The Longest Day
The Longest Day, Thursday, June 21
After taking Rita back to the airport on Sunday, I had an appointment with an electrician on Monday to fix an electrical problem with my dining room light fixture, which would come on only dimly, and then go out. He came and replaced the dimmer/transformer switch in the wall, and made out what I thought was a hefty bill (any of you out there without a trade, think electrician). Thursday, June 21 is noted for being the longest day of the year. That day was a very very long day for me: I was expecting the plumber on that date at 8:00am to fix my kitchen faucet, which had been dripping under the sink. As an afterthought, I remembered that Rita told me that my guest bath sink faucet was very hard to turn on. So, expecting the plumber at 8am and wanting not to have to pay him for another trip on another day, I decided to have the part when he got to my house on Thursday. Therefore, as in the 3 Little Pig story, I got up at 5:30 to be at Home Depot to make this purchase and be back home with it before the plumber got to my house. When the plumber came, I said nothing yet about the bathroom faucet and he concentrated on the kitchen faucet, replacing all of the parts that he had told me to purchase. When he finished with that, I asked him if he had a bit of extra time to look at the guest bathroom faucet, and I showed him the part that I had bought. He said ‘sure’, and he seemed surprised that I had exactly the right part. It only took him less than 10 minutes to fix that one and then he gave me the bill.
Plumber Mileage and Labor: $91.72, Parts $121.57
Electrician Mileage $49.00, Parts & Labor: $149.00
Total: $411.29
Satisfaction: priceless
posted by Monica @ Saturday, June 23, 2007
7 comments
7 Comments:
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Your experience reminds me of one of my favorite plumber jokes.
The toilet backs-up in a man’s condo. Not being mechanically inclined, the man called a plumber. When the plumber arrived he opened his tool bag and unplugged the toilet in about 15 minutes. “How much do I owe you?" said the man. “$100” replied the plumber. “$100! That’s equal to $400 per hour!!” cried the man. “I am a senior CPA and I am not able to charge my clients $400 an hour.” “I know, neither could I when I was a CPA” said the plumber.
That's pretty funny. How is it that my blogs seem to remind you of a joke? But I like it.
I'm confused, you bought the parts yet was charged for them by both the plumber and the electrician.
Sorry. The plumber got his Kohler book out, and wrote down the part numbers for me to order by phone, and then to call him when they came in and he would put them onto my sink. So, the parts were charged on my credit card. Then, while on vacation in Sarasota, the maintenance man was sent to our unit because I was having trouble turning on their kitchen faucet. He replaced a part in the faucet and let me keep the packaging. Thus, when I got home and the plumber's parts for my kitchen had arrived in the mail, I called the plumber and we arranged a date for him to come out and fix my kitchen faucet. Then, before the plumber arrived, I had an epiphany and took the Sarasota packaging information to Home Depot and they sold me the same part as the information on the package to fix my bathroom sink and I had it when the plumber came. So the plumber installed both the kitchen and bathroom parts in the same trip.The plumber charged $92.00 for trip and labor for fixing both the kitchen and bathroom. It's the electrician who made out like a bandit for his parts, labor and trip. If this is too convoluted, it's OK. I'm happy that everything got fixed, but I'll find me another electrician if I ever need one again.
Today I had a roof repairman over to take care of a leak in the roof over the garage. I showed him where the water was coming in by a mark on the garage ceiling. he went up on the roof and checked at a gable corner. He said the corner had never been done right, came down, opened a new tube of rubberized roof caulk, back up on the roof and did the job. While he was up on the roof, I asked him to look at the other corners and he replied he had intended to do that. He fixed six corners, came down and started to clean his hands. I asked him how much all the while remembering your experience. He had been up there for about 30 minutes, and at my place for about 40 minutes total. He said you owe me nothing, this is just goodwill for me. If you ever need a new roof, call me. I wanted to give him $20.00 for a hamburger and he refused, just shook his head and said: "No it is for free." Does Krista do this kind of work?
Krista does do this kind of work, but only if the installation of the roof was their job. She will give them an estimate, tho. I cannot figure out why my Google blog makes me sign in like everybody else. Some of you guys' blogs recognize me without my signing in. What's wrong with mine?
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