In the few short weeks I have been running the retic business I have seen how easy it would be to be shonky and take advantage of people. It makes me wonder how many times in the past I have been shafted and not even known it.

On a couple of jobs there has been extra work to do – work that was not quoted for and that was going to be an extra expense. As I sat and worked it out I tried to make the cost as little as possible as I know what its like to be hit for extra. The first person I had to up the price on was completely blase ‘oh yeah whatever…’ I think I could have made it an extra $800.00 rather than extra $400.00 and I would have had a similar response.

Yesterday I was doing a job for a young couple and it turned out there was some extra digging to be done and some extra parts to be purchased. The extra cost was $140.00 – quite a bit I would reckon for a couple of young 20’s. I did it as cheaply as I could and made a minimal amount out of the extra work.

But… if I were a bastard (a bigger bastard than I am 🙂 ) then I could easily have told them it was another $300.00 and they would have been over a barrel. I was almost finished and they needed the work completed so they would have had to pay. They were in a corner and I could have almost asked any amount and got away with it.

These thoughts cross my mind, not because I want to screw people over but because it highlights the level of trust we operate with in so many aspects of life.

Then today, as I picked my car up from the local mechanic today he charged me for 30 mins work because it running fine and didn’t need any more done to it. I thought that was pretty sweet. $44.00 all up – because that was all it cost.

I actually think the vast majority of people are quite honest and while they want to make a decent living they don’t want to screw anybody. I guess the tension point is the gap between what is fair and what is ‘expensive’ and how we navigate that.download parasomnia free