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Subject:Re: Round #4263 with the Client From Hell From:"Dick Margulis " <margulis -at- mail -dot- fiam -dot- net> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Mon, 7 Jan 2002 11:05:35 -0500
Doug,
You understand the legal situation perfectly, as I see it. And I think everyone else does, too, including Andrew.
It seems to me that Andrew is arguing that people lie a lot, even when they supposedly agree to something and sign to a contract to that effect. He further argues, apparently, that the smart businessperson will assume the role of doormat and that this will curry favor with the CFH and bring so much return business that it will make up for the loss. (Humiliation is not an issue, because, after all, this is business.)
However, there is another school of thought that says the customer is not always right, and that Clients From Hell can be so disruptive to your business, so demoralizing to your employees, and so expensive to service, that the best course of action is to dump them unceremoniously. If you can collect a few bucks in court in the process, so much the better. The basis of this position is that caving to bullies, like voting, only encourages the bastards.
This is clearly opposed to the older principle that the customer is always right (Andrew's position, I take it). And at some point, each business has to choose which way to approach its customer qualification process.
Dick
From: "Douglas S. Bailey (AL)" wrote:
>As I understood it, the CFH agreed to the 7 steps when they signed the
>contract. Thus, it's not up to Elna's firm to worry about the steps. It's
>merely a case of the CFH reneging on the contract, which is what they did
>when they decided not to support the 7 steps. If they didn't like Elna's
>work process, they shouldn't have signed that contract.
>
>Or did I misunderstand the situation?
>
>
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