I want to start this email off by letting you in on a little secret.
In all my time spent running my towing business and dealing with customers, employees, vendors, and competitors, I’ve run across some nasty characters.
People who lie, cheat, steal, and stab you in the back. Sometimes for gain, sometimes just for spite.
But one of the worst type of people out there…
Those I could barely stomach were the folks who complained about accident recovery bills.
If you’ve ever had to deal with someone after they learn the cost of recovery, towing, and storage – you know that they can sometimes lose their minds.
Happens a lot.
It’s because they have no clue as to what you do or the amount of resources it takes to provide these services.
I’m not just talking about the physical work of getting out of bed at 2:00 AM and responding to a rollover accident, performing the recovery, cleaning up the scattered debris, collecting their belongings, and then loading, transporting, and unloading their vehicle…And finally finishing up at 5:00 AM.
Leaving you spent and dragging throughout the following day.
But before you could do all that, you had to purchase trucks, train drivers, and dispatchers and then put them on the payroll. You had to buy or rent a storage facility, purchase five different types of insurance policies, maintain and repair your trucks, keep diesel in your trucks, and pay miscellaneous overhead costs, all while adhering to Federal, State, and Local rules and regulations.
You invested years of your time, plus more than a million bucks in order to have the honor of providing them service.
But here they are, pounding on your desk, squabbling over a $300 dollar bill.
Doesn’t that get under your skin?
Did me.
Some of them were doctors, lawyers, and other business owners. Folks you think would know better.
Isn’t it funny how they appreciate the value of the work that they do? They charge a lot for it, right? – but for some reason, they underestimate your value.
And it can be unnerving to have to struggle through the ignorant ramblings of people who have no idea what’s involved.
Rather than losing your cool, as I did a few times, take a step back and ask yourself why it’s important to you that they know what’s involved.
Why are you wasting your breath explaining why it costs as much as it does?
Because regardless of what you tell them, they’re still going to complain.
So, let them complain.
When you explain your charges profusely until white bits of spittle accumulate at the sides of your mouth, your hope is to gain understanding from the other person, right?
Well, it ain’t going to happen.
They don’t care, and neither should you.
So don’t allow your neediness to transform you from Dr. Jekyll to Mr. Hyde.
Because doing so only harms your business and how you approach every subsequent interaction.
When you need them to understand or need them to value your service, you’re exacerbating the issue.
Your over-the-top response to a tow bill complaint is only going to make matters worse.
If you escalate, they’ll escalate.
Which can lead them to vent their frustrations in the form of an online review, or complaining to whatever entity oversees towing in your area.
You don’t want that.
To avoid all that drama, simply don’t react.
Because their initial knee-jerk reaction to your bill will soon wain.
It might take minutes or hours for it to sink in. But they’ll deal with it and move on.
So should you.
Don Archer
P.O. Box 104432
Jefferson City, MO 65110
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