Hello everyone-
I got a call yesterday for an inside only post construction clean on 12 large panes. The caller was the owner of a marble company, and they had either installed or restored a stone floor in this house. There were 12 large panes…5 feet by 10 feet high…on 3 sides of the floor. They had managed to get the windows dirty while doing their work. They attemepted to clean them, they failed, and thus the call. They have to have these windows cleaned because this house is going into 2 magazines and the photo shoot is this Friday. I was the only one they had called that had any time to do it.
I explained that yesterday that I had time, and that I’d be charging by the hour, and that I would need a waiver signed. I asked for their fax number so they could fax me back a signed waiver. They wouldn’t give me one. They said we’d meet the contractor onsite today at 2 pm.
I arrive at 2 PM today with 3 copies of the waiver in hand. The floor guy shows up at 2:10. The contractor was not there, and the floor guy tells me don’t worry about it, I’m on the clock, and I’m going to get paid for the time I’m waiting. In the meantime, we go inside to inspect the job. I point out 5 scratches that are already on the glass, and explain the whole fabricating debris issue. I told him that at this point, I wouldn’t even just squeegee the glass without a waiver because of the pre-existing scratches.
The contractor shows up at 2:45. I hand him the waiver. I explain everything to him with the floor guy standing there. I tell him theres loads of information out there, including www.stopscratchedglass.com. Then, the floor guy says “yeah I know” and he whips out a bunch of stuff that he printed off of Dan’s site and tries to show it to the contractor.
The contractor then says “I have to call my boss”.
The end of the story is I was there an hour and a half. I made $120, half from waiting for the contractor and the other half watching the contractor and the sub argue. I thanked them for their time and excused myself. All of this, and nobody was mad at me, and nobody blamed me for not wanting to do the work.
By the way, the glass was Oldcastle…a ticking time bomb.
No waiver, no work, no way, not ever.
