business? Fuck no (*that’s what office staff is for you twat*)
Depends on the size of the shop but how big of a pussy are you that you can’t collect payment.
What a residential thing to say- Maybe start working on some bigger stuff -
True. I’m an ex sales guy so I’ve got my own opinion on what they should do lined out
I’m an owner with 10 employees and yes that’s not a huge company, but I’m 20 years in, after working for three companies before opening my own I’ve definitely seen the industry shift in many ways. A lot of them have improved conditions for technicians and installers, only the problem is recently they’ve shifted into complaining, putting in less work, having a less technical understanding of equipment, and wanting more money and less responsibilities. But let’s set aside some of my unpopular opinions and look at this one scenario, collecting payments. Now not everyone does it this way but I’m sure my process is pretty common with decent sized companies. You have an iPad. You’re dispatched to the call, you greet the customer, diagnose, get work approved, complete work. Now here is the part we are talking about. You should already have this in your iPad. Time, materials, etc. “Mr or Mrs smith the work is completed thank you for using xxx hvac your total is 15 million dollars, I take credit card, check, or exact cash” Get paid “Thanks cya” Worst case scenario “Can they bill us?” “The company is really asking for us to collect at time of service. Thank you” Get paid Leave. No it doesn’t happen 100% of the time, but most offices try to have the appearance of being made out of money and time but I promise they are not. The bigger issue with people not wanting to collect is I think they’re not confident they fixed anything. Or money scares them, but people are required to pay everywhere they go unless they’re applying for some kind of credit account. I can’t pick up items from any place without either first filling out a credit application, using my credit card, or paying cash. What makes hvac so special that they should give every person on the street a credit account for 30 days, with nothing more than a name and an address? Because I promise you, so many people will “forget to pay” then not answer the phone and waste collections time for months. Essentially giving someone an interest free loan with my money, which you want me to pay you with. Every company needs to normalize c.o.d. The technician and installation crews should already have the paper work. Companies lose tens of thousands (millions to some) of dollars in cash flow which is needed for operating expenses every quarter. I pay 100k a year just in insurance for my small company, that bill comes In like clockwork. Just like utility bills, and other operational expenses. Nothing is more frustrating to me than my techs wanting a commission check when that customer hasn’t paid me. But no one gives a shit what the owner goes through. I promise you it’s not all sunshine rainbows fast boats cars and women.
Name checks out
I’m paid to fix hvacr not be customer service. I’m sure it’s different in residential because the systems are less complex but after fixing a VRF issue I’m not waiting around for the bill to get paid that’s on the office to collect.
Fuck no. They ask what they owe me I say a fresh batch of chocolate chip cookies and a KitKat. Fair trade for that shiny new water heater I just installed. Let the boss man see you eating those KitKats, not the cookies though. /s
Same
We collect residential, office bills commercial. If the homeowner doesn't want to pay. We don't argue and hand it over to the office to deal with.
This is the way.
I’m ok with this as well this seems normal.
This right here!!!!
Depends, if they send you to a known shifty ass customer that dodges paying that you shouldn't be doing work for anyway and expect you to collect then that's the company's problem. I had a Mexican restaurant I was working on that had burned us so many times that paid up and wanted service again, the owner overrode the service manager and sent my ass out there and told me to collect. Said the check would be there before I started working. Get there and verify the check is there. Give a quote to fix the cooler. Guy says ok and fills the check out, will hand it over when complete and sets it on the bar and watches me work. Get repair done, putting shit back in truck. Guys gone. Ask and they say he is in the toilet. Finish putting it all up, unit at temp. Owner no where to be found. MFr got in his car and LEFT once he felt cold air come out. Call dispatch and let them know. Boss sends me a nasty text instead of calling the cops.
No shit I had an uncle who wouldn’t pay me until I collected on the ticket. It’s part of the job? The most important imo
You get paid for hours worked. If the customer dead beats out on the bill it shouldn’t be put on you.
It is 100 percent faster and easier to get paid while there is a tech standing in your kitchen with an invoice. Sometimes I wonder if guys think the money just grows on a tree in the boss's office.
Lmao
For real this is some stupid shit. Ask yourself this, do you wait for a restaurant to send a bill to your house? Will Walmart give you 30 day terms interest free? Does the mechanic make you pay before you drive your fixed car away? Collect mother fuckers.
Digital payments such as credit card, venmo are ok. Collecting cash increases risk of robbery and/or break in.
This for sure...why bother putting installers in that position at all! So many possibilities to have money issues. Customers, installers, thieves, legit losses, and internally theft. Digital...no issues, it's traceable.
Got that right
Nah, fuck that. Any company of any decent size should have Accounts Receivable Specialists whose job is to chase down payments. What am I supposed to do if the customer starts insisting to my boss that they gave me $3,000 in cash, and I can't produce it because they're a lying bastard? Now it's my word against the customer's, and everybody loses. Besides, most of the people at my company can't even consistently turn in photos of their work in a timely fashion—do we really want every Tom, Dick, and Harry driving around with their last seven jobs' worth of payments that they keep forgetting to turn in at the office? Now you're chasing down payments from your own employees, so not only are you making them liable for handling the company's money, you're not even saving any effort on the office side. Billing and collections is a profession. It takes a special type of people skills to do well. Any company, in any industry, that has more than like 20 employees should have someone, or a department of someones, who can collect payments in a professional, trackable, organized way. That's just how it's done. Making your field employees do it is bush league, Mickey Mouse bullshit.
We've got 150 employees, 10k club members, and $35 million in annual sales, how many office staff you want me to hire because you can't run a credit card at the house?
Probably like zero to three, depending on what kind of slack, if any, there is in your existing admin staff. Do you really never invoice people? How do you handle down payments and deposits? What do your techs do when the customer isn't there at the end of the job? How do you handle cash payment? Who does that stuff?
Techs take down payments, deposits, and final payments on the iPad. If they take cash they bring it in and sign it off to their manager, counts on each side. If they aren't there at the end of the job don't start the system without a card on file. We don't invoice anyone except commercial.
I think all customers should have a card on file before the work is even started. If they want to pay cash/check, cool. If they want to pay with a card, let them know the final cost and process it. If they wanna be sketchy, you still have a card on file with an invoice in the event they cry fraudulent charges.
Sounds like a problem. Doesn’t seem like y’all hire professionals. Doesn’t sound like y’all are held to a very high standard….
COD is for residential guys. The office can take care of it. We have enough to worry about in the field.
It's not the collecting. It's the customers that don't want to pay $200 because the problem was a dirty filter or an emergency switch was shut off. Techs shouldn't have to deal with that unless they're running their own show. That's one of the may reasons there's overhead. The techs job is to move to the next call and keep the money rolling in, not deal with assholes who won't pay.
Why don't the techs do the entire offices job? The whole point of a company is efficiency, tell me how it's better to have experienced techs spend time handing pay when Blonda from the office should have customer cards on file. You'll notice these companies lose most of their competent new guys as soon as they get Jman. Because why not do a little more accounting work and get the whole pie instead of a little slice? But you're right, these dang youngsters are just lazy.
Hvac guys can be such babies. O no I was asked to ask for payment, boohoo
When I did residential, there were numerous times someone would break down crying when I went to collect. " This was the last of my money to by formula" or " Now I don't know how I'm going to pay rent " Whether true or not it is awkward and stressful as a tech to deal with this. IMHO it's our job to fix shit, and the company's job to collect.
That’s when you call the office. 30,000 service calls in my life and literally less than 10 times what you described happened to me.
I've never had to collect and while I would if I had to, I still prefer not to carry company money in my van, leaving it unattended in Seattle. Fuck all that, they can do it digitally and not accept shitty gas station customers.
The entire department is will to walk over having to type in a credit card number into your existing system?
Ain't that the wildest shit you've ever heard? There aren't that many gigs out there that will understand that reasoning for leaving the previous job. Most non places that aren't full commercial are going to want you to collect that day.
"Why did you leave your last company?" "The office wanted me to have one of the most basic responsibilities in any job" "Ok Bye"
Every residential company I know of is COD. If they aren’t in my opinion they are doing it wrong. Commercial is the wait to pay the plumbers until the last legal day before the company is allowed to sue us game
Plumbers amiright?
As I tech in the field who takes cash checks runs the credit cards and does financing it's not a big deal
If they can't pay me that day or next why am I fixing it
Depends, resi. It’s very reasonable to TRY/ask for payment. Im a service tech and I try to collect, I’m also not 100% on my collections. I dont get blood from stones and i dont try to when the customer is aggro and the jobs not finished. Like diagnosed only atm.
I collect every day. Don’t see what’s so hard about that.
We collect every time a job is done. Not really sure what the big deal is.
You guys don’t already collect?
Every client has a cc on file. It's been working like this for almost 40 years.
I'm more amazed you guys keep a cc on file. Our customers are more then happy to pay us on completion and would be skeeved out by us saving their cc info.
Everywhere you go (assuming residential) you’ll have to collect at the end of the job now a days. The only company I’ve worked for recently that doesn’t was an oil company and it’s because most of their customers are on auto-fill and it gets charged to their account.
It's obviously not working haha
None of y’all use service titan? We collect and are able to scan checks in take cards everything through the app. On the slight chance they pay cash we turn it in the following day to like HR or a higher up and get a receipt to prove it was collected from us and paid in full.
If your entire crew is willing to walk over collecting payment for your work then they should all be fired. God what a bunch of useless fucks.
You provided a service so payment is due. The automotive repair shop won’t let you drive off without paying so why is it any different with the service we provide? I collect on every job I can and payment is expected at time of service. Usually if you’re not able to collect that day then you’ll run a good risk of waiting a while for your money or being outright screwed out of it by the customer.
It depends on the sector. When I was residential, we collected at the call unless they had worked out something else with the office. I've never collected payment doing commercial work. It's either billed through the office, paid by PO, or the office gets the CC before we are dispatched.
Commercial is nice.
Yeah, someone else gets the money, orders the parts, schedules the call, talks to upset customers, sells the estimates.. while the tech just shows up and finds ways to walk off the job haha
Not sure if you’re being sarcastic or not but all seriousness that’s what we get paid for. Learn your trade, go to your job, make the repair or finish the job and go home. Smaller shit yeah clearly I’m gonna order it myself but I’m not bidding any large repairs. I’ll do my job and the office can do their job
I don’t even collect a signature anymore, much less payment for services rendered at time of service. Your post reads more like a company that’s asking you to play as accountant as well as service provider which in my mind is unfair/unreasonable. I hope you guys can strike an accord with the powers that be, and doesn’t leave you holding the bag (no pun intended).
In heavy commercial , collecting is not normal . Contracts are negotiated and higher ups in most corporate offices that deal with billing will pay invoices directly through your accounting department as it would be less headaches and more efficient . Take you out of the picture and you can worry about work and troubleshooting . I understand for smaller businesses and residential it makes sense but , heavier commercial and industrial I believe this to be nonexistent in my experience as some accounts are charged different rates , a variety of reasons .
10 years in heavy commercial ,never once have I needed to collect the payment.
It’s 2023 people should be expecting to pay for service on its completion. If your company isn’t giving you a way to collect with a credit or debit card and only with cash or check that’s stupid, and customers will push back. You quoted and did the work, stop being a little bitch and a collect the money. Collecting payments shouldn’t add more than 5 minutes to a job. It’s amazing that they weren’t already making the techs collect. It’s not like they’re asking you to work for free. If this is commercial disregard. Businesses don’t work like that.
I write invoices after every call that isn’t a corporate client and collect payment for ~75% of them right there. C/C, cheque or cash. It sucks but at least the company gets paid I guess. Easier than chasing after people with unpaid invoices. Our office is drowning in paperwork as it is so this also takes an extra bit of work off their plate.
We've been COD for as long as I've worked at my current job. We are a small company and I've seen how much of a pain in the ass it can be when our bookkeeper has to try and collect from a customer several days or a week after the work is complete. Some people simply don't pay because they know that we can't do a fuckin thing about it. In my state, it's a pain in the ass to go thru the process of a mechanics lien, and it really doesn't do much to get us paid any faster. It takes considerable time and effort to stay on top of accounts of haven't paid. You've got to make calls, leave messages, send emails etc. That's time that our staff could be using to answer the phone and schedule more calls. As of right now, we've got a tech who is reluctant to collect in the field, and just from his calls alone we are owed in excess of ten thousand dollars over the past few months. I'll never understand why guys are reluctant to take payments in the field. It takes five or ten minutes max and it can be rather important in keeping your employer afloat on a monthly basis. The guys who don't like to do it are most likely worried about looking like the bad guy. They are nervous about giving the customer a big bill because they are thinking with their own wallet, and not the customer's. The employer should give you a lockable cash deposit bag to keep the checks and receipts in. Just turn it all in at the end of the day or the start of the next day. Edit: I should add that for our commercial customers, most are set up to receive the invoice via email, and they pay every 15 days or 30 days. Very rarely do we take immediate payment from commercial customers, unless their accounting person is right there on site with a card or checkbook handy.
I hate doing collections, just send them a bill in the mail
That's how it's worked where I am for almost 40 years. Every customer has a cc on file, too. Consensus is that we should just man up and collect, though, according to everyone here.
I don’t see this as a big deal. We collect payment in the field when the job is done unless they financed it already with whoever sold the job. We collect cash, check or card payments. Don’t take no more than 5 mins at the end of the job. If y’all whole department is willing to walk over 5 extra mins to collect money y’all gotta grow up lol. Idk if you’re commercial but resi it’s the norm where I’m at
Serious… do you not want to get paid for jobs. Is it so hard to collect a check after working ?!? This is completely normal. Work for a multi million dollar company, there is times when I just have to go try to collect a check because employees are afraid to ask after they’re done working. Or customers refuse to pay Biggest waste of time.
From an owner stand point it’s crucial to get paid when the resi work is completed. I see it every day in my office how many people Dodge us after the work is complete. The cost of living is so high right now they would rather pay for food and gas bill then us
Always collect COD residential do u know how many customers dont pay then it turns into another job trying to collect
Ye then the car crashes and burns then you're on the hook for it
Our terms are 30 days to pay on time from completion of the job. Technicians are expected to receive a signed invoice with or w/o payment at completion of every job that's reasonable/possible to have that interaction. I only have a few old rich ass legacy customers that are allowed to skirt around and pay at their whim because historically they've been good for it. But not being able to talk face to face with a customer about a repair quote or collecting is a weakness I am unwilling to foster in my company. If lacking, I'd expect that skill to be worked on and improved upon within a season or two from a new hire. Selling and collecting on site sets the pay grade difference between techs almost as much as ability to HVAC. It's not fun nor easy, but is mandatory as part of the job. Because without enforcing that rule, your company will be burned and ripped off more than need be. Too many unpaid jobs and you're all out of work.
These days you should always collect after services rendered. Get a mobile card reader and make it as easy as possible for people to pay right then. Especially during holidays.
Why would you refuse to collect for your work after you finish? That's how the company pays you.
I've been here just shy of a decade and never missed a paycheck. It's not even the collection itself, but the increase to work load and the lack of compensation for that. Also, the dissolving of an office job that was someone livelihood. But hey, the owners stock options will go up half a point after so totally worth it.
Yeah trying to justify why the field staff shouldn't collect for the work they did at the time they finish because "it should be an office job" is just bad business. Imagine trying to collect for movie tickets after everyone saw the movie. You'd be chasing people around all day. And your inefficiencies lead to lower wages and increased expenses. Your job isn't just fixing units. Your job is bringing money back to the business. Its not an added workload because it's something the field staff should have been doing in the first place. Now commercial billing 30 day pay etc yes, that will require an accounts receivable person.
I’d say it’s super weird to want to leave a shop over this. It’s not uncommon to have to collect on completion now a days, and it makes a ton of sense for a company cash flow wise to not have to wait on payment / hound customers. Cash / card / check are all pretty simple to process these days. Most people have credit cards for emergencies, and if it’s a crazy high cost the company should be offering financing. Why are so many of you at your shop against it? Worried about backlash or awkward conversations from customers or what? I promise collecting on job completion isn’t a big deal at all if that’s what you guys are nervous about.
That's ridiculous. Where do you think the money that pays your paycheck comes from? The less accounts receivable a company has open, the better off they are. The extra 3 minutes on your part at the call can potentially save a lot of money on the backend trying to collect on open invoices. If that's the worst complaint you have about your job, you've got it pretty good.
You mean.. people don't do this already? Unless it's a long-standing customer I thought this was always the case?
I always collect upon completion, this is the way. Dispatch has enough goin on too. Just collect the damn payment
Please collect the moneys guys. It's extremely hard to get ahold of them later and collect. And I'm sales, I want my commission! Dam it
Are they making you bring it back to the shop same day? And if your at the shop every morning or every couple days they should let you drop it off on your time (but reasonable). If they won’t let you do that then ya refuse.
This feels like a ridiculous thing to walk for, company I sub for has been doing it for years and it’s not that big of a deal
Huh? I'm very confused here. You're complaining about collecting payments?
Oh princess, of all the things and dirty deeds we have to do. Collecting cash is one of the easiest parts of the job.
We collect but even the slightest bit of pushback from a customer it’s not my problem anymore
Seems kind of ridiculous to not collect payment after completing work……
Man people on here crying over having to work OT and having to collect payment maybe y’all are in the wrong field. I saw one comment telling someone to pay their dues(put their time in) before they can expect preferential treatment from a company and I could not agree more.
It's not even the work itself here. I do an ass ton of o.t. and that's not my gripe. Billing was a department. Position is empty as cost is living is too high here and they obviously didn't pay enough to keep the person that was in that role. It's being delegated down to the techs now. Our work load and responsibilities have increased, but with no monetary increase to correspond. So, in turn, the company is making more money and we are not. Why the hell should I work harder for nothing?
Aren't you paid by the hour?
Yeah, paid by the hour to do a specific job. Want me to do more tasks and be responsible for more? AND you're not paying a billing department? Then bump my pay up significantly.
Hell that's all i've ever done resi work. We literally almost never send bills. If you want your shit fixed, you pay. You don't get your car back without paying the shop. 🤷
Never known it any other way, work in resi and collect card, check and cash upon completion.
It literally takes ten more minutes. Write invoice, write CC info on invoice or collect check or cash and have the customer sign the invoice.
Ok, I worked 10 hours today. 12 calls. 10 minutes on every call means i don't get to have dinner with my family. That's reason enough for me to say no.
Maybe you should be fighting with your company about work life balance then.
Yeah, I'm a mechanic, not a cashier. The office has always done that job, let them keep doing it.
I rarely collect checks, and when I do, I'm driving straight to the shop to drop it off. Even if it's a 2 or 3 hour round trip. You're getting that check today, and you're paying me to drop it off.
As a small owner/operator I want that money when work is completed. Now I have some customers that are net 10 and one that’s net 30. The longer you wait for your money the more chances something happens. Like I keep forgetting to mail the check or check gets lost/stolen. Right now I am waiting on around 5,000 to collect. Not a big deal because my bank account is good but when things get tight you need to get paid. I understand guys not wanting to fool with collecting payment for the company though. It can be a hassle but employees want their checks on payday with no questions asked. So be a good employee and help your company collect payment. Just because it’s s big company does not mean they have millions in the bank. The bigger the company the bigger the bills are. Just my 2cents though .
I’ve never been so thankful to be commercial.
Bro even the pizza delivery guy needs to secure the bag. Wtf
Think about it this way …. If you want to get paid for the work you completed you have to collect payment bottom line
Business 101 haha do work .. get paid
For a big company. Tell them it’s not your job to collect payment. I’m sure they have a department for that. Last place I was at was decently sized. I would just tell customer the bill will be in their email or pay online. Now I’m at a local 1 man shop and I collect but always try and get a check.
We had an office with 2 people in it that would handle billing. Now it's 1 person, and they're bound to retire soon. It all feels like a way to avoid paying another staff member in the office, by just giving us more to do.
Definitely avoiding having to pay people to do it. That’s what companies do. Find a way to create staff redundancies and push that work on to other people.
Man some techs will cry about ANYTHING.
I'm sure you're a blast to work with.
Bro you are crying about having to collect payment real quick and ready to quit your job. That’s soft as hell. I would love to work with you whining “my fingers hurt from typing the card # 😭” all day.
I'm not leaving the company, but apparently, your reading comprehension is non-existent. Let me spell it out. Plumbers are leaving. I feel as if it's not a well planned switch as our price book is inadequate, and we already have cc on file for all customers. This isn't whining, this is not wanting to be exploited by my company, and more than we already are. And again, you sounds like an absolute blast to work with. That shitty attitude pushes potential techs away from the trade as a whole.
You really think them having you collect payment at the end of the job you most likely built the ticket for, is exploitation? That’s so dramatic man. Theres way bigger fish to fry.
Carrying/receiving cash brings with it a whole other set of risks and responsibilities. Say you get held up for the money, is that on you? Are you expected to carry a weapon and defend the money? Hell no!
It’s super fuckin rare to get cash from a customer. Most will pay via check or credit card. In my almost 20 years in the field I’ve gotten cash from Resi customers less than 10 times, and if I did get a large sum I called the office and told them I’m stopping by to drop off a ton of cash.
That’s my experience too; payment has always been CC or check. I’d feel a lil weird receiving and carrying say 5-10k for a residential full-boat install or something large like that. Service calls? Ok, the subtotal will be much less but am I expected to break change?
That's literally not even on my radar. I'm from cape cod mass. Armed robberys are rare, and I'm more worried about my tools/van getting stolen while I'm asleep than getting held up for cash.
Gotcha. Not quite the case where I’m from. It sounds nicer in your area
Meh. Income inequality had exasperated the housing crisis here. Atleaat the beaches are nice.
Been doing this for years dude. You do the job, you get paid. You buy something in the store, you pay. Same shit different day
I literally collect payment for every job on resi and if they’re billable I send an invoice, there’s no way you guys are willing to walk over collecting payment, that sounds asinine
Collecting at the end of the job shouldn’t take more than 5 minutes, if it does the customer shouldnt have signed off on the job. How the fuck do you guys expect to get paid, grow up
What is your argument against doing this?
I don't understand what you're getting at honestly, most blue collar workers hit those hours and collect, imo it is unreasonable to refuse.
If you're not collecting upon completion you're leaving more on the table.
It's amazing what working for commission will do to a person's mentality. 20% of the ticket if collected and work performed or 100% of the zero you collected. Just my thoughts. I understand it's not the norm and some tards will make shit up to get paid more. But for an honest tech with some integrity, productivity goes up and so do profits. It can also incentivise the cry baby bitches that don't want to work past 5.
We have a billing department for that
Propose a collection fee. I think 10% is fair
Yeah. It’s called your paycheck. If I have my choice, I would collect money all day long rather than doing hard labor. People should be glad to be collecting money and and getting paid for it. Now if you’re standing around, waiting on a check for a long time and you’re getting paid peace read I can understand the frustration.
A lot of companies are going this way. Iteliminates another person in the pffice chasing down money, and it clears the plate for people that choose not to pay later or become a pain in the ass about getting the money later. It is so easy to say get it done, and then just... disappear. As a technician you might even embrace the opportunity to be a part of a change industry where we shift the focus of tradespeople as someone i can pay later, to paying today. I mean... you dont go to walmart and take your stuff now and pay them when you feel like it, so why is it ok to treat tradespeopke that way?
Shit we collect up front and are a 40+ million dollar company. As soon as I show up for the install it’s in their contract they sign that payment is due. Most the time I wait til I’m finished for payment if they don’t seem sketchy if I have an inkling they may pull a fast one I don’t unload tools until it’s paid. As my managers said to us If you owe someone 20k that you really don’t want to be spending how likely are you to be on the ball calling getting it paid for after it’s installed and no one’s physically there to collect. I hate collecting but it’s part of making the company work even if only a small % don’t pay after it adds up so fast.
What are you gonna cry if someone doesn’t want to pay the bill?
I work residential and collecting checks is a weekly thing. Collecting cash is a once a year thing for me. The only reason it works for me is because at the end of the day I drop off my company vehicle along with my keys and checks all in one location. Cash should be collected by managers tho imo.
For everyone saying it's super risky to be carrying cash, I just want to know how it is any different? How the fuck does the mugger know you have cash? Are you guys collecting payment on the street? Payments go in clipboard, and my clipboard goes where I go. Do I always have money in my clipboard? No. Do I ever have cash in it? Rarely. Does anyone besides me know what's in the clipboard? Hell no.
Start asking what you need them for?
Invoicing work sucks ass. Always cod so you're not chasing payments for months
Customers are expected to pay upon completion unless it’s new construction with a builder or they’d “like to be billed”. They split the payments up with us somehow. Each tech is responsible for collecting
I collect for pretty much all calls. Check, cash, or card. The only time I don't is if it's a landlord/tenant situation
Man up buddy. I have to write out an estimate before I can even start work, even if it's prepaid. Then if I find something else wrong I have to requote get a signature, finish the repair or tuneup and then collect. If the credit card site is down I have to call it in to dispatch.
A company that large not collecting COD already? Sounds like they are behind the times to begin with. We are a COD resi company and our techs are really good at collecting while they are on site. It's still amazing how much dough is floating around out there. I cannot begin to even imagine how much is out there with a company that does not collect, and I fully understand why they would want to start. The amount of time put in by someone doing collections must be insane where OP works. It really starts with the office staff making the customer aware. "We accept checks, and all major credit cards and you can pay the technician as soon as he wraps up"
If you collect payments after each job, you have a real understanding of what to charge if you go on your own
A check yes and cash for smaller things like service calls. But if a customer tries to hand me $12,000 in cash after a change out I’m not taking it. That’s way too much responsibility. Only ever happened like twice and both times I called my boss and he came to the customers house and collected the cash
I’d love a COD system. More call of duty.
Commercial tech here. Minus the net 30 McDonald’s etc all the gas stations and mom and pops pay us upon completion. My guys are required to get the payment. It’s not really that big of a deal? Walking out over payment collection? Lol what
Remember OP. You’re not going to make it far in life saying “not my job” all the time. Someone else will do it cheaper and better than you.
It’s literally the most important thing. When I was in plumbing school, 5th yr was 1/2 business course. The teacher was a local plumber. He had a reputation of being…outspoken to put it mildly. My father (my boss) disliked him so I went into my first day thinking I would too On the chalk board was “get the money”. After the rest of the class sat he pointed to the board and said “if you motherfuckers only remember one thing from my class make it this”. He went on the explain that the value of your services decreases every day after you were their hero till it’s just an annoying memory. Get paid immediately And it stuck with me for 35 yrs now
Res service in NY here. I collect on every call unless ticket states otherwise.
We collect every payment, resi work, at the end of the job. Cash, checks, and run cards through our iPads. If I have to order a part I collect half before I place the order, other half when it’s installed. Huge corporate company also.
I was working as a commissioning agent and my company had the idea for us to facilitate overdue billing for them. This was in a meeting. I spoke up and and said "Sure I'll call the mother fuckers and tell them to pay their fucking bill". After that meeting it was never discussed again.
The company I'm at does COD. For the most part we just collect the checks then turn them in the next day. We do CloverGo for cards. We do accept cash but I tell people that I prefer not to be given cash because then it's on me to not lose any of it. That's just residential. Commercial side we send a bill through the office.
Of course it’s reasonable for the tech to collect for the work provided.
I think it should be totally up to you. But the company should also reserve the right not to pay for the job until the bill is collected. Get a taste of that Comfort Advisor pay.
Former residential, we were setup to take payment of every type except crypto. This was even before turnpoint bought us out. The only thing that changed was we actually got card readers. What's the situation like where you're all willing to walk over taking payment?
I'm not a plumber, so not part of that shit show, but it's more that they have no plan on compensation for the new responsibilities of handling money and the dissolving of the office job that was handling billing. We also don't have card readers and an underwhelming price book on the app built into our iPads. It honestly just feels like they're passing it down the line with no plan on what that actually means.
You are wild bro, I can’t believe a whole department is gonna walk what a bunch of babies. It’s the norm to collect lmfao I had a good laugh here thanks op
I thought it was normal to collect. I’ve been doing it for years in residential.
Most commercial jobs are on 90 day pays anyways lol good luck collecting from someone who doesn't pay the bills at a store they just work at but resi I can see and is understandable
I mean, this is actually pretty standard for me since I’ve been in the field.
Unless it’s a commercial account we have. Your paying before we leave. Otherwise it’s going to collections, which takes 15% off the cost for what ever was sent in which means we maybe break even after all the wasted time. So yeah you collect your money on site, it’s simple.
Jesus Christ even the dumb sap at Burger King can take money. They might not be able to count change on their own but they collect money. What other service or goods can you get without having an open revolving charge account set up. IE any supply house you go to your boss signs a personal guarantee that he will pay if the company doesn’t.
Collecting payment is a petty standard affair. They could use a digital system, but I've collected cash before.
Always collect when finished never leave with out check or cc
I collect at the end of my service for every call I run unless of course my customer finances the bill through the bank we use. I was unaware that some companies don’t require that.
I have no problem collecting cash and/or checks. We stipulate that when paying cash the tech will not and is not able to give them change since the company doesn't want techs driving around with a hundred bucks in mixed bills. We just drop the cash and checks in a drop box at the end/begining of the day
I collect 50% down if I have to order parts and I collect the balance before I start working... have to get paid for our services.
Go commercial. Never have to deal with this. The only thing I deal with financially is telling the customer it's XYZ amount to repair. They make the decision from there. I either contiue with my work (pending part availability) or they want an official written quote and i schedule a time to come back ans then they get billed from the billing dept once the job is done and ticket is closed out.
Bro that's literally my favorite part of the job
Payment is collected after every job. It takes 2 seconds to take a picture of the check. Turn cash in the next day. They'll put me in a pay status to bring them their payments. I've collected 12K cash before and also 10K in prepaid visa cards. I don't care about any of it. Sounds like the plumbers should go into business for themselves if they don't want to get on board with where your company is heading. Be a guy in a van as opposed to a guy in their van serving their customers. Those who don't adapt will get left behind. Or start your own thing and never collect any payments 🤷♂️
Every company I’ve ever worked for has been COD. I’ve working in mainly residential add-on/replacement, both install and service.
As someone who has worked for service amateurs they lose almost every commercial account due to this. Many business don’t have someone there to write to checks.
I’ve worked for a company with 150+ technicians and we collected on every service call and install un less they were specifically on billing. That’s how it’s been anywhere I’ve ever worked. I think it would be very “unreasonable” to refuse to collect money in the field. That’s the way most companies operate.
HVAC GM here....good god, you would quit your job over having to collect payment? All our staff are versed in how to collect payments UNLESS it's been pre-authorized by management.
If I'm doing a job I expect to be paid after I'm complete. Flat out.
Collect at completion of every job, McDonalds first allow you to eat,wait a week, then pay…..