Customer wants to cancel order

[CarbideBob]

...
As for long term blanket orders, it needs to be clear up front who carries the risk. When negotiating them I've often been given two options:

Seen an option 3.
Year blanket shipped as released.
At end of year all not yet released parts are shipped and billed.
Imagine my surprise when 6000 SNR-620 carbide blanks show up on the doorstep.
My bad.
Bob

 

[john.k]

I worked for a shop where the two brothers who ran it were pathological liars......anyhoo,when I went into machinery maintenance ,youd think I would have known better,but I became a customer......And was promised same day service on urgent jobs.....that was lie #1.

 

[bikemutt]

This was years ago, when I had a real job. The company I worked for agreed to purchase, and signed a PO for about $50k worth of equipment, They changed their mind after the vendor had already ordered the equipment. "My" company, a Fortune 500 subsidiary, cancelled the order.

The vendor sued for breach of contract.

I had to be in court to testify since it involved my department. The vendor's lawyer looked like 3-day old drunk, "our" lawyer looked like he appeared on the cover of GQ.

"We" lost. The judge even awarded damages for willful something or another.

you never know...

 

[sreeb]

Why was the engineer touring your shop at all if he didn't know you had gotten the order?

Sounds like he didn't know the specific job involved until he saw the material.

It might be that the problem is an unethical or illegal relationship between the engineer and the other vendor.

But it is likely that the engineer knows the prints aren't good and parts built to them may not work in the application.

 

[Pete Deal]

Thanks to all who responded. The customer did end up buying the material. It has been a valuable lesson to me and I “got off cheap”. For some more background, the customer was new to me but was a regular customer of a business I knew and I knew that they ordered parts regularly. I did ask for material costs to be paid up front and submitted the invoice and was under the impression that a check was in the mail when I ordered the material. Next time I will be better prepared for these situations. Waiting to get a check and have it clear would have been best, but part of why I had the job was because I promised a shorter lead time in the first place.

Good news! Glad it worked out.

 

[triumph406]

If you have access to Dun & Bradstreet it's always worth checking their rating to see if there's any negatives that could be cause for concern

 

[EPAIII]

Good discussion and advise.

I would add one thing, be more cautious about up-front payments that are paid via a credit card. I worked for a company who used credit card accounts for as much as they could in order to get the airline miles (they had to travel a lot). But the thing about a credit card is the buyer can claim fraud and the bank which issued the card can reverse the payment, even after it has been accepted by your bank.

I would ask for a check or cash from a new customer.

 

[Strostkovy]

Quoting hours should be considered more as marketing costs for the business and not something to recoup from the given order.

After all there is no guarantee that you will get the job you quote. I've seen plenty of people here suggesting to get quotes from three or more shops/suppliers. How many of you have 100% of your quotes turning into orders?

 

[trevj]

I kinda miss the basic concept of hiring a goon of a leg breaker to deal with folks that are knowingly welshing on their owed money.

Busy living through a land lease deal where the money just...stopped. One of the principals, seems to think he should be able to hang his name on any of the Company assets, as "His", well before all the bills are paid.

Been...not fun...

At least, some of the assets are here on the property, and they HAVE acknowledged that none will leave until their bill to us is paid out. They had promised a payment schedule, made one payment, then...silence...

They know where to send the cheques to, they done so for the last couple years.

 

[john.k]

Oddly,there is a bit on telly tonight of a well known business non payer,the guy was once an Olympic Gold Medallist (or two),anyway ,he (and girlfriend) lives in some luxury on other peoples money ,and has done for 40 years or so.

 

[barbter]

Oddly,there is a bit on telly tonight of a well known business non payer,the guy was once an Olympic Gold Medallist (or two),anyway ,he (and girlfriend) lives in some luxury on other peoples money ,and has done for 40 years or so.

An ex neighbor here very sporadically paid his rent - mid 50's he had a web business but "couldn't be arsed". He wouldn't miss going to the bar or buying drugs - to quote him "why should having no money stop me from enjoying myself"....

 

[john.k]

I know a guy was making fabricated parts for White Trucks.....he got well ahead of the orders,so he could do same day delivery ........he's still got a shed full of battery boxes waiting for the big 1975 sales push....He s nearly 90.