I dumped NO Fix No Fee..

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anth

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I did this for a short time..did not really advertise it, but I got to thinking what kind of impression does that give my customers.

" I will try to fix your computer and if I can't you can take it some where else"?

Frankly if I an cant fix it I should not be in this business, and should take up playing the tuba..may be I would be better at that.

So there really should not be anything I cant fix..and if it goes on my bench, how can I not charge for my time because... I could not fix it???

Everything can be fixed either with replacement parts or a brand new computer if that is what it needs to be..and sorry if this subject has already been beat to death..
 
anth said:
I did this for a short time..did not really advertise it, but I got to thinking what kind of impression does that give my customers.

" I will try to fix your computer and if I can't you can take it some where else"?

Frankly if I an cant fix it I should not be in this business, and should take up playing the tuba..may be I would be better at that.

So there really should not be anything I cant fix..and if it goes on my bench, how can I not charge for my time because... I could not fix it???

Everything can be fixed either with replacement parts or a brand new computer if that is what it needs to be..and sorry if this subject has already been beat to death..
Click to expand...

People like the No Fix, No Fee quote. You just need to clarify it. On my website I put a FAQ for it and it clarifies what it means otherwise people may think that they don't pay if they don't want to go ahead with the fees.
 
anth said:
I did this for a short time..did not really advertise it, but I got to thinking what kind of impression does that give my customers.

" I will try to fix your computer and if I can't you can take it some where else"?

Frankly if I an cant fix it I should not be in this business, and should take up playing the tuba..may be I would be better at that.

So there really should not be anything I cant fix..and if it goes on my bench, how can I not charge for my time because... I could not fix it???

Everything can be fixed either with replacement parts or a brand new computer if that is what it needs to be..and sorry if this subject has already been beat to death..
Click to expand...
This is exactly the ethos I work from, by stating 'no-fix-no-fee' you are laying the thought-seed that you might not be able to fix it. Truth is anything that was built by man could be repaired by man; reality is it may not be economical, desirable or practical to do so. Because you are the messenger as such, doesn't make you culpable. As long as you are able to give your best professional, informative advice then there's no reason a client will not be happy to pay for your advice and recommendation(s).

The only customers who will ask or seek for a no-fix-no-fee deal are the cheapskates who will not only do everything they can to pay you the least they can get away with for your efforts, but increasingly in today's litigious society they will even try and get you to pay for their consequential loss.

No-fix-no-fee has never been a good marketing concept. It's negative and demonstratives weakness and a lack of nous. Imagine the state of society if all trades and professions used this as a cop-out for not getting the job done?
 
I wonder about some of the companies (generally the big-boxes) offering a no-fix-no-fee structure. One I came across (gizmo) is:

Gizmo's no fix no fee guarantee means that if we cannot provide you with a solution to your problem, we will not charge you for our services. In some cases, the solution may be that you need to upgrade or replace your software or hardware.
If we advise you to do so and you choose not to upgrade or replace your software or hardware, you acknowledge that we have met our commitment to you by providing a solution to your problem, whether or not you choose to implement that solution.
Click to expand...
So basically, their fix might be to just replace your machine?! If that's not taking the marketing BS to the extreme, I don't know what is...
 
I recently took my car to the local garage with three different problems. They weren't able to fix any of them. I still ended up paying for them to try though.

(Ended up buying a new car, but please don't let this morph into another vehicle thread!)

So next time I'll be more inclined to take it to a garage who does "No Fix, No Fee" - except they don't exist afaik.

"No Fix, No Fee" can mean different things to different techs, and to different customers. If you advertise it then you need to really clarify what exactly it means on your FAQ/T&Cs.

It's one of those perennial contentious issues like fix/n&p, mac/pc, av/no-av.

I used to do it, and don't anymore. But may do again in the future!
 
Cambridge PC Support said:
I recently took my car to the local garage with three different problems. They weren't able to fix any of them. I still ended up paying for them to try though.

(Ended up buying a new car, but please don't let this morph into another vehicle thread!)

So next time I'll be more inclined to take it to a garage who does "No Fix, No Fee" - except they don't exist afaik.

"No Fix, No Fee" can mean different things to different techs, and to different customers. If you advertise it then you need to really clarify what exactly it means on your FAQ/T&Cs.

It's one of those perennial contentious issues like fix/n&p, mac/pc, av/no-av.

I used to do it, and don't anymore. But may do again in the future!
Click to expand...

And show prices/no prices :)

I know Iptech thinks differently but to me no fix no fee shows you have confidence in your ability that if I can't fix it I will not charge you. To me the client should get the message that there is no way a company would give that statement if they didn't think they could do the job. I must admit though you do agonise over these things. I used to have a prices page but did away with it.
 
We sometimes come across issues we cannot repair, but I usually still ask for a diagnostic fee of $25. Most clients totally understand we put time into it and think that the fee is more than fair. Granted, we don't spend HOURS on one thing without figuring out we can't fix it, but here is a good example.

Neighbor at the office dropped of a client machine is his and said it was full of viruses, blue screens, no networking, we were afraid this was going to take us all day to do. Once we got it, NO problems at all. My back end tech spent a couple of hours just making sure we didn't miss anything, nope.

Now it's not a virus removal nor a cleaning, just a $25 diag.
 
Along comes a customer..the tested the no fix no fee, that I just did away with..she had old HP Compaq, that just recycled it's boot process, turn it on it would get to the desktop then just reboot..

I thought no problem this is going to be an easy fix, it's probably going to be the MBR run a test on hard drive no issues..fix MBR..same results..hmmm..called her told her that we needed to reformat..she was fine with that..back up all of her data, I started to dban the hard drive...blue screen, ok.. I thought fine..I will just nuke and pave with out the dban..no such luck Windows would attempt to install then would just blue screen, looked up the blue screen error code and it pointed to hardware failure.

There are no other components..it had on board video, network, and sound..tested the memory..memory tested good.

What is was left...power supply tested it..all voltages good...Bios I don't think so..Motherboard...only thing left..it's older machine not worth replacing the MB.

So I her called her and told the situation, also told her that we have some Dell business class GX520's that she could purchase for about the same price she would have payed to get the computer fixed.

She was pleased came by picked up her new computer..very happy with it and even asked for a stack of business cards, she thought the price was too low and wanted to pay more, told no the price is good and you don't have to pay more.

This maybe kind of an unusually situation.. but it proves that "it" what ever "it" maybe can be fixed, and you don't have to take a loss on your time.
 
My back fee is $35 if that is that is the only work needed, I back all data when I do a nuke and pave..no charge. AV I install Comodo anti-virus and MSE.
 
anth said:
Along comes a customer..the tested the no fix no fee, that I just did away with..she had old HP Compaq, that just recycled it's boot process, turn it on it would get to the desktop then just reboot..

I thought no problem this is going to be an easy fix, it's probably going to be the MBR run a test on hard drive no issues..fix MBR..same results..hmmm..called her told her that we needed to reformat..she was fine with that..back up all of her data, I started to dban the hard drive...blue screen, ok.. I thought fine..I will just nuke and pave with out the dban..no such luck Windows would attempt to install then would just blue screen, looked up the blue screen error code and it pointed to hardware failure.

There are no other components..it had on board video, network, and sound..tested the memory..memory tested good.

What is was left...power supply tested it..all voltages good...Bios I don't think so..Motherboard...only thing left..it's older machine not worth replacing the MB.

So I her called her and told the situation, also told her that we have some Dell business class GX520's that she could purchase for about the same price she would have payed to get the computer fixed.

She was pleased came by picked up her new computer..very happy with it and even asked for a stack of business cards, she thought the price was too low and wanted to pay more, told no the price is good and you don't have to pay more.

This maybe kind of an unusually situation.. but it proves that "it" what ever "it" maybe can be fixed, and you don't have to take a loss on your time.
Click to expand...

If this is really what happened, you may wish to review your basics, as well as your diagnostic and repair procedures.

Rick
 
He does have a point.

I'd love to know how you came to the conclusion that a computer that has booted to the desktop has an MBR problem. Or why you'd need to overwrite the entire drive with DBAN.
 
MobileTechie said:
He does have a point.

I'd love to know how you came to the conclusion that a computer that has booted to the desktop has an MBR problem. Or why you'd need to overwrite the entire drive with DBAN.
Click to expand...

Good point on the MBR, it would not have never booted up if it did have a MBR problem.

I had the recovery disks, if I have the recovery disks I always run DBAN. Drives right in the edge usually fail dban ( in my experience) I would rather have the drive fail while it was in the shop.
 
anth said:
Good point on the MBR, it would not have never booted up if it did have a MBR problem.

I had the recovery disks, if I have the recovery disks I always run DBAN. Drives right in the edge usually fail dban ( in my experience) I would rather have the drive fail while it was in the shop.
Click to expand...

Fair play but there are quicker and better ways of testing a drive than DBAN and they don't overwrite the drive, something which you might be overjoyed with should you discover that your backup failed or they change their mind about not having any useful data!

Drives with reallocated sectors, which some would consider as worthy of failing, can pass DBAN. I find a quicker method is to check SMART first because that will show up drives that SMART knows are bad in seconds, then Seatools short test because again that will fail some drives in minutes and then you only need to fully test the ones that make it that far with a long generic test or MHDD or similar. In the long term this sort of sequence can save hours by avoiding whole-drive testing a reasonable % of drives.
 
You do realize that just "testing the voltages" on a power supply is not going to tell you if it is good or not? The symptoms you described sound like a textbook bad power supply that is failing under load.
 
Last edited:
ATTech said:
You do realize that just "testing the voltages" on a power supply is not going to tell you if it is good or not. The symptoms you described sound like a textbook bad power supply that is failing under load.
Click to expand...

Thought about that after I completed the job...it may have been a bad power supply even if voltages tested ok, like you said reflecting back at did look like text book power supply failure under load.

Live and learn by your mistakes...I made the mistake but my customer did not have to pay for it..she is much happier with her new computer.

And if I had to do at all again...I still might have recommended a new computer simply because of the age of the Compaq.
 
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