CONSUMING INTEREST
For Services Rendered
By LESLIE ADRIAN
But the Daily Mail's revelations a few weeks ago of the imaginative service charges made for repairs to domestic appliances come into a more serious category altogether. Too many service engineers tend to trade on the ignorance and timidity of women by inventing defects that sound more important than a mere break in the wiring or a faulty connection. In the radio repair business, for instance, 'evening out' repair work has a long and dishonourable history. The argu- ment always went that tracing a minor fault that did not require the replacement of a com- ponent with an attractive profit margin was a dead loss. So to make up for the cost of such simple repairs the service engineer would over- charge for fixing a set in a matter of seconds (he would, of course, hang on to the set for a week to make it look good). There was just enough in that argument, in the days when everyone depended on the wire- less for home entertainment, to soothe a few consciences. Nowadays consciences seem tougher, and no excuses are given for charging £7 for changing a washer. But it would help all of us if people would be a little tougher themselves about the bills they get for service.
A correspondence in my possession between an angry customer and a dealer in refrigerators shows, however, that once the cash is handed over you can write letters till doomsday without redress. This unfortunate was given a bill for 44s. 6d. for a repair that cost 8s. 6d. in materials and 6s. for labour. The rest was 'travel' from Woking to Cobham, about ten miles. After two letters protesting at this charge, the customer received a reply from the service controller say- ing that this was a 'standard charge' worked out in consultation with the Pressed Steel Com- pany, consisting of 24s. an hour for the en- gineer's time and Is. 2d. a mile for the van.
A further protest brought a letter from the general manager of the agency saying that, had they known he would object to the travel charge, they would have sold him an 8s. 6d. door catch to fit himself. The general manager added that, in spite of the high charge, they had not made an 'exorbitant profit' on the deal. If they really had not made a large profit on such a transaction they must be inefficient as well as expensive. My correspondent, having paid cash on the spot (or rather his wife; I doubt if he would have) could not recover a penny. But perhaps the company concerned might be prompted to rethink their service rates.
A friend of mine has decided to give up National Savings (certificates, anyway). Ten years ago a paternalistic employer cajoled him into a savings group and he bought a 15s. unit once a fortnight. He did this for a year then left and took with him the little blue book of certificates, which he has just rediscovered tucked away among a pile of yellowing post-war credits.
He decided to cash the savings certificates and got form P57613 from the post office. He wrote down all the numbers of the certificates (nine letters and figures) and all the dates (mostly stamped upside-down or barely legible). He then counted the number of certificates (`i.e. documents,' says the form) in the book-twenty- four. The book unhelpfully says nothing about containing two dozen pages nor are the pages Numbered. He then crossed out all the sentences on P576B that did not apply to his request for payment through a bank, addressed an envelope and, finally, read condition (iii) Payment through a Bank. It says, 'Keep a note of the serial num- bers,' when sending in certificates for repayment. He says it's the hardest £6 he ever earned.
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