Freelance welding on my days off. A customer wanted to hire me to make a fence gate, but he didn’t have solid blueprints. He had a crude sketch drawn on a scrap of paper, but no specific measurements. I offered to come by and take measurements, but he didn’t even have a fence base to take measurements off of.
Essentially, he wanted me to construct a property fence gate of unspecified size and install it to a nonexistent perimeter fence. I told him these issues, but he didn’t care. He wanted me to build this fence gate, but he didn’t know what size, what materials, and where to install it.
I fired him. A welder’s reputation means everything. I’m not about to make a thing for a customer who doesn’t actually know what he wants. I did him a favor by walking away and not taking his money.
The spite sounds fun, but giving the customer what they ask for when they want a shit job is still going to reflect badly on you. A lot of the time, potentially problematic customers should just be directed elsewhere to make their data someone else’s problem.
Whether or not you gave them exactly what they asked for, if they don’t have a realistic vision/hardware/site you’re setting them up for a bad time, and they’ll bitch about you because you couldn’t translate the ephemeral concept of an idea that never left their skull into something that looked good or they wanted, and they’ll be sure to tell everyone who made the mess they’re unhappy with.
Freelance welding on my days off. A customer wanted to hire me to make a fence gate, but he didn’t have solid blueprints. He had a crude sketch drawn on a scrap of paper, but no specific measurements. I offered to come by and take measurements, but he didn’t even have a fence base to take measurements off of.
Essentially, he wanted me to construct a property fence gate of unspecified size and install it to a nonexistent perimeter fence. I told him these issues, but he didn’t care. He wanted me to build this fence gate, but he didn’t know what size, what materials, and where to install it.
I fired him. A welder’s reputation means everything. I’m not about to make a thing for a customer who doesn’t actually know what he wants. I did him a favor by walking away and not taking his money.
I would have made a gate per the drawing.
To 1:1 scale.
The spite sounds fun, but giving the customer what they ask for when they want a shit job is still going to reflect badly on you. A lot of the time, potentially problematic customers should just be directed elsewhere to make their data someone else’s problem.
Whether or not you gave them exactly what they asked for, if they don’t have a realistic vision/hardware/site you’re setting them up for a bad time, and they’ll bitch about you because you couldn’t translate the ephemeral concept of an idea that never left their skull into something that looked good or they wanted, and they’ll be sure to tell everyone who made the mess they’re unhappy with.
No tiny gate for you, then!
This, 100%.
I’m not about to tarnish my professional reputation just to spite a clueless customer.