You ever get that one guy...

[jimilee]

I had a guy once notify me that one of my builds wasn't working (I test EVERYTHING thoroughly before shipment) and the guy was plugging his guitar cable into the OUT jack

This exact thing happened to me.  I sold my "Beastmode" and "Megatron TMK2601" builds to a fellow who messaged me to say that Beastmode would pass signal when bypassed but didn't work when engaged.  Turns out he'd plugged the amp into the input on the pedal.  I'd tested it before sending it, so I knew it wasn't the pedal.

I've done a few consignment builds and I hate doing them, mostly because I won't send anything out that has a flaw that I would accept for a personal build.  So, I decided to charge through the nose for those builds to compensate me for the stress involved.

What I enjoy doing far more, is doing a random gift build for a friend or a child of a friend who might have started playing and is showing some dedication or aptitude.  I'll find out what they're into from their parents and build accordingly.  "Tiger Drive", "Darth Punk", "Genuine Fake", and a few others have been designed and gifted in this way.

I once changed 700.00 for a multi build that I didn't want to do, knowing he would pay it. Turns out he did. That sucked a bunch in all honesty, but it did fund other builds.


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[jkokura]

I have had a client that has done nearly the same thing. I kept taking it back after he told me it didn't work. After the 3rd time I 'repaired' it for him, he was asking for a refund. At this point I've lost money on the shipping. You guys know that the margin on most custom jobs is small anyway, but between my time and the actual funds out the door, I'm down $100 by that moment, and I asked him to consider that it's a problem on his end, and not on mine. I wasn't willing to take it back, and each time had sent it to me it had worked fine for me. I tried to no avail to get the symptoms to show themselves, but nothing.

Man that was frustrating. Among the last custom pedals I ever did.

Jacob

[gordo]

Mike, having purchased  a fair number of boards from you and having build problems at my end a few times I can honestly say I can't imagine dealing with a more helpful and patient guy and the product has been superb.

Ok I may have used your name in vain a few times as I tried cramming all that shit in a tiny 1590A box but damned if they haven't all worked :-)

[jimilee]

Ok I may have used your name in vain a few times as I tried cramming all that shit in a tiny 1590A box but damned if they haven't all worked :-)

Bwahahahaha


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[flanagan0718]

Ok I may have used your name in vain a few times as I tried cramming all that shit in a tiny 1590A box but damned if they haven't all worked :-)

Bwahahahaha


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Hahahahaha!


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[lars]

It is unfortunate there are many people who's sole goal in life is to make life miserable for other people. These are the ones who even if they opened up your pedal and found you had put a wad of $100 bills in there as a bonus, they would complain that the rubber band was the wrong color.

[midwayfair]

Wow, I've been super lucky.

I've only had a couple pedals come back for repairs ever, and everyone I've ever dealt with has been amazingly nice about meeting me halfway on clarifying what can and can't be done with the pedals. I have a super generous warranty policy but no one's ever taken advantage of me.

[danfrank]

It is unfortunate there are many people who's sole goal in life is to make life miserable for other people. These are the ones who even if they opened up your pedal and found you had put a wad of $100 bills in there as a bonus, they would complain that the rubber band was the wrong color.

You're giving people too much credit. A wise man told me once to never assume maliciousness when ordinary stupidity more than covers the situation... Lol!
There are a lot of people out there that don't really know what they want. Or they have this idea in their mind about something that is completely in fantasy land.
I try to cover all my bases before the transaction is done so there are no surprises afterwards. I will let them play through it to make sure that they want it, I can't stand people that have buyer's remorse after the deal is done. Fickle children... Lol!

[culturejam]

This is exactly why I stopped building one-off stuff for strangers years ago. Everybody is an unreasonable asshole when it comes to custom work.

On the other hand, these days it would be pretty easy to troubleshoot an "it doesn't work" bullshit scenario via Facetime, Zoom, Google Meet, etc. I would them prove it doesn't work -- LIVE -- before I would entertain a return.

[flanagan0718]

This is exactly why I stopped building one-off stuff for strangers years ago. Everybody is an unreasonable asshole when it comes to custom work.

On the other hand, these days it would be pretty easy to troubleshoot an "it doesn't work" bullshit scenario via Facetime, Zoom, Google Meet, etc. I would them prove it doesn't work -- LIVE -- before I would entertain a return.

Yes it would. I wish I had thought of that!

I do plan on building short runs (5 or 10 of a pedal at a time) for a bit to see if anything flourishes from it. But the custom one off stuff, aside from close friends, it not for me anymore. "This guy" has helped me over the fence on that decision.
He's a nice guy (seemingly) but I just don't have the time or patience anymore for this kind of crap. I love the hobby and refuse to let anyone ruin it for me.
-Mike-


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[culturejam]

I think the main problem with the custom, eh, customers is that they have no idea what is or isn't possible or any degree of concept of the difficulty/complexity of a particular desired feature.

"Hey, I know you are almost done building version 4 of the 7-in-1 trem-o-stortion I commissioned, but you could just throw a simple 800ms analog delay in there as well? I will pay an extra $20 to cover the cost." 

[matmosphere]

I think the main problem with the custom, eh, customers is that they have no idea what is or isn't possible or any degree of concept of the difficulty/complexity of a particular desired feature.

"Hey, I know you are almost done building version 4 of the 7-in-1 trem-o-stortion I commissioned, but you could just throw a simple 800ms analog delay in there as well? I will pay an extra $20 to cover the cost." 

Yeah, I think anybody that is seriously considering doing this should talk to some freelance graphic designers or something like that. Clear expectations are set before work begins and if there are any changes while the project is happening then the client will pay extra.

The real issue is that people can often get a custom pedal for about the same or less than they could buy a production product. I can't think of any other industry where a custom made product is cheaper than buying something off the shelf.

Look at guys who make custom guitars, they sell for two or three times what an American made Fender sells for.

[mauman]

I completely understand the frustrations expressed here, and I've had a few of those unpleasant customer encounters myself.  For context, 100% of my pedal builds are custom, and while I make more than I spend, I don't depend on it for a living.  I do think it's possible to enjoy doing custom work, but it takes setting clear expectations and boundaries in advance, and educating (potential) customers starting with their first encounter with us. 

They only know about us what we tell them, or more often what we fail to tell them.  Do I have a written policy for my ordering process?  Change requests?   Drop-dead dates?  Cancellations?  Delivery dates?  Returns?  Refunds? Warranties?  Mods?  Out-of-warranty repairs?  If not, it's hard to fault a customer for not sticking to them.  I fire maybe one customer every year or two, and when I do I can usually trace the problem to some failure of communication or consistency on my part.  The majority of buyers are anywhere from ok to great in their interactions, and much of my work is repeat business.

My point is that if you really want to do custom work, you CAN do it and enjoy it IF you can articulate your policies and stick to them.  When that doesn't work, and sometimes it doesn't, that's when you fire that customer and move on.  If you had a bad employee, would you close the business or would you fire them and move on?  Life's too short to spend time with knuckleheads.  Thanks for reading!  MikeA

[Willybomb]

This was my basic blurb to people who came looking for a custom build.  This was for the Bimmy build you'd find in the Build Reports forum.

So, with a custom build, you get lifetime support, postage to you included in the price, graphics of your choice (within reason, it has to work with the control layout, but we discuss that in the process), we can chuck your signature on it as a "signature edition", but I have a few caveats:

It gets done when I get done - I have a job (this stuff is for fun), a partner and a kid, plus parts are hard to get from OS currently.

Half up front before work starts, the rest before delivery.

So, I'm going to quote $220.  It's a bit of work in this case.

[flanagan0718]

Update: got the pedal back and everything works fine! I am beyond angry now. This guy is officially fired! I am refunding his money, less the 2 unnecessary shipping costs and $50 for my pain and suffering.


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