Sorry, not to win something…
Being better than the competition is something that I’ve long prided myself in.
To be better, or the best, you have to be not just good at what you do, but scrupulously honest as well.
I have never feared competition because of the service I provide – you only have to see the reviews to back that up – and the help that I often give for free as well as never overcharging.
So why am I writing this? Because some people out there are just the complete opposite. No good at what they do, but also disgracefully dishonest as well.
Until recently I wasn’t too concerned with anyone in the Peterborough area, other than some of the phone repair shops, but yesterday a 13”, 2011, Macbook Pro was brought in to me that wouldn’t charge, and wouldn’t boot up but had been taken to someone else somewhere out of Peterborough, a nice guy apparently, but so far as of his depth as to be laughable… or at least it would be if he hadn’t charged this customer £150 for, as far as I can tell, nothing at all.
He offered to upgrade the memory from 2gb to 4gb for £30, which is a bit odd as the Mac was sold with 4gb memory in the first place. Apparently he’s now saying that it wasn’t to do that but to replace a defective 2gb stick – but he also charged £120 for “solving the problem” of not charging or booting by replacing the DC in board… except that if he did it at all it was with a secondhand one – it still had dirt on the magsafe around the pins. The only problem is that the one he supposedly fitted didn’t work either which is why it was brought into me. From what I saw I doubt very much that anything was replaced.
I checked and charged the battery in a different Mac and reset the SMC in the problem Mac and it was working fine for a while – maybe that was what the other chap did. Eventually I did have to replace the DC-in board and it’s now working fine. The cost was less than half that charged by the nice chap who seemingly did nothing.
I don’t charge for what I don’t do, I don’t charge for problems that don’t exist and I usually know, after 37 years of looking after Macs, exactly what needs to be done.
And I don’t fear competition.
Why do other people lie and cheat their customers? I have no idea. To me it’s a recipe for disaster. Maybe other people need to rethink their modus operandi.