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Re: Merloni
Heh Kev, it’s nice to see that the tom-tom system works way out there. 😉
I don’t think that anyone in here is dumb enough to want this work, it’s going to ba a nightmare farce IMO and one that could potentially sink businesses left and right. I mean FFS, NESN have told all the members up front that they will not be paying in full till February 05! How many of us are in a position to lend NESN and Merloni OUR money to save their asses! Then, to top that off they STILL OWE money to people that dropped them more than 6 months ago.
And now they accept a contract from a manufacturer that is notorious for not paying, rejections and not accepting stock back. Only this time you won’t even have any power TO actually send stock back or hold it in lieu.
Anyone that takes this on wants their head read, seriously. Let the bastards drown in their own pool I say and we’ll pick the spoils when the dust settles.
And yes, I am worked up about this one simply as I can see these fuckers taking out decent service agents by forcing them to go to the wall and that, IMHO, is just shite and I will do everthing I can to fuck it up for them and stop them harming the guys. So I ain’t done with this yet, I just need some debate opened to let loose again.
K.
Done and yes, any shite like that just delete it. They are trying to bring the topic back up to the fore, twats.
The same applies to blatent spamming, i.e. adverts with external links that are not industry related, just delete them.
K.
Well, I can be a bit more selective in what I read and, generally, I don’t go back and read what I write. If that makes sense. 😕
The page count rattles up the minute I decide to do anything on the site though, but Dave is constantly scanning all the spares stuff etc., also I sometimes use the NWAR login for admin duties, which is at No14 IIRC. 😉
K.
Re: Merloni
Well here’s a thought or two for you…
What if they are not allowed to sub out the contract work? Who knows what conditions apply there.
That aside, what would you rather do, the work you’re charging for back to an insurer and/or the customer directly or the warranty stuff? No brainer.
Of course they will pass out the warranty calls in the hope that we mugs will do a good job and get stocked up with us all hoping that the rest will follow in due course. Gets them out the shit, puts something back on NESN’s balance book and there’s no risk to Merloni due to the way the spares are being handled. They really can’t lose here as they’re taking fuck all risk and, in all fairness, the indies can’t fuck up this work any worse than Merloni already have. They probably weighed the cost of gettign it done, with those rates, against what they can reject and fuck about with and the on-cost to the other operations of the service arm.
Also their own troops hate the site of Ariston & Indeshit never mind us, so they have “in-house” issues in that area anyway, so farm it out and dump the problems on some other poor sod.
Fair play to them, it’s a good plan so long as you don’t have some twat like me seeing right through it. But they missed one vital little fact in all this, GIAS have already tried this approach more or less and so did they on a direct basis, in both instances the indies got badly burned fingers.
So I would suggest donning an asbestos suit if you take this on.
K.
Re: Hotpoint Advertise Franchises!
Del wrote:The Devil is in the detail I’m affraid.
Yep, it is indeed.
Del wrote:This addittional work is a pilot scheme according to NESN’S own press release and without wishing to cause any offence, it’s timing i.e. just before the Christmas mayhem is more than a little suspicous to say the least.
Well, just a but suspicious methinks, especially given the rates on offer. This, to me, looks like a desperate measure to bail themselves out and, of course, NESN are so desperate for work right now I think they’d sign a deal with Bellzebub himself.
Del wrote:At first glance the suggested fee of £35-6 would seem reasonable for volume work but is there any premium for gas work or tub changes ?.
Yes, there is. I’ve seen the rates and on the face of it, they are attractive for normal work, but this as we all know is not normal work. 😉
Del wrote:Are there any cast iron guarantee’s for the return of damaged or incorrectly supplied spares with a credit note by return rather than the usual 12 month plus, if at all, as is the norm where Merloni are concerned ?.
Ah, this is the bit that interests me greatly.
It is stated that you buy from your normal supplier and claim back, Merloni will check the prices to see that you are invoicing back at cost. That will take a staggering amount of effort on their part as well as add to costs as the spares distributors are not going to churn that stock around with no mark-up on are they? So why not just set up direct accounts?
Well, for one thing there’s loads of guys out there sitting with unused Merloni stock from the last debacle with them and, two years on, they’ve still not sorted that out. See my previous comments about a class action. So many of these guys are or will work for NESN or any other WP, they cn’t have a direct spares account as they are already in dispute over spares, now if it were one or two you’d have to think that it was a localised problem to the agent/s in question, but it’s not! Almost every single one I have ever spoke to has catagorically stated that they could not get any spares returned to Merloni. So, by doing things this way they eliminate that issue as the spares distributors won’t want to know about returns, especially on special order items which probably 90{e5d1b7155a01ef1f3b9c9968eaba33524ee81600d00d4be2b4d93ac2e58cec2d}+ of this will be to them and if you want the supply of spares to continue you will HAVE to pay for them irrespective of whether or not you’ve been paid.
Had Merloni used another WP, let’s say CDSL who would be the obvious choice given the givens, then they would have handled the spares and would have had to have had a returns policy in place. That would then have been kicked back to Merloni, but this way the onus is put upon the agent to pick up the tab on spares.
IMHO, this is an EXTREMELY dangerous situation for any service agent to be put in on warranty work, I cannot stress enough the risk in this.
Del wrote:If after Christmas let’s say by February the contract is not to be continued, will NESN undertake to remburse all agents for protracted delay’s by Merloni in picking up and refunding all unwanted stock.
Not a prayer of it happening.
Del wrote:With regard to the three month suggested call back clause. Does this refer to any other fault or same fault only. What if the fault is due to a failure of a component supplied by Merloni is it right that a NESN agent should be expected to underwright all spares supplied when there is no mark up on the spare in the first place.
No clarification on the point as yet.
Del wrote:Remember Hotpoint charge a minimum of £90 per completed repair !
We could all give a good guarantee for that fee dont you think ?Yes, but you won’t see any of that as it will be cherry-picked.
Del wrote:Is’nt it a little rich for them to expect NESN members to provide a better sevice to their customers, than they can provide themselves, for a third of the cost, that they are prepaired to work for.
Just a bit and on top of that a lot of the risks are passed to you as well, not very good and I would not entertain this work on that basis.
K.
Re: Merloni
The more I see of this the more it stinks, these rates seem designed to tempt people and there’s no way I will believe that these will be there for any length of time.
INVOICING REQUIREMENTS
Address Details – Customer name, address, and postcode
Authority Number – supplied by Merloni usually 15digits long
Agency Field – Engineer number – again allocated automatically by Merloni
Policy Field – Merloni Fault Code 6 digit number (2alpha – 2 numeric– 2 alpha)
Description of repair
Part Details – Merloni Part Number, description of part, cost of part (Merloni cost price only)
Date Complete -completion date of job.
The NESN network will be servicing Merloni in warranty products, mainly home laundry. Merloni will pass all service requests via the NESN Head Office facility where they will be auto-imported onto our system.Customers contacting the Merloni call centre are always advised of an appt date, the agreement with NESN is that this date will be the date they call Merloni + 4 days. This date will be shown in the Approved Field on Page 1 of the NESN system. It is important that ALL customers are contacted to either confirm that date or to move the date forward wherever you are able to do so. It is vital that customers’ expectation is managed with regards to appt dates.
Any special instructions from Merloni, such as directions, extra contact details etc will be shown in the Other Memo box on page 1.
On customer contact the job should be changed to Visit Scheduled with the actual Call on date logged in that field on page 1.
Any parts fitted to a Merloni job are to be charged back at Merloni cost price, Merloni will check the part detail and price at the prevalidation status so it is vital that this info is entered correctly.
Labour Rates
Call Type FC- White Goods £37 + vat
Call Type FC – Gas Goods £50 + vat
We have also agreed an out of hours call out charge, this includes weekdays after 6pm and any call out on Saturday or Sunday.
Call Type SC – White Goods £52 + vat (Out of hours call)
Call Type SC – Gas Goods £65 + vat (Out of hours call)
Call Type IN – White Goods £34 + vat
Call Type IN – Built in Electric Cooking £39 + vat
Call Type IN – Freestanding Gas Cooking £48 + vat
Call Type IN – Built in Gas cooking £50+vat
Call Type SI – White Goods £ 49 + vat (Out of hours Installation)
Call Type SI – Electric Cooking £54 +vat (Out of hours)
Call Type SI – Freestanding Gas Cooking £63 + vat (out of hours)
Call Type SI – Built in Gas Cooking £65 + vat (Out of hours)You also need to record the Merloni Fault Code in the Policy No field; the fault code is a 6-digit code, which consists of 2 numbers, 2 letters & 2 numbers. Fault code tables will be supplied.
All jobs must be completed for invoice within 5 days of the completion of the repair.
It is Vital that the NESN system is updated to enable us to accurately monitor performance and thereby increase volumes on this contract.These rates are top whack, why are Merloni paying them especially in light of what they’ve been offering up till now and in the past? It doesn’t make any sense other than two scenarios, one they’re so fucked for cover they have to pay them or, two, this is a short term fix.
If the former then why not offer similar rates direct? Many more people would have taken it up at those rates and they would have saved NESN’s management fee. The only reason I can see for it is those already outlined, that is that the spares situation suits them as they cannot be held accountable or to ransom due to non-payment. There really is no other reason that I can fathom.
In the case of two, well if it’s short term then that would explain the paying of high rates but why not continue with DAG as is? Where is the sense in changing the arrangement that they already have in place and, at a lower cost? It doesn’t make any sense to do that unless DAG are getting pissed off.
Like I say, the whole think reeks more than a week old fish.
K.
Re: Merloni
Okay, to get back to the topic in hand…
NESN have fuck all chance of making this a success, frankly CM is trying to repair the damage done by JT and put NESN back on the map. If she does that by fucking over the service agents then she probably doesn’t give a shit.
Let’s diagnose the recent message bit by bit.
I am delighted to announce that we have negotiated a great opportunity for the NESN Network. For a trial period NESN will be providing service support to Merloni for their in warranty products. Should this pilot prove successful, we fully expect to receive in excess of 40,000 jobs over a 12-month period.
Oh look, here’s some good news we’ve got some volume.
As you may be aware Merloni have some 1500 own employed engineers who complete on average 8,000 service calls per day. However with Merloni’s ever-increasing market share, they recognised that partnerships needed to be formed in order to maintain and enhance their reputation for customer service.
Merloni have more than they can handle and are looking to farm some of it out.
Such a partnership has been formed with Expert Appliances who are handling their refrigeration products and now with NESN for Home Laundry and other White Goods.
It’s good enough for Expert who are paying £40 a call so it’s good enough for us.
We decided that a four-phased roll out was the only approach for this pilot, mainly to ensure that the NESN network could handle the capacity offered but also to enable us to monitor that the contract is a viable option for both parties.
We have no idea where this is going or how long it will last and if it gets fucked up we’re out in the cold again.
Fortnightly reviews will take place during this period, where performance, spares supply, Technical problems and volumes will be monitored.
We know we’re going to have issues, especially on the specifics mentioned.
The Merloni philosophy has always been to prebook all appointments for their customers and as such the Expert Appliance contract is based around prebooked appts of 2 days hence. However, we knew that this was not a suitable agreement for NESN and our Members and after intense negotiations with Merloni, they agreed, last night that all requests passed to NESN will be on a + 4 day basis. This change in policy, which requires, amongst other things, system modifications at Merloni is a measure of their commitment to do business with NESN. It is vital that ALL customers are contacted to either confirm the date agreed by Merloni or to move that date forward where you are able to do so. Managing the customers’ expectation in relation to appointments is paramount to the success of this contract. Therefore both Merloni and NESN will be closely monitoring appointment dates offered, bearing in mind that NESN has a 3-day SLA with all of our clients.
I love this bit! Expert can do it so, so can you and we’ve already told you about Expert before now. They expect customers to be moved up, as in that you will prioritise Merloni customers and with the veiled threat, albeit very subtle, of the 3 day SLA that they have you under contract for.
Twats.
The labour rates agreed on this contract are, I am sure you will agree, exceptional for in warranty repairs. There is also an additional out of hours /weekend rate built in alongside a 3 month warranty on recalls. (NESN standard is 12 months on White Goods) Only genuine parts must be fitted but these can be sourced from your preferred supplier, providing that they are charged back at Merloni cost price.
Honestly, this one paragraph is the killer blow, read it very carefully and weigh the consequences of it in detail.
How can you agree to a labour rate being “exceptional” when you are not told what it is? Teh out of hours or weekend call rate is worded in such a manner as to assume that it is expected. 3 month warranty, but on what?
But that last sentence is just a topper, an utter blinder if ever I saw one. You buy from your normal supplier and bill back at cost with no guarantee of payment for what you buy. Also, how do they audit what you paid, what you bought or what you even used? This is just a fucking joke this is.
So in effect, you pay out for spares irrepsective of the outcome or payment status buying genuine spares with no way to withhold payment for rejections, unpaid invoices or unused stockholding. You have no recourse on any spares ordered whatsoever.
This is why they used NESN and not CDSL as CDSL could fuck them on the spares if they started to prick about as well as buy direct from factory, NESN cannot do that and, if the agents get screwed, well tough. It is also why they quoted the ridiculously low labour rates to direct agents as, quite simply, they know they’d have problems eventually with spares returns and training/tech info. Why on earth do you think NESN can pay £36 a call and yet the best offered to a direct agent is £30 and NESN have to have at least a few quid on top of that figure again.
So, in effect, yet again the agents are being used to prop up NESN and at the same time bail Hotperloni out the shite over the busiest period of the year, when they need the help the most. Don’t let it be you that gets fucked over.
I cannot stress strongly enough the importance of you, as service providers, utilising the NESN system to manage the progression of these service calls.
We’re stuffed if you lot don’t play ball!
All that remains for me to say, is that I believe this is a golden opportunity for all of us and as such lets all work together to secure the long term future of what promises to be a very lucrative partnership.
Yes, they would say that and yes, it will be lucrative for everyone, except the poor bastards that actually do the graft!
K.
Ehm, yeah too busy doing Hotperloni work and trying to work out if you’re screwed or plugged. Probably the former given what I’ve read of it.
There’s enough work for all, just keep your cool on it. 😉
K.
Re: Distriparts price increase
A nice summation of the effects that current pricing trends are having on the industry at large Alex, let’s hope that some people actually heed the warnings that we are giving them.
But somehow I think it’s unlikely until the final crunch does come. 🙄
K.
I didn’t realise it was in the public forums TBH I blindly assumed it was in the trade ones, but no matter I think it does serve as a great advert for us working together anyway. No sensitive stuff there anyways. 😉
K.
Re: Hotpoint Advertise Franchises!
I really didn’t have time to answer this properly earlier as I was a bit pushed for time, but before some of the more eager beavers scurry off to become an NESN agent to grab some of this please bear in mind what has already been said regarding previous experience with Merloni and NESN seperately. The fact that several people, after a year or more, have still not gotten spares returns sorted speaks volumes on its own but let’s dig a little deeper shall we…
NESN are still owing (so rumour has it) several companies money months and months after they stopped working for them. In some cases I hear tell that is over 9 months and in four figures!
NESN still, despite my repeated attempts sorted out my rejections that are 18 months or more old, shockingly (NOT) some of those are high-value repairs.
One repairer I am led to believe has had to resort to court action to recover bad debts from them, as far as I know this is ongoing NOW!
Buying spares from any old supplier is fine, but only IF you get paid on time to allow you to pay your spares bill and, Merloni motors and modules which you will use ain’t gonna be cheap, think about that one a bit.
NESN have apparently said they won’t be settling their monthly accounts with repairers in full until (estimated) Feb. 2005, so are you prepared to fund NESN/Merloni until they get back on their feet or, indeed, even take the chance on it? Now go back and read the previous paragraph again please.
Do you really think that NESN is the only provider that Merloni have approached? Why did they get this with such a decent rate where others have failed and, in one instance I am informed, for a lower rate?
NESN alledgedly have inferred that they successfully sued UK Whitegoods and that little gem only reached me last week, whether the allegation is true or not is irrelevent as it is totally and utterly false and, should I hear it again I will be left with little option but to take decisive action on the matter. If it’s not true and this was being fed in just to wind me up, well what does that say about the company? It is very hard to take legal action against an opinion of an individual and then they wonder why people want to remain anonymous, really is it any wonder?
And I am not a faceless person on UKW, neither are a lot of NESN’s critics in here and if they want me, then they know perfectly well where I am and they have the phone numbers and emails as well.
No doubt I will accused of “having it in for NESN”, well in some ways I do as I was unfairly terminated by them, a matter that they still have not even had the decency to apologise for. In addition to that they still owe me money, over a year later, think about that. But mostly what I don’t want is to see any of the agents come to harm and, if you have any doubt about the sincerity of that then you haven’t been paying attention to an awful lot of what I say and write.
So before you jump in feet first, think long and hard about the consequences that you may face.
K.
Of course as ever, this is only an opinion based on the information to hand at the time.
