"Ed Pawlowski" wrote in message
...

wrote

The part that's most interesting is "This is in spite of my
agreeing to pay their bids. " I don't know what exactly
that means, but I'm assuming it means he agreed to
pay them for quotes? Did he just offer to pay them?


I took it as he was willing to pay the quoted price and did not try to
knock down the price. Whenever I bid a job, it was a fair price and if
you don't like it, thank you and goodbye. Once I negotiated down and I
was unhappy the entire time knowing I was making less than anticipated.
Lesson learned.

I can see a contractor agreeing to a lower price and later not being
happy, thus the no show.

When I was doing iron work, if the customer complained about the price or
terms or tried to beat me down, I'd just be nice, leave soon, and put an X
on the upper corner of the proposal. This meant do not do any work for this
person in any case. If they pound you down on the basics, they will pick
apart everything else. A proposal is just that, and worth less than the
paper form it is written on. It is not a contract (in most states) until
accepted, signed by the buyer, returned to the contractor, and deposit made,
or terms agreed upon.

If they called, I just told them that I had some big contracts come in, and
would be busy for months. I then had them call back later complaining of
what a bad job their BIL or the alien down the street did, and could I come
fix/finish the job. I would tell them how sorry I was, and that being a
licensed contractor with no complaints at the Contractors Board that I
guaranteed all my work 100%.

There are all sorts of reasons for contractors to no show or fail to
perform. And lots of times, we don't hear the whole story, or at least the
other side. But when it all falls into place, and everyone's happy, there's
usually a few very good reasons for that, and we don't often hear about the
cases where there is negotiation, cooperation, and working together on fine
issues.

MHO, YMMV, and all that .............

Steve, ex steel erection contractor.

Steve

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