Wisler Plumbing and Air

Serving Roanoke and surrounding areas.

Menu
Schedule Online
or call (540) 483-9382

We’re Presentable: More of the Big 20

Customer Service

by

Play

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Google Podcasts | RSS

At Wisler Plumbing and Air, we live by the Big 20. You can go back a few posts and read about all 20 standards, but today we want to dive deeper into three of them.

We are caring and courteous.

We wear uniforms.

We clean up after ourselves.

We are caring and courteous.
Being caring and courteous is important to us. In our mission statement, it says that we will serve people, and I think being caring and courteous is a big part of that.

Many times, clients are dealing with an unexpected emergency that’s going to cost them money they were not ready to spend. Sometimes the breakdowns can be emergencies, which can be scary. Those are situations when being caring and courteous goes a long way.

Another way to put it is that we try to be empathetic. It’s not just a transaction to us, it’s a relationship. Our staff is sometimes in unfavorable weather or working where there is sewage present, and handling that in a very caring manner goes a long way.

We wear uniforms.
First impressions matter. If there is family at home, they’re going to be paying attention to what the service personnel looks like. They want to feel safe and secure. So, we are cautious about who we let into that environment. If someone is not dressed professionally, it can cause fear or anxiety.

It’s really just about making sure our first impression is done with care, and that we have consistency throughout our staff.

We clean up after ourselves.
We want to leave an area better than we found it. We use mats and we put on shoe covers. We keep vacuums on the trucks and make sure to clean up before we leave so that the customer isn’t having to come behind us to do it. We even carry all-purpose spray and rags to wipe things down when we are done. The job’s not complete until the cleanup is done.

If you want to work with a team that cares at this level, you can call Wisler Plumbing and Air at 540-483-9382.

by

Play

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Google Podcasts | RSS

The ‘Big 20’ is the minimum standard we hold ourselves to at Wisler Plumbing and Air. Onboarding for every single member of the team includes signing an agreement to uphold these standards while representing the company. When we make a mistake or come up short, we can always come back to these standards; we can take responsibility and take action to do better moving forward.

Until now, the ‘Big 20’ has been mostly internal at Wisler Plumbing and Air, but today we’re going to share them, and we’ll get into greater detail in future posts.

  1. Show up on time.
  2. Do the job right.
  3. We listen.
  4. Neat appearance.
  5. Caring and courteous people.
  6. Well-stocked trucks.
  7. Drug free.
  8. Wear floor savers and lay down mats.
  9. Wear uniforms.
  10. Well-trained technicians.
  11. Personal phone answering.
  12. Background checks.
  13. Be honest.
  14. Hard workers.
  15. We value feedback.
  16. Clean up after ourselves.
  17. Give price in writing before the work is done.
  18. We stand behind our work.
  19. We smell good.
  20. Recommend options.

The ‘Big 20’ is just a minimum bar, and sometimes it’s hard to live up to. But we onboard with them, train around them, and have the list posted in all our managers’ offices. When we have a client concern, instead of getting defensive, we say: hey – did we live up to our own standards? And if we didn’t, we need to take ownership of it.

Stay tuned for a more in-depth look at the ‘Big 20’ and call us at 540-483-9382 to work with the team at Wisler Plumbing and Air.

by

Play

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Google Podcasts | RSS

Sometimes companies can be fearful of talking about a topic like satisfaction guarantees for a couple of reasons. One is because if someone is not satisfied, we have to take ownership of our mistake, and that doesn’t always feel very good. Another reason is because we can be fearful of people taking advantage of a company’s guarantee.

Our satisfaction guarantee is there to remove the risk of people doing business with us. If we offer a 100% satisfaction guarantee, there’s zero risk in choosing us. We’re a team of humans, so we’re imperfect and we do mess up sometimes. As we’ve always learned, the main thing isn’t the adversity itself—it’s how you respond to it that really matters. We’ll do what we need to in order to resolve any concerns.

In my experience, I’ve found that people don’t want to take advantage of you. It turns out that clients are truly concerned that we’ve done something wrong and we need to take ownership of it. For example, we deal with excavation and sometimes rainstorms will cause mud to run somewhere it’s not supposed to be. We try to answer those concerns and get them resolved promptly, but it can be very difficult when working with Mother Nature. Because the client’s satisfaction is very important to us, we try do do whatever we can to resolve the situation.

Not too long ago, we had a job where we were busting up the concrete in a home. We have a process to keep the dust level down, but unfortunately, we dropped the ball in that area and there was a dust issue in the home. We fielded the customer’s concern, addressed the issue, and got the area cleaned up. We did what we needed to do in order to leave the customer satisfied.

I’m working on a situation right now because we subcontracted a pipe lining company from eastern Virginia to line a sewer 12 years ago. We applied the appropriate warranty to the lining, which was 50 years. Unfortunately, the subcontractor isn’t standing behind the work they did. So we are standing behind it. The bottom line is, when I look at the quote that was given to the customer, it clearly and simply states the work done and the warranty we provided. It’s costing us a great deal of money now, but I was personally in that client’s home and I said we would do the right thing to resolve her concern.

The customer agreed to work with us because they had confidence that the problem would be resolved and wouldn’t come up again in the future. Even 12 years later we’re still making sure our commitment is being honored. Sometimes an issue isn’t really resolved and we have to do extra work at our own expense. We must make the choice to do the right thing, even though it might not always be very fun.

If you have any questions, contact us today or give us a call at 540-483-9382.

by

Play

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Google Podcasts | RSS

One of the most frustrating things for a homeowner is setting up an appointment for a service person to come to their home and they don’t show up, show up late, or don’t follow directions. We focus on being on time, and we give a two hour window in which we will arrive. We also try to notify people when we’re on our way. I really think meeting our client’s needs comes down to dispatching correctly. It’s important that the people fielding the customers’ requests are well-trained in asking the right questions so we best understand the issue you’re dealing with, how serious it is, and exactly what we need to do. Asking the right questions is vital to making sure someone’s needs are properly met.

Next, we need to make sure we send the right person to your home. We’re very much aware of how the technician we send could make or break the customer’s experience. (Nobody likes it when a technician seems incompetent or when it’s the first time they’ve ever seen the issue.) We assess the task that needs to be done and assign it a skill level. We also assign a skill level to every technician (because everyone is slightly different). Then we try to match up the right technician with the right task to make sure we’re sending a competent person to every home.

A lot of times people think that a company will dispatch its technicians to cover a certain radius. A technician in South Roanoke would just run all the calls in that area for the day, right? Well, not exactly. We do not focus primarily on the location of the call as much as we do the skill level necessary to do the job correctly and meet the customer’s needs. So we may have technicians passing each other by on the way to calls. This is all about making sure the customer has a satisfactory experience.

We make these choices when coordinating our technicians because our time is valuable and our homeowner’s time is valuable. We want to make sure that we’re doing our absolute best. Sometimes we do have to make multiple visits, and sometimes we don’t get everything quite right over the phone. But I’d like to think that the vast majority of the time we’re able to do it well and make sure that the customer’s problem is solved.

If you have any issues with your plumbing or HVAC systems, you can always reach out to the team at Wisler Plumbing. Just contact us today or give us a call at 540-483-9382.

by

Play

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Google Podcasts | RSS

I don’t think anybody likes negative surprises. Unfortunately, businesses often surprise people by sneaking in fine print with extra fees. So many of us are wary of fine print that it’s not surprising to hear someone say they’ll wait around and see how much higher the invoice will be after all the extra fees are added in. We try to do business differently than that. The price we tell you it’s going to be is the price that you’re going to pay. We trademarked the term Straightforward Pricing because it signifies our strategy of being upfront with clients.

Sometimes companies justify misleading their clients by saying it’s just an expected way of doing business. They view a service charge as something everyone should already know about, and they won’t even mention explicitly. Well, maybe a homeowner doesn’t know they’re going to be charged a service fee because they’ve never had service personnel in their home.

Most of the time it’s already not a good day when you have to call the plumber. There’s a lot of anxiety involved when dealing with an unexpected situation in your home, like a flood, water leak, or even a complete lack of water. Do I have the money to pay for this? Can it get fixed? How long is it going to take? Are they going to do the right job? Am I going to be taken advantage of? So many questions cross a homeowner’s mind during a time like this. Being straightforward with something as important as pricing helps to lower anxiety. When you have a lower anxiety level about your current situation, I think you can make better decisions.

I also think that you can make the right choice when all the options are presented to you, especially when you know you can trust the bottom line. (We believe in giving options to empower the customer to make a decision.) That ties along with another part of what we do with our pricing structure: Straightforward Pricing is a form of task pricing, so we don’t charge by the hour. Instead, we charge by the task or job. Another way to set prices is by using time & material pricing. One of the downfalls of time & material pricing is that homeowners can be penalized if the technician isn’t very good. If the tech wasn’t prepared with the right parts, the homeowner would end up paying extra because the job took longer than necessary. That’s why I think task pricing is much more of a fair approach.

Without Straightforward Pricing or some other form of task pricing, there is no consistency. I think it’s very important for homeowners to feel like they’re not getting charged differently just because of their status, what their home looks like, or because of whichever technician they got on a particular day. I believe in consistency, and all the things we do with Straightforward Pricing helps to build the trust level of the people we serve.

In the trades that we’re in, we strongly believe in the fact that we shouldn’t give a ballpark price over the phone only to go to your home and find out it’s going to be double what we thought. Instead, just reach out to us by calling 540-483-9382 or requesting an appointment online. We can have one of our technicians or reps come to your home, evaluate the situation, and explain exactly what needs to be done. Then we’ll give you options with a Straightforward Price so you can select the best fit for you.

by

Play

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Google Podcasts | RSS

You know the old adage, there’s more than one way to skin a cat? Everyone has their own way of doing things. When I talk about the Wisler way, I’m not saying it with arrogance, but as a way to describe our approach to getting things done. There are definitely many different perspectives and other successful ways for a business to function. The Wisler way is how I label what I’m about to share—these are some of the main things we’ve found to be helpful to our success.

First of all, we’re selective, meaning we focus on hiring the right people and making sure they’re a really good fit for our organization. More specifically, our organization is shaped by our customers’ needs. Customer feedback is what guides who we are and how we build our culture. Nobody likes the service personnel visiting their home to be rude, unknowledgeable, unable to get the job done right, disrespectful of their property, unable to be upfront, unfriendly, or unpleasant. We key in on these kinds of attributes because we know our customers need personnel who provide a high level of service. We fulfill those needs by by putting a strong focus on who we hire and how we hire. People’s homes are extremely precious—they hold the things that we find most dear, like our children and our parents. Anybody who steps foot in that environment needs to communicate safety, care, and respect. It takes a special person to be able to do that.

Next, we’ve found that people have to be trained, whether it’s from a technical standpoint or a professional standpoint. As we hire someone, we may find that they need training to improve specific skills (e.g., communication or service). Our organization is very much about growth and development, whether it pertains to the overall business or the individual. Someone may have the basic skills necessary to be a service technician or an administrative person within the business, but they can always develop various skills to become even better. That’s a big part of who we are.

Finally, because we fail a good bit, I think we need to focus on getting our work done right. (Perfectionism probably makes me a much harsher critic than most other people.) I do think there is a right and a wrong, and doing the right thing is important. It takes discipline and organization to get a clear view of the work you’ve done and then do the right thing, even if it’s not the easiest or most fun thing to do.

In summary, we focus on hiring the right people with the correct fit, we believe in personal growth and training people to obtain new skills, and we’re about being disciplined to do the right thing no matter what type of task it may be. If you have any questions, contact us today or give us a call at 540-483-9382.

Diamond Club

Our Ads

Jobs

Blog