I recently came across an article in WebCPA about clients who are pains-in-the-you-know-whats (PIAs). Their word, not mine. The author supports the belief that you shouldn’t fire these clients, you should charge them more. I tend to agree. Dealing with rude or impatient clients can certainly be exhausting. However, these people are nonetheless paying clients!
Have you ever been to a restaurant and asked for several substitutions on your order? Did the wait staff grumble or complain? Probably not. They probably just nodded and informed you that it would cost slightly more for the substitution. Did this make you want to leave the restaurant? I doubt it! The restaurant made more money and you left satisfied.
On the other hand, if the staff had grumbled, complained, or otherwise treated you with disrespect, you probably wouldn’t have been as satisfied. In fact, you’d likely never return to that restaurant. You might even tell friends and family about your negative experience, which could prevent them from eating there as well.
This scenario can occur in any type of business. My accounting firm took on a client several years ago who would fall into the PIA category. This client failed to bring in necessary documents when asked, was slow in responding to inquiries, and made our job much harder. Rather than fire this client, we explained the situation and increased his monthly rate. The client didn’t flinch.
You see, he knew he was hard to work with. In fact, he knew that it would be hard to find the same level of service for the same price from some other firm. He’s happy, we’re happy and our bank account is happy.
Moral of the story: Add in the PIA factor when giving price quotes.
LeAnn Carlson
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment