The Huddle - Episode 132 - Flooring Feuds: Settling Debates Between Installers and Clients

Are you tired of those pesky disagreements between installers and clients? In tomorrow’s episode of The Huddle, we dive headfirst into Flooring Feuds: Settling Debates Between Installers and Clients. Join Paul, Daniel, and Jose as they share real-world scenarios, proven negotiation tactics, and practical tips on how to find common ground in even the trickiest situations.

Whether you’re an installer, contractor, or homeowner, you won’t want to miss these insights on turning conflicts into win-win solutions..

The Huddle Podcast is where the flooring industry comes together to connect, learn, and thrive! Recognized as the #1 podcast in the flooring community, we provide an unmatched platform for professionals to discuss everything from installation techniques to industry trends.

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what's up team welcome to the Huddle your weekly Playbook helping you gain forward progress in your flooring career

we're here to help you win for our new viewers welcome to the team speaking of

team we're down oh he just pops up he's there he's there we got Jose and Daniel

Gonzalez as always gentlemen how you guys doing good sir how are you doing good doing

I'm doing awesome just uh braving the cold and

snow and yeah think we got a total 16 degrees here

today can you guys hear me okay this time yes sir yeah just

loud we got 35 at this point so we're doubling you up but uh man it was it's

going to be cold at the end of the week and we've gotten a crap ton of snow for our

area so all right well still isn't bad over here still isn't bad over here normal I

guess uh but you get spoiled when you get that little bit of melt and you know if it's 35 over here my son is walking

around his shorts like it's spring yeah that's just kids that's teenagers for

you well everybody thank you for uh joining us this week if you uh wouldn't

do wouldn't mind doing us a great favor and if you're you're catching us live you know join in on the conversation get

involved we're going to be talking about something that I'm sure all of us have dealt with and that is uh pretty much

settling conflict between you know installers and um the clients whether

that be a GC or a homeowner or whatever so we're going to kind of break it up into the different time frame so join in

tell us about a dispute you may have had and we'll talk about it um and then we'll just talk about we you

know like always we have our own experiences we'll bring to the table about some different uh times when we

may have gotten in a yeah because we were all installers at one point and then it's that one of those things where

you don't realize it until later on it's like yeah I probably could have handled that a lot differently yeah and and hindsight's

always that hindsight's always got that 2020 on you and uh you learn a little

bit and you know if you got through one that was uh incredibly difficult and

wouldn't mind sharing with the rest of us how you did that that would be awesome so uh if you're catching us uh

live here yeah join in on the conversation if you're catching Us on YouTube or one of the social media

channels make sure to give us a like And subscribe Your Love over the last year has been noted and recognized we've got

thousands upon thousands upon thousands of views in the flooring industry uh we are uh very excited about

our future here at the Huddle and uh speaking of that we're going to be at Ty this year again and we're going to be

walking around doing some key interviews uh checking out some education sessions as well as you know just giving you guys

insight into Ty again um with that let's get moving on to the topic of

the day settling debates between installers and clients so

you know I thought it'd be good just to kind of put some framework around a debate this doesn't this goes from

anything right you can have a debate or you know a dis a diff disagreement with

a client um on how the project was going to go

schedule there's you know construction is very fluid and tough because you got

so many of these things you know um you go to a convenience store and have a

transaction there's only a few things you can really not enjoy you know what I mean like the person or the price of the

product they all have the same products with us you could be schedule delivery

the installation quality the quality of the product itself payment you know

timely payment getting uh any any number of things so one of the biggest uh

things I I'm going to pull from is some some surveys are some studies that we've

ran on um some of this may not be exactly like a linear

line um to our listeners because we're all very professional um but if you look

at the most negative reviews from customers from places like Ang for

example the number one thing is about money and the quality

and not feeling like they got paid what or that they got what they paid for on the other side of that you see the

installer uh you can see the installer um and their side of it and a

lot of times it's like expectations uh that this client had

versus what they bid so I think that's the first thing that comes out is setting the

expectation when the client has an expectation that this high and it's impossible to meet no matter how hard

you work that's where I've seen a lot and I've gotten myself into a lot like

telling somebody when I was installing yeah' I'll have these three rooms done

by Monday no problem yeah was a problem right

something didn't go right the patch didn't dry the glue wasn't setting up as

fast as as the bucket says whatever um and those are the scenarios I've gotten

myself into and I typically was dealing with gc's but what I'm kind of would

love to start with is homeowners I've done a handful of homeowner jobs uh or

residential projects direct with the the end user we do maybe five or six a year and

we have always approached those by just setting clear expectation um and get making sure we

get money up front we have a payment schedule with them hey you're if it's a bigger project you're going to pay us

this much at this time at this time at this time and so we always hit those payment schedules and if you miss one

and that's also their chance to kind of tell us what they don't like about what's going on uh that's worked out

pretty well but a few times I've not been paid one time comes into mind and

then I want to hear some War Stories from you guys you do a fair amount of residential I know but

carpet you know it's it was my fault because I scheduled the install like just a day or two after the

carpet was supposed to come in for a residential uh project and you know the

lady took off vacation I think I've told this story before yeah shows you how how

big of an A2 and I took um but you know she took her vacation for

this had boxed up all the stuff and then our carpet didn't come in and it didn't

come in for three extra days so the the question is how do you deal

with that stuff do you give money back I can tell you how I dealt with it but how

do you guys see those types of scenarios like how do you deal with stuff like

that first of all be honest on what happened right

it's I did I blamed everyone else I think um like especially

the covid era was super like you're looking at all these

timelines and it's just honesty upfront it guys like it said it was supposed to be here last week and I still have not

seen it like that's where we kind of start managing like just our schedule and

being like I'm not going to schedule you until I got something in hand because of the way things have been

yeah and this happened a couple times where e even if you do get uh a ship and

delivery date there's still variables to factor in and like Daniel just said

because of that instance it's very hard for us to to

guarantee dates based off of a schedule especially if they're requesting time off and you know residential you know

you're displacing a family uh commercial depending on what size the project is and you might have a little

bit of a a little bit of a window to get it done right like a window of opportunity

versus very strict days yeah yeah and but those those windows

are like hard Windows too though because like you know you guys do schools school

has to open like you might miss a few vacation that's where it kind of gets I don't

know which one's harder I I wouldn't even try to say which one's harder but you know school is going to open and

you're either going to get the floor in or they're going to hire somebody who's going to get some floor in and you may

have to go tear that floor out to get the right floor in when it comes in or whatever the problem is so yeah the the

um homeowner though I found doesn't you've taken a a butt tune

from a general contractor right like they can get like mean but they're still a little

professional side to it man I've taken chewings from homeowners

like all all things were on the table to call me uh or yeah you know what I mean

like it got personal well they don't have anyone to answer to so it's easier for them to

just out whatever they want right because you're you think about it too and it's like with a GC and it's it's

weird because with a GC they're more professional but you can look at it like

I can push them back a little bit more than when you're dealing with the homeowner right when the homeowner can be as much of an a-hole as they want to

you and you still got to look inside yourself and be like don't say what you want to say yeah this is where chat GPT

comes in if you got them right but can't do that live

no let me so there there was one that we had

and it wasn't very long ago where you know there was some disputes going on

and they ended up calling the office phone and I talked to them and I was probably on the phone with them for half

hour 45 minutes or something like that and it was his project and it's like it

it it's nice to get an outside perspective because I didn't know about the project other than the few little

details that he gave me and I was able to kind of calm her down and let her know that

hey this is who we are this is what we don't do and and what we are going to do like

this is we pride ourselves on our professionalism and you know at the end

of that conversation she was like I am so glad I got to talk to you I going to give you know the installer and Jose a

call tomorrow or tonight I don't remember what she said but she was like

it's it is nice to have that outside perspective because you weren't dealing with it so thank you for everything that

you said and it kind of made her look at things from that that different perspective too because it's it's always

them versus me and you're going back and forth like well that that that brings up a great point I mean the point there is

that the store has to have like don't just throw the installer

under the bus right out of the gate like if a somebody calls and they've they've

got a problem with their job and maybe something going on they don't agree with

with the installer or something and they call the office I mean that's essentially what happened right they called you and and then your job is to

not just toss your guy under the bus but to help the home like help the two sides

come together right and actually settling the debate be empathetic with the homeowner too right because it's

like I understand how you're feeling because this is your home this is your pride and joy right this is what what

you've built so and you they are they're spending a lot of money on even if it's

a small project right we don't know what what cost is a lot to someone so every project is like that and it's like I

know that you know you're spending your hard-earned money on this so let me empathize with you a little bit and Lead

You In the Direction Where We want to know that you are taken care of yeah and that's really what it

was too right it wasn't that um that what the conversations between the

homeowner and I weren't very different than her and Daniel except for Daniel

had no stake in it right he had no reason sure any direction he listened to

her side and said well this is what we typically do this is how we typically operate and then you know it came from a

neutral party who wasn't involved in the last two days of conversation you know what I mean

and know yeah it's hard to find balance when it's already so offset One

Direction yeah that happens a fair amount with in commercial companies with

like the manager like or the owner of the company like myself and then my

project managers uh a GC or someone may not feel like they're getting the enough

attention or whatever it is they they they call me and almost always out of

their mouth I'm not trying to tattle here I just wanted to chew on your ear

for a second I hear that type of a tone and that type of an approach from from

people a lot and most of the time it's not that the project manager has done

anything that uh wrong so to speak it's a lot of times it's just

that they need that outside voice to help them understand without feeling

like they're talking to a PM trying to sell them on the same understanding so they they just need an outside voice

that that may say Hey you know whatever the issue is for example

guy's not showing up uh and I'm like well let me chat with you know my my

project manager and and see what happened were they scheduled well I called him

yesterday okay well sometimes it takes a little bit more time than just one day to get to

mobilize a commercial crew they're all on a job somewhere you know I'll use Jim

I'll just call him Jim they're all on a job somewhere Jim and so they're not they're not just waiting and I'm sure

that RPM is doing everything they can to get them mobilized soon as possible well he hasn't called me back

and the point is is the customers can jump to concl iions and they do that a lot and the more that if you're the one

taking the call you can tamper down the the emotion and get

them to reality that like hey Art this PM XYZ pm has no um benefit to not

taking care of you like he wants to do your job he wants to get your job done

communication and all that stuff is very important I'm sure he'll be calling you back soon soon you know it's it's um

it's one of the reasons why we work really hard at our company to try to get customers called back within you know

just a few hours um they just think they're you're ignoring them and that's

another thing I think at the end of the day no matter who the customer is if they feel ignored or

unimportant so how can you make them feel important that's the same thing like when when when I put on that that

hat right and and I am I am the customer I'm the client I call and I'm

communicating because I want results right and I try to think about it that way too just myself like I need results

like why is this charge on on my card why is what is this invoice for or you

didn't fix my car my car still you know I'm thinking of all the different scenarios and I try to factor all of that into and um yeah you got to put

yourself in the in the customer shoes Y and and and that goes with commercial

residential do our best to to keep all aspects in

mind when we're having a conversation and we try to help our our crews communicate um the importance of

sticking to the guidelines of the installation and trying to maintain a schedule and and trying to factor in all

of that we try to do our best to do that but you know it's it's not always rainbows and butterflies and and the

land of construction I know that for sure and that's to it it kind of gives you a different perspective when you're

talking to other customer service people and I kind of start because you do you get heated and a lot of the times I'll

say I know this is not your fault but this is what has happened to me so I'm

sorry if I sound like a I have an attitude but it's not directed towards you and I kind of start out that way and

that's based on the conversations that I've had you know having to deal with stuff like

this yeah well your car is a great example if your car's in the shop and

one of my PM had his vehicle in a shop and we were talking about a job and he said well he just called me you know

this morning and I'm trying to get him the answer and I said well if if your your truck's in the shop right now if

you call them and you want an answer uh about something and they don't call you back

at the very least would you rather them call you and say hey you know I won't name him out but hey uh your your

vehicle uh is waiting on a part and I haven't received the ETA on that part

yet I will call you as soon as I get it is that better or just waiting until you

get the part and saying hey your part's in and I you know so people just want to be communicated with and know that you

care about them and know that you um that they matter to you same thing on the install world I

mean we're off in kind of the office setting but man as an in installer it was a lot different because you feel

attacked uh you know what I mean yes yeah 100% you go on these groups and you see

some of these guys that are like my client said this and they like went off on them and it's like man

there's there's different ways to approach things and sometimes it is that outside perspective you have to look at

what if this was happening to you right how would you want to be treated and I I

think that's just one of the mentalities of flooring installers or construction guys General right and that's why a lot

of these guys are like I don't need training because I already know what I'm doing it's kind of those same guys are

the ones that get super hotheaded because they already think that they know everything yeah you got to take a I

agree you got to take that step back and try to put yourself in the customer

shoes for just a second consider for just a second that you could have done something better and that's where you're

like be honest you know and you might be able to get yourself you know through

this scenario and there's so many you can't without bringing up specific times

um you know typically for me it's been schedule and getting done what you want

to get done um for for example I was doing a high school I was laying it was

about 10 11,000 yards of carpet broadloom carpet in a high school and you know you're working along

the classrooms or I mean I'm banging them out doing five six classrooms a day 5600 yards a day um but still not it's

like once the contractor got acclimated that he didn't appreciate the fact that a three-man crew was tossing down 600

yards of carpet and wanted more even when even in some of the

scenarios where we were able to give him a little more part the headbanging started coming when other trades were

there and that starts happening that happens in even new build residential where you're supposed to go in and do it

and you're promising something but you can't get started for two three four hours you know that that that has to be

added that duration you gave them essentially a duration and they still

you know half a day from you they have to realize you're probably going to be a half a day later than what you said uh

that kind of goes back to TW hindsight being 2020 and communicating hey I lost four hours this

morning because your electrician was in the way I'm GNA be four hours on Monday

or whatever the scenario is y there a carry over brother carry over like hey I

can't make that up in one day right you've already taken half my day and you know can't you just work longer yeah

just just C more people yeah yeah we need more guys that's another need 20

guys to do this one room that's another fight I get into uh with Jal contractors

we just need more guys I'm like more guys is not going to solve the problem at all not at all more

guys you have two bathrooms and by the time this guy gets the crew

the the installer going and layout done and he's in the other bathroom like more guys just going to be in each other's

way and then you got the way that each installer lays a little bit differently yeah and that's going to

play into it I'm like you don't want 10 15 guys in these things it's uh it's

incredible all of the times that you get into these scenarios uh it's incredible how

blinders and we got to remember from the install putting back on your installer shoes like the blinders that customers

get sometimes though they they just are Furious and you are going to take it and

I guess the question is can you take it without losing your cool or sometimes

yes sometimes no right because everybody's got their their life at home everybody's got their issues that

they're dealing with and some some days that that trigger is just a little bit touchier than others and you know it all

depends I guess how old is your relationship with said client or contractor how well do you guys know

each other um because knowing when to approach someone with an issue or if

someone knows you and they see the look on your face as they're approaching you and they have an issue it might be a

dead stop and shoot a text hey come and see me when you have a minute you know and and that's the that's the benefit of

uh creating relationships and being able to work alongside of the same the same companies with the same teams all the

time um but Daniel has stopped me long ago from

raging out for sure well I would just I'll just say

that you know I I'm usually pretty cool until someone tries to put us in a situation that we shouldn't have been in

right though it's not our fault and maybe we were promised something and I and I stand up for for us and then they

come back and they get defensive or they start yelling at at my guys like can't

do that around me like you can't I go into protector mode and um and maybe I

and I go overboard you know I if you're going to be times 10 I'm going to be times 20 so and that's that's who I was

back then I don't know if I'm like that now anymore as much but Daniel definitely stopped a couple instances

I'll just go that way you can certainly get farther with a little bit of well they say you know sugar than

vinegar or honey than vinegar um I think it's true but just knowing how to talk

to people like if that's one of the things I think that we lose when we

don't value education when when you go through trainings and such you a lot of the

different uh certification programs will talk about this kind of thing and teach you how to communicate with people

communicating with people and giving them a way out to be right but you still accomplish your goal um they say it's

you know it's a it's a form of manipulation right but there's good and bad manipulation right if you're

manipulating just means you're trying to get somebody to do something you want them to do well then we manipulate every

day all the time all of us you know I'm trying to constantly get my kid to do

his homework I gota you know I got to figure out a way to line up incentives and and talk to him in a way that it

makes sure that it resides uh if I'm dealing with a homeowner or a a a a

client that's upset I need to sometimes manipulation is the best

thing it's not a bad thing it's like understanding their side of the deal so that I can respond appropriately in the

best fashion um so it's not always a bad term I wanted to get that out there

because a lot of times you're trying to just communicate with them in a way that they know you have their best interest

and you're not trying to do nothing wrong half the time they just I I feel like they they have a distrust and for

any homeowners are on here like the trades people aren't always trying to screw you you know and that's kind of

what I think that where people get really defensive is when they feel like their characters attacked I know that's

where I'll get that's where I'll get defensive is if my character or my

company's character like our you start saying we we're this and that we're

going to have a discussion because like that's not in what do yes people can

make mistakes and we may have made a mistake we may have let us work together

to identify where we could do better but certainly don't just throw the baby out

with the bath water you know it's those kind of scenar that really bother me and

I think that's what we don't realize right is that everyone's human and homeowners gc's like if they see an

issue they just get so angry all the time because you're a professional you shouldn't be making any mistakes but man

we're human too so that's just the nature of what we do we're going to make some mistakes let me give me some time

so I can fix it it's at at the end of the day you're going to have a product that's going to perform and that's really all that should

matter yeah yep and and that you actually care

you know from an installer standpoint like like I said earlier when you're

personally attack though that's that gets tough well um so I want to add to that

what you just said to the personal attack you're right and and I think that that's where frustration comes in on on

a project uh residential commercial is the when when someone is attacking

the integrity and and even though you are putting forth the amount of effort

uh needed or required or or above and beyond to make sure the project is going good or it's installed properly and you

know the things that we get back is something like time it's taking too long too long to dry I can't I can't I can't

change that I'm doing everything I can on my end um but

the being able [Music] to bring yourself down a couple notches

and bring the client down a couple notches before progress progressing with the conversation as to why and how can

we fix this and I think in the middle another that is another part of this

whole that whole thing you just said Jose is that um often I I got better at this at like

talking through uh difficult scenarios with customers when I realized I I quit

like Desiring their appreciation for what I've done it's our

job it's it's what we're supposed to do like if you agreed to it you already

made the agreement the agreement's done the appreciation was back there now you doing the thing you agreed to do there's

no appreciation guys like there's not you're not going to get some additional appreciation or you shouldn't expect it

not that you don't ever have that homeowner comes up and gives you 500 bucks or 100 bucks or something and says

man you did awesome I appreciate it that's still pretty that's still the the

exception not the rule not the rule yeah yeah uh for the most part people pay you and

they expect a service back that exceeds their expectation and as installers a

lot of times we're like well and we still get this from our from our subs sometimes man what about the weekend I

just worked this I did that and that I'm like bro I gave you the timeline that you had to do the job clearly laid out

what was what had to be done drawings specs everything and and

we met on the job and all of went through all this and now I just need you

to do what you said you would do for the price you said you'd do it and that is the same thing that

homeowners want right they they have an agreement they want you to do now don't

get me wrong they're just those bad apples out there and sometimes bad apples you you know part of this

discussion is walking away we fired clients before we've got a couple of

of contractors we won't bid you know and we in essence fired them just decided

we're not going to do business with you yeah I mean it was um we had one not too

long ago where you know a contract came through and I'm reading through it and I'm like this is I'm not going to sign

this unless you change this and they said no and I said okay you can move on to the next person then it's that easy

I've had that happened plenty of times and that is the benefit you have in commercial is that you can kind of see

what they're how they're going to be or at least what they're going to hold your feet to the fire on by the contract in

residential there's not as much structure around it and you're going off

of a signed quote but it doesn't have 22 pages of terms and conditions that

you're gonna that what you're gonna follow and what they're gonna follow um so yeah it's it's kind of um a a

different beast in that way uh but I did find a lot of relief when I quit

thinking like they owe me something for doing your job look how great that yeah

like look how great this looks yeah it should look great I should do that professional

you're professional you know Daniel and I have done some projects just to say we've done them we knew we knew we weren't going to make any money we

probably lost money on some of the labor but just to have that under our belt you're like people said it couldn't be

done and we're like watch this Gatorade

this let me do this yeah you know it's it's just for the to build that that internal

reputation right to to up your your level of Integrity for yourself and expectation for yourself um yeah so

what's your real life advice to to um the installer out there grinding it away

whether it's in the residential or commercial world and um you know just grind in way but

runs into a hammerhead of a person that's just dragging him through the

dirt and often it's going to be around money if it didn't have money involved we'd just shut our ears off and and work

but often they're threatening not to pay yet or whatever I think I probably had more of

those clients than Daniel has um and in the past I've tried to deal with with

all of that instead of letting someone else having to deal with it right got thick skin um advice for that is is um for one

know that you're you're you're not always right and even if you think you are or if you know you are do not lead

the conversation with that chip on your shoulder like I I like what Al I mean you know if Alex he just commented here

and said he has a like a 22 page uh contract for residential and Commercial

and he don't play around uh approved by a lawyer um has it kept you out of

um have you been able to leverage a document Alex to get you through some of

the the uh disagreements uh I'd be interested to to know if you've been able to say Mrs Smith on page 15 it

clearly states this I'm doing it by the book right let me know let me know if

that got us out of some Jam sometimes because um even commercially where if

they don't have a cont you know and they're going by our proposal and it's clearly spelled out what is going on and

then they come back and they're like I thought you were going to do this and I'm like read this I mean it's you sign

this like you don't yeah don't sign it if you're not gonna read it we leverage

that a lot in the commercial world as you know it's site conditions and even

though uh you know our great sponsor Flor Cloud you know they they solve a

lot of those problems uh with sight conditions being able to just have them at your fingertip at the

end of the day though the site conditions is a lot of what we we get into fights with and then we have to

tell the contractor like look read this the specs read the contract that you

your contract to me states that X Y and Z and we've had to leverage that before but we don't have

the benefit of of sending a general contractor our contract that only

happens when we're dealing with an end user right and we've actually had some of the gc's actually incorporate

everything that we have into the actual contract too yeah we ask them to uh at least you

know scope in the scope of work um make sure that you know just stuff that comes

up but most times it's floor prep and floor protection those two things are

all they always try to get them in there and I'm always having to mark them out and say I would I'll provide floor

protection for you but I'm not going to do what follows that which says I'll replace any damage for free oh yeah

because I don't have control over who's on the job site I don't have control

over the schedule I'm not the sheriff of the job you're not going to let me tell the electrician you can't be in that

area that day you are running the schedule so if the electrician has a

lift on my 10 year 10hour old uh resilient floor like we're going to have

some problems but I can't no no craft paper is going to keep that from happening you know so we always have to

mark out protection of floors yeah that's a good way to

put we install once application yep one time yeah so those are the types of

things we have to fight with but we also get to l our contract because you know they can't put in writing although we

have had contracts just like you said Daniel where we were like I walked away from a nice job but their contract was

just too aggressive it tells me they're jaded is that how you feel when you read a

contract that's like trying to cover all these scenarios and put you in a you're

always because contracts at least in Kansas are supposed to be mutually

beneficial they're supposed to be mutually beneficial agreement and when I enter a contract to read it I'm going

with that mindset I'm going to have to give up some stuff but I should get some stuff and it shouldn't just be the

dollar figure on the page it should be the the arrangement and the agreement

this should be mutually beneficial protection for me protection for you but

man I've had some that are one-sided as all get out and yes here's another benefit to go to like conferences and

stuff you'll get to sit through Jeff King seminars and that guy knows how

to out of the situation there there's some stuff that we change I think every

time we hear him speak we're taking notes and we're like Yep this is what we're going to change about it yeah 100% And it's uh ju just uh the

the wording and the structure of the sentence is very important too right so

try to try to word it so that way it's not confusing to me or the client or whoever's reading it TR but there there

is a a certain way to have um per Jeff's advice there is a certain way to

structure a sentence so that way it actually means the what it's supposed to mean well we're in the part of the

conversation when we're talking about settling disagreements where we're trying to avoid disagreements that's

this contract and negotiation phase on your jobs being clear and concise about

what you're offering which is what a contract does and the delivering upon

those promises but that first step man Jeff has brought it up man and he's been

a CFI convention he's been at Ty he's been at he goes to all these things and he'll sit there and talk to you Jeff

would give you um yeah he is retiring soon although

I still bet you he hangs around every now and again because anytime you sit down with Jeff King to have a conversation he's going to tell you

about a flooring job I mean he knows this industry better than any attorney

I've ever ever met but you'll get some free advice from a $500 an hour lawyer

just by going to uh you know one of these conferences and hanging out with that guy especially if you buy Luba a

couple of drinks

yeah let's see what what does Alex say says good luck in any state if you don't have uh a lawyer that's looked over all

the verbage in wording your contract is not not worth what it's written on especially when it can when he can go to

court I think uh what I get from that is like you know you better figure out make

sure that you understand the verbiage I've read hundreds and hundreds of contracts

hundreds I'd probably read at least a hundred plus a year uh doing about we do

about 3 to 500 jobs per per year I'll bet a hundred of those are contract

and um so I bet I read probably 100 contracts a year and they the

verbiage luckily I get repeat clients so it's the same contract with different uh

exhibits the Scopes uh and then all I got to do is make sure I'm reading through the scope

browse through the contract make sure they didn't change anything most time they're templated but the the exhibits

is where they put all the meat and potatoes of that particular job so I agree with Alex make sure your

attorney looks over the contract the base contract that you're ever going to get and we you know that's we leverage

our attorneys for for those purposes when we get a contract we're like man this seems way too

aggressive that's the and but an attorney also go overboard you send a

attorney a contract that that thing comes back with so much red half you

know what I'm saying so well they're trying to protect to yeah they're only looking at it from one side so it's it's

t it's tough to have the um the balance there uh but you got to understand your

risk factor both as an installer or if you're a company that is uh you know a a

provid materials and labor you got to understand your risk factor and how risky your company is we're pretty risky

from a company standpoint we'll do projects with new customers and uh you

know we get pretty aggressive we'll do them out of town I mean you know what' you

say so sorry if you guys can hear the the office phone was ringing and I just happened to have it like right on the

other side of my laptop

yeah well I did hear it but I have a question I have a question for you you know we're talking about these contracts

but like how important is it to have the information you know that's pertinent to

the project up front and have the conversations up front about what is included what is excluded and maybe

giving both sides uh you know the the client and and us our side the

opportunity to bring forth any questions and concerns um prior to acceptance you know like how important is that

residential commercial I think you know what Alex wrote there as well as you

know our previous little bit of conversation on it I think that that's the most important part you don't have a

job to sign the contract and so you're not obligated to nothing yet you can't

so you know there's a saying and I'm sure you guys have heard it some of my best jobs are the ones I didn't do oh

yeah you know right some of the some of those jobs you go to you wanted it so

bad and then you you hear about it later and you're like man I'm glad I was not

the winner on that sucker right we've all had those

and so understanding and communicating and having a clear understanding of what

you're supposed to do I love Alex's approach that like even on residential jobs give them a contract formulate a

contract pay your attorney you know get on the Huddle and and talk to Alex right here I guarantee you he's got an

attorney because he's he's pretty uh happy with the way it looks like it even wins him work yeah you know over other

people just because you know everything is laid out like this is what I'm doing this is what I'm not

doing yeah it takes a lot of the uh the gray areas away and it you know it's

just like when uh you're going to actually install the job

right um what do you know you know as well as I do being an efficient or a

good sheet vinyl installer has not a lot to do with how fast you can move a

knife like the actual it's it's got mostly to do with how you set the job

up all your preparation for that right that's a lot of it like making

sure that you have the areas to work that you have that you have all of your

um uh you know you've scheduled all your roles you're I mean just everything like

that the setup well it's the same with the contract it's like the setup of the job the before you ever sign it is to me

Paramount um I'm getting motivated now to even read my contracts a little bit deeper than what I have been is I'm I'm

giving advice I'm looking right back at myself and saying man you know I could

do better there but the truth is that is the best that is the most important time of a job is before you do it making sure

that it's agreed upon between both parties and that if you can do it in writing uh I know a lot of uh installers

don't have contracts and I think that you know if Alex is uh laying out any uh

uh good advice here I should say Alex is clearly laying out some good advice you should have a contract and um there's

multiple ways to get it but you know big big big part of this is just making sure

you know what you're doing and you're you're really happy with the agreement before you go into it another thing once

you've made the agreement stand by it dude Stand by Your Word one of the things we can always hang our hat on is

that we will finish your job we will take we like I'm not just going to let

you fall off the edge of the cliff I'm here to make sure that you your job gets

done now I'm gonna fight for some extra money or for a little more schedule or

whatever the problem is but you know let Stand by Your agreements but make sure

it's a good one first y sometimes that's the hardest thing to do is to stand behind

stand behind an agreement that you know could have had other variables involved but in order to maintain uh that that

level of Integrity you've work so hard to get is it's easier sometimes just to to bite your lip you know and and just

get your head down put your head down get to work remedy it if it's a small one take care of it shake their hand and

say sorry for the inconvenience have a nice day right and Lanny says that you know 20 signatures

or initials before you move forward and people will probably look at that and be like man that's a ridiculous amount but

some of these contracts that we sign it's signed here initial at the bottom because they need to make sure that you're getting every single page sign

here yes I read this page sign here this page is done yeah most of most of ours

are like sign the main part and then initial initial initial that on every

page I would say that I like the contracts like Lanny was just talking about that are um

require for it's like they want to make sure that you're you're on the same page

yeah additional work it can seem scary but but what you can do is right you have your terms in there for the

contract and then you're like did you understand this initial here did you understand that I am not going to be

removing any ASB bestus sign here yeah

yep yeah I like the kind of contracts that make it as clear as possible but still mutually beneficial and then when

you start getting into the you know legal language of defaulting and these types of things and termination for

cause and termination for convenience and all these different

scenarios that's where it really needs to be you know

uh anybody's got example contract I mean this Alex the way he's writing is making

me start think like maybe the contract should be written to prot protect us obviously to protect us right against

certain things but to favor or to I don't want to say appear right because

the clients we we do want to favor them right we want to make sure they're covered and they understand they're covered and warranted but maybe the the

verbiage in there should you know be written in a manner where it's appear to

be more heavily favorable for the client you know with a couple guidelines obviously that that we must well the

contract you know that's why it's mutually beneficial you give a contract to a client they can even though it's

your contract they can hold you they're they legal um they they can legally hold

you to the contract even though it's yours right I mean it's it's a mutual agreement having it written up so that

your homeowner is protected but it's very clear what you're offering and what you're paying for I think that's what

Alec Alex was really pointing out uh I seen a comment from Rolland that said

remember the good old days when your when a handshake was your contract your word was your contract oh

your word was your contract yeah well my word is my bond remember that I I still

think it should be it just can't uh govern a job because uh

Amnesia you know I remember I almost remember the day that your handshake was

no longer good enough yeah that's crazy to think about I I almost remember that transition in mind

it's like what but but you said but you said like never problem it's because you you you know we

there there's so much um to lose there's so much to lose and

people got sick of losing and said well I need to write this thing down I think it's a better way I mean I agree that I

I love the times when you can be like yeah I'll be there and all right yeah here I'll pay you you know but

Lanny says that he thinks that it it should be you know making something that's small

enough not to scare them off but detailed enough so that it works for all

parties yeah I agree with that yeah we we we this whole conversation went

towards the uh swung towards the contract side of the world and we've done a a pretty in-depth podcast on

contracts but it shows you how important all this is and that how important

your if if if this because this podcast is called you know is talking about

settling disputes even that if you build your contract right gives you the framework

on how disputes are settled like you know that even that part can be put in

the contract so it depends on how hard you want it to be I can also tell you I get contracts from gc's that are like

two page or a one pager man do I appreciate it y

you know man do I appreciate those as long as the scope is part of that contract and saying you're going to

provide these things for this amount of money and they leave out all the other stuff like it it gives you that that's

as close as you get to what Rin was talking about these days is those one pagers that's just like look you're a

good dude I'm a good dude we're gonna do this thing together uh that kind of

thing and it sign down here it's a this size of job I do love those and I and

those are typically the most enjoyable com uh companies to work with because

you're typically working with an owner or someone high up at the company it's the real big huge General Contractors

that their contract we're doing one at 11 11 worth right now that's went through four or five people's hands baby

it's not even that big of a job uh $130,000 project commercially it's not a

huge huge job you know it's a good size job just a couple days of work sometimes

yeah it's it's an it's not a a massive job but the it has went

through multiple different layers of people and con and it's just massive

company with in-house C counsel and you know I tell you it's

um every I every T I mean even down to our bond when we sent our bond in had

like if you don't have a seal because we don't have a corporate seal that we stamp do you guys have a corporate seal

no most small businesses don't I mean I don't have a corporate seal I mean you can get one but so it's never been a big

deal it's never ever came up your signatures are seal when you're a small

business well um they made us sign a whole separate document stating that we

didn't have a seal I mean just it's gotten so over those are the ones that are tough

and I I don't I don't love but just get a candle and a ring drip the hot candle

on the paper seal it with the ring brother there you

go yeah so anyway uh let's see I'm going to go

through some comments in our contract we talk about going to B

the I think he said the Bad and the Ugly not the Bad and the Ugly I think that's what just saying that you know you're

explaining everything and if you're basically not willing to do what we say

that needs to happen then we're good and I mean realistically that's how it should be anyways it's just people have

different ways to get that across and do you need 22 Pages or do you need two

pages it's there you go how how small and detailed you can get right it's if

that works for you definitely do it if a two-pager works for you you do that and it's I think the longer you've been in

the business especially from the GC side the bigger their contracts get the

longer they're in the the more complexity and all this stuff and part of that I think is just that they've

they've been burned a time or two uh lost Daniel Man Down they've been burned

a time or two and then man man down and then um you know added that to their

contract and before you know it a one pager two-pager turns into a 10 15 20 30 page contract

so right and and you know sometimes some of these um attachments and and like the

bid docs and all the the forms that come along with it have the contract from the

corporation that the General's working for and then they try to mimic that and then they add their terms to it you know

and it's like you said you the longer they've been around the more that's on the GC side and plus you know but

getting to what Alex you know he's been uh commenting on H the contract being

mutually beneficial should ALS it like he's proof it will win you jobs because

he's stating right there that customers love the fact that everything's WR out on paper and that they they I'm sure it

makes him like stand out you know some guy comes in and writes a quote on a piece of not a piece of you know one of

the quote books you get at the distributor's warehouse versus an actual professional

contract I'm sure that sets him apart and um yeah I I I'm a big fan of what

he's doing all right well dudes another hour

on a Tuesday afternoon has flown by and um I think that the big takeaways

for me is you know there's dispute resolution but where we landed or got really deep in the weeds

is trying to find ways to minimize ever getting into the dispute and it comes

down to both parties understanding what you're offering and what you're

charging yeah you got to just yep it's it's all about that communication and

we'll we say it every single time but I think that's kind of the where everything comes back to it's

communication communicate with your installer communicate with the client and then that's the only way things are

going to get get solved yep all right well guys we appreciate

all the comments we appreciate your um your insights and expertise frankly I

hope that helped some uh some people that may not use contracts yet um and

and and really smokes you gave a lot of apprciate that and appreciate all the comments appreciate your appreciation

and we will catch you guys next week same time uh you know three 3 pm Central

every Tuesday Eastern or Eastern um jump

on yeah get jump on communicate with us uh if you catch us on one the channels

please like subscribe give us some love let us know um any topics that you uh

you know would like for us to cover and last but not least we will be at TI we're g be doing a lot of stuff at ti so

make sure you guys come out there and uh yeah thanks Lanny appreciate it

buddy um come out there and see us we're going to be running the podcast we're g do some overtime episodes as usual and

and uh pretty excited about getting back out to Tai so with that we will catch you guys guys next week