On Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 9:28 AM, Terry Farrell <mfarrel2 at tampabay.rr.com>wrote: > I'll try to make this as short and clear as I can. A piano teacher calls me > asking $$ for tuning. I tell her my standard fee. She asks if I give > discounts if she can get some of her students pianos for tunings. I said I > don't discount. She asks again. Business is a bit slow due to economy. I > said that I do discount $10 off a tuning for churches or other organizations > with multiple pianos where I can submit one invoice. She asks if I can do > that for her and her students. I want more work, so I relent (yeah, yeah, > you know where this post is going, don't you?)...... Okay, standard $$ less > $10 for you and your students - if we can get them to schedule on the same > day, etc. so it works well for me. Agreement reached. > > First of all, it took me three visits to tune her Yamaha upright (nice > piano). First visit I raised the pitch about 15 cents (she did move the > piano from out of state, and was somewhat flabbergasted that it was off > pitch because she has it tuned every year). While raising the pitch, about > 15 little children showed up along with about 5 young mothers - kids > screaming, TV blaring, moms chattering - you get the picture. I told her I > could not tune her piano with all the noise - let's reschedule. She agreed > and apologized for the noise - the new appt. would be noise-free she said - > we set it for a few days away at 4 PM - I told her it would take me an hour > to tune her piano. I was over on the far side of town that afternoon on > appointments and ended arriving at problem piano teacher (PPT) at 4:30 PM. > She let's me in the door and asks why I wasn't there at 4. I told her my > schedule and work got me here at 4:30 (with an apology). She said she had a > date with her husband at 6 and needed to start getting ready at 5. I said > okay. She said she was uncomfortable with me in the home after 5. I said > "okay, I understand, I apologize for the confusion, let's reschedule - is > tomorrow at X okay?" She said that would be good. Show up for the third time > (Saturday afternoon - she had a recital that evening and I wanted to be sure > to have her piano tuned for it), give the nice Yamy a darn good tuning. She > wrote me a check for PR + Tune less $10. > > Before I left, she asked me if I could fix her player unit (disclavier > (sp?)) - turned out it worked okay, but after she played a bunch of pieces, > I asked her if that was a quiet at the unit would play (the best it could do > was approaching forte!). She said yes, that was as quiet as it would play - > and then added that level was as quiet as SHE could play the piano. I said > something like "I'm sure you can play quieter", she said no. I opened the > piano lid and looked at let-off. Most hammers were letting off at 1/4" to > 3/8". I explained about action regulation and how excessive let-off would > make it difficult to play quietly. She said she understood and that my > explanation made sense. I told her if she ever wanted to improve the > performance of her piano, we could schedule an action regulation. She said > she would think about it. Great. > > So the next day I tune the piano of one of her students. This was the > Funky-Case 1959 Wurly console I posted about yesterday. This piano had seen > A LOT of HARD playing - like it had been in a southern Baptist church for > many years. The entire middle section of keys were low (key-leveling low), > for whatever reason, let-off was about a micron away from the strings (those > notes that went through let-off), excessive lost motion, and needless to > say, the entire mid-section of the action had bobbling hammers. You could > get most of them to strike the string once if you really whacked the key, > but most of them would bobble on a medium blow. All hammers were deeply > grooved. Several hammers were flat because their center pins had walked out > and they moved erratically (wildly). Another 8 or 10 were very loose and you > could see the pins had walked. Another dozen or so felt okay, but you could > see the pins walking. An old stick & wire repair on a hammer shank fell off > while I was testing things. > > I discussed the piano ailments with the owners. The player was a young > child playing only a few months. I recommended three levels piano > improvement: 1) replace piano now; 2) do minimal regulation and repair to > make the piano functional and reasonable for a beginner student and then > replace piano within a year or two; 3) if the piano were not going to be > replaced, then I recommended full action regulation and repairs. Hubby asked > repeatedly if we shouldn't do the full monty anyway, I said that was fine, > but that if they were going to replace it within a couple years, that I > could make it function reasonably well for half the full monty cost. They > agreed to the minimal regulation/repair approach to restore function. I told > them I would call them to schedule the work. > > Before I left, I raised the pitch of the piano 50 to 90 cents and spliced a > bass string that broke during the pitch raise (man, that was the loudest > break I have heard yet!). Told them we could settle up $$ when I complete > all the work. > > Except for three trips to tune PPT piano, sounds okay so far - right? > > So, yesterday evening, PPT calls and leaves message - "How come you are > charging Mrs. Funky Case (FC) $X to tune her piano when mine only cost > $X/4?" PPT apparently played the FC piano when they bought it ($300) a few > months back - she concluded that the piano played just fine. I called her > back after waiting for the smoke to stop coming out of my ears....... I > explained to her about action wear and regulation. Fortunately I was able to > incorporate what PPT and I had talked about with the excessive let-off on > PPT Yamy. I also explained that half the notes on FC piano had gone so far > out of regulation that they were bobbling (multiple strikes) AND that > several hammer/butt assemblies where FALLING OFF AND that another dozen were > very loose. She explained to me that FC didn't even want to tune the piano, > but that PPT had told FC that the piano was sooooo far out of tune that she > really should have it tuned (wow, imagine that). She told me there was no > reason to do any more work on FC piano that what I did to her piano (PR + > tune). I bit my tongue and said that was fine with me, but that the piano > was untunable as notes were bobbling and hammers were falling off and were > not even hitting a number of strings and that I would not be able to tune > the piano. Goodbye! (I was maybe a tad huffy, but given the situation, I > think I kept it quite reasonably under control.) > > Okay. There it is, that brings anyone that has read this long diatribe this > far up to the current situation. I'm of two minds: 1) Do not do any more > business with PPT or ANY client spun off from her AND, when someone calls > asking for a discount, tell them YOU DON"T DISCOUNT PERIOD!!!!; or 2) Do > whatever FC wants and try to make them as happy as possible. Mrs. FC and Mr. > FC really seemed very nice and concerned about having a decent piano for > their children (four) to play. > > Believe me, I have no problem at all walking away from ANY work related to > PPT and her spin-offs. I value peace and low stress in my life. BUT, I would > like to help them if they want to have their children playing on a > functional piano. Can anyone think of an approach to convey to Mr. & Mrs. FC > that I'm not trying to rip them off, that their piano is worn to the point > of disfunction, and that it will be a detriment to their children's piano > progress and experience to have to practice on that piano in its current > condition. Heck, I don't really need to take the action back to my shop to > repin a dozen action centers - the main reason I was going to take the > action back to my shop was that I was going to file the hammers at no charge > - that didn't need to be done to restore function, but I just couldn't stand > it! > > I find this situation bizzare. I knew it, I knew it, I knew it. Right after > I got off the phone with PPT when we set our initial appointment, I walked > over to my wife and told her about the discount, and I said that I just know > something really funky is going to happen with this teacher. I know I > shouldn't have given her a discount, but with business being a little on the > slow side, I'd rather tune several pianos at $10 off rather than zero pianos > at full price - but I just know something bad is going to shake out from > doing this. > > Any suggestions to help four kids get a functioning set of keys under their > little fingers? > > Oh, and, I have not yet called FC back to pick up action (since PPT told > them there was no reason to repair/regulate their piano). > > I'm glad this list is here for venting. I feel a bit better! Thanks! > :-) > > Terry Farrell > > PS, I hope there are not too many misspellings and grammatical errors in > this post. I usually re-read before sending, but in this case, in an effort > to not get all steamed up again, I'm just going to hit send now! > > > Hi Terry, I feel your pain, I've been there, recently. One thought that I didn't see suggested by anyone else, if you have another tech that you can ask the favor of either have him/her accompany you back to Mr& Mrs FC and offer a 2nd opinion or send him/her alone. I recently did that with piano player(pianast is to elevated a term)in a church who felt the grand piano I had re-hammered, installed new shanks & flanges, rebushed keys, regulated "didn't sound or play as well as it did prior to the work being done". We're talking about an american made grand from 1959 that hadn't had a full regulation since it left the factory or much else except for lost motion and tuning. I invited a friend, another tech, to meet with her and myself to ascertain her complaints, she couldn't really put her finger on anything face to face. I had discovered from the minister that she really wanted to get rid of the acoustic piano and get a digital!! It has been my discovery over the last 40+ years in this business that the most poorly informed opinions and frequently most poorly cared for pianos belong to piano teachers. Good luck Mike -- It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. Aristotle (384 BC - 322 BC) Michael Magness Magness Piano Service 608-786-4404 www.IFixPianos.com email mike at ifixpianos.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20100323/f1717e9f/attachment.htm>
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