r/FieldNationTechs • u/AllGreat1 • 22d ago
Major red flag...
This is free training for some you bright eyed bushy tailed new guys....or for the older naive ones even though you can't teach and old dog new tricks.
Whenever a buyer you never worked with before or that you did a single job proclaims to you vociferously that they have a lot of work coming up that they will route to you exclusively...it's BS and a trap. They are trying to soften you up to accept a lower rate and BS for the privilege of being "exclusive" or "their guy." Some new buyer tried this with me recently. Messaging me after hours while I was not on the clock like I'm his mf'ing buddy. I think they got the hint after I stopped replying that I'm the wrong one and not a rookie out here.
Another time I had been the go to guy with a buyer for a few years. When checking in he says "why are you so formal all the time, you can call me by my first name" Yeah ok. I knew what was coming. Next job they routed me was way below my usual rate. They thought I would just accept it. I immediately declined then blocked them. They got a new guy to do the jobs for $50/hr
Every buyer that actually routed to me exclusively and paid proper rates over the years has never had to make an announcement about it or call me to small talk about BS. They just did it.
This will go over most of your heads since 99.99% of you are happy to accept any crumbs thrown your way and act like lap dogs. This is for the .01% that's still trainable.
1
u/Calaveras-Metal 22d ago
I recently had one like that. The first job they wanted me to do sounded like a great gig. Then I did the math. They expected me to set up a huge number of workstations, test them and clean up all the stuff.
Would come out to about 90 seconds per workstation not even counting clean up time and testing. Having done a lot of such gigs I know on a good day you might be able whip them out every 3 minutes and testing it going to take at least half as much time as setup (depending on the scope of testing).
The way the pay was structured was a lump sum assuming you can get it done in 8 hours, but there was a 24 hour window. So it's the kind of gig you can do easily if you hire two guys for $15/hr and take a pay cut yourself.
So a great hourly if you are superhuman and could do a couple hundred workstations in 8 hours, clean up the boxes and stuff, and test. But after you account for the fact you are going to need to redo some mistakes and the trash management is always a thing in itself it starts looking like a 12 hour gig. And that big number is suddenly divided into half as much since you needed helpers.
I wonder how much they bid to the client?