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Re: e-Jobs
Over the last weeks I have been watching the development of various threads and the building excitement that seems to be infecting some of the members of the forum, I have become worried over certain issues and ideas put forward and only Kevin’s input seems to be having any effect on the discussion, he obviously feels the same concern as I regarding e-jobs and the allocation of such. My reference to DASA and jobs for the boys was due to the elitist attitude they had when it was first formed and that is what came over to me when I started reading this thread, with its references to agents and franchise holders.
But I do have more serious concerns over this issue that have not yet been brought to light and I feel could, if allowed to continue, damage this site and its growing reputation very seriously.
My concerns are to do with the membership and the lack of knowledge of the reputations of such members. Now we all know that we are all jolly good chaps that would never rip anyone off and our reputations and qualifications to do the work is obviously impeccable or is it? I have been on this site only a short time but have come to respect certain individuals as intelligent knowledgeable people but that does in no way tell me what kind of work they turn out, or if they are just bodge it and leg it guys! Now don’t get me wrong, I am not trying to slight anyone in particular but if the work is filled from this site and the customer is dissatisfied, it is this site that will be seen to be responsible and I would ask Ken to have a really serious rethink of the whole issue before ploughing ahead with this plan.
The potential income from work gained on this site is tremendous but the damage that could be done to the site by unscrupulous cowboys is a greater. Lets face it all you are asking the members to do is join the site and then to subscribe and sign up to the charter in order to join in the e-jobs and you know nothing abut them am I being paranoid? I think not.
I believe that some kind of vetting should be put in place prior to being allowed to join in the e-jobs maybe your new AC could come up with something? I don’t know, I only know that this is being rushed and could harm the site beyond repair if it all goes pear shaped.
Richard Scanlon Snr
Teeth, Richard, teeth. The AC will have teeth and if necessary WILL use them. That’s the whole point. UKW as a body now is virtually self regulating, it will extend into the eJobs area too. If it doesn’t, the AC is an accountable body and will act.
Those who sign up are agreeing to be regulated by the AC as part of the deal.
Would you wish to be named and shamed on the site? It shouldn’t happen – but it could, and sadly one day probably will. That it will be seen to happen is actually in our favour.
So we’re all going to do it right, aren’t we?
Regards,
Penguin45.Re: e-Jobs
Richard,
As usual you are absolutely correct.
However, whilst we do “vet” as much as possible it would be unfair to exclude anyone on the opinion of the local competition as that trade association we all know and love has done. It is entirely unfair and leads directlty to the “elitist” path that you so correctly point out, being an authorised agent or not has little bearing on that as there are one hell of a lot of “approved” manufacturers agents that are not in DASA. One leading manufacturer’s WP told me recently that they would be surprised if even 40{e5d1b7155a01ef1f3b9c9968eaba33524ee81600d00d4be2b4d93ac2e58cec2d} of their network was in DASA. So to me, also knowing some other bits and bobs, that’s a non-starter as a reason for DASA being accused as being elitist.
Also, whilst I’m not defending DASA here, it was started by Zanussi agents to combat the cowboys which, at the time, were rife in this trade but the trade has changed dramatically since that time and the “cowboys” are no longer the issue that once they were. I do realise that there are unsrcupulous traders out there and I want them gone as much as we all do, but any trade has them and always will all you can do is to combat them with information to the customer. Customers (or many of them) are stupid, they think they’re getting a bargain when they’re not. But I digress, this setup led to the view that DASA was an elitist organisation and through the years DASA has done little if anything to change that view and not talking to the trade was the gravest mistake of all IMO.
Spilt milk, let’s move on…
We do vet applicants, we don’t judge them. And that’s the beauty of UKW as well as, I guess, it could be it’s Achilles Heel to an extent.
However what you also have to bear in mind is the support available here, even from competitors in the same area/s that is freely given to try to improve the industry, full stop. If they have an issue then it is possible to find a cure right here, where they began with that work. It is an entirely unique and new approach, quite radical in many ways.
If we recieve a complaint from a customer there are several mechanisms in place to deal with it, not least of which is the one I WANT to see put in place, which is the Advisory Council. This is again a totally unique take in solving exactly the situation that you describe and, I believe, an industry first if not a world first in concept. It may not work, but I feel that we have to try and I think that it’s a very worthwhile goal to aim for.
I also truly believe that it will be a success or I wouldn’t bother with it.
But I stand by the maxim of vetting, not judging. If someone abuses that then fine, it’ their loss as we will axe them from e-Jobs. The structure and rules are already in place, all I need is the bodies to do the job of judging in any such cases. I will have no compuction at all to retain the chaff, we want the wheat.
K.
Re: e-Jobs
I have often remarked whilst still in Dasa that once past the joining routine NO checks were ever made on the member. This was thrown at me several times by work providers during the network-dasa days.
So learning from that mistake has to be the way forward.
Well the only way to vet and monitor is to have regular visits by a representative who is there not only to keep you in touch but to make you conform also.
So the fear of losing something will not alone “vet and monitor” our members. As to how to employ someone in that role adds a new dimension to “subscriptions” and as Ken says “self policing”.However, as the more astute of you might guess, we do have options which we are working on. So give us till the Feb 05 meeting to progress the problems of “how we regulate the membership”.
Not an immediate answer Richard but we are working on it.
I do have a short term solution to the problem also and will chat to ken and dave about it, today.
Kevin
Re: e-Jobs
kwatt wrote:2. You allow the customer to chose from a list as is suggested
I refer back to my previous post on the subject. Giving the customer the choice will always be a better option and number 2 gets my vote :tup:
kwatt wrote:in which case any control that we had is lost.
What control do you really need other than an established Advisory Council in place should their be any come back? Bearing in mind for a moment, we are trying to encourage more and more repairers to join. If then 5 members are in one area, throw the jobs up in the air to land fairly and squarely on the customers lap, there’s no more fairer way than that. 🙂
Unless that is seen to be done, you won’t recruit any in joining the system and certainly none would subscribe to a ‘random’ allocation that’s for sure. Also a point very much an important factor is simply that these days less and less chargeable work is coming out of it. Quote £50 call out and the customer runs a mile in the opposite direction and buys a new machine.
Martin
Re: e-Jobs
Yes Martin but giving the customer the choice means, in web terms, that they generally chose the one at the top of the list as Dave rightly points out. Unless you start to make clear the differences and there’s only really agent or not and charges to do that.
I think the general consensus is to go with option 1 and discuss this further at Sibson in Feb, which is only a few weeks away anyway. It will allow us time to see just how the land lies anyway and what sort of volumes pass through the system, bearing in mind that it is new and will take a few months possibly to start really producing.
What I want to make clear is this though, this is a subject for the repairers ONLY meeting on the Saturday! This is our baby and we do not want to have this discussion in front of insurers, WP’s et all on the Friday so leave it be till the Saturday. In so far as they are concerned we’re all happy campers.
And Martin, it’s not random. Read through what it does again. 😉
K.
Re: e-Jobs
Hi martin,
I’ve been on a completed call rate of £50.00 plus vat for 12 months now without any appreciable drop of uptake of our services.
For de deitrich we quote £80.00 plus vat with 80{e5d1b7155a01ef1f3b9c9968eaba33524ee81600d00d4be2b4d93ac2e58cec2d} uptake from customers without problems.These prices do scare away those who want summat for nowt.
Kevin
Re: e-Jobs
Take a long weekend, then come back to 4 pages on this one.
After a while I got fed up with reading as it seems to be an argument going nowhere.
Quite simple, let’s be grateful for what we can get out of this. There are bound to be some calls we each gain we may never have seen in the first place. Added to that we may miss some what we feel is rightfully ours, but in the meantime capture a call that would have been someone elses; healthy competition I call that.
All we should do for now is to work on whatever we get out of this, and manage whatever calls happen to land our way. Once the “lurning curve” is over, then we can be more territorial, dot the I’s cross the T’s etc.
You can be as pedantic as you like about it, but there will be the odd call you would rather not have for whatever reason; and if you are too inflexible, you won’t be able to suggest another agent take it on if you are busy or feel you cannot provide a good service.
Alex
Re: e-Jobs
Well Alex you will bugger off on holiday! :rotfl:
You’re right, let’s just make it work and sort it out later, as always we’ll remain entirely fexible on it and await the results as and when they happen to reach a more orderly way of doing things. Right now it is an entirely unknown area as it’s never been done before.
However I do think that the discussion was well worth having as, I don’t know about anyone else, but it’s taken my thoughts on different tacts and that, to me, is a good thing.
K.
Re: e-Jobs
That can be a dangerous path Richard in terms of marketing ourselves well and I think that the forums, in conjunction with the use of the Advisory Council, will be more than sufficient for now.
In the future, you never know what’ll happen. 😉
K.
I see your point Ken, I just thought that if they could read the compliments link it would encourage more people to try it. I never ment for the complaints to be public untill settled one way or the other
Richard Scanlon Snr
Re: e-Jobs
Yeah I know what you mean by it Richard, but the idea here is to raise our game a bit, maybe a selected “quotes” would be the way to go, in conjunction with the forums etc. it really doesn’t take much more I don’t think. Anyway, the forums is the best advert we could possibly have in all honesty as the guys are just brilliant at helping the public, but then that seems to me to be what this trade is, a bunch of guys/gals that just want to help people and if they make a bit in the proccess then all the better.
K.
Just so you all know…
The Repairs@ module now seems fine and working as we want it, as well as being a LOT easier for us to manage remotely via the usual web interface. Hats off to Calum and especially Paul that did all the coding for this as it really is very, very cool.
So tonight Dave and I will be entering on all the repairer details that we have but it’ll be mostly Dave so buy the poor sod a beer when you see him next as, believe it or not, I have a meeting this evening but I’ll get a couple done. 😉
Point is, we’ll test a few tonight or tomorrow with a view to Repairs@ being live at some stage tomorrow afternoon or early evening.
K.
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