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Isn't that pretty much how every transaction these days is structured? If I hire somebody to remodel my bathroom, he will do the job well enough that I won't r

Isn't that pretty much how every transaction these days is structured? If I hire somebody to remodel my bathroom, he will do the job well enough that I won't raise too much complaints but also cut as much corners as possible without me realizing, so that he can save time and money. If I buy literally any kind of consumer product, it has planned obsolescence built into it. If I go to a wealth manager, they will try to sell me the investment/pension fund that gives them the best commission. If I go to a dentist he will try to sell me on treatments that will earn him the most money.

CuriouslyC 4y ago
That's not true of craftsmen as much because they live and die by reviews and referrals, and people raving about your craftmanship, punctuality and politeness lets you charge a premium relative to your competition. Cutting corners and slap dashing work gets you 3 and 4 star reviews.
- numbers_guy 4y ago
  Most people cannot tell their ass form their face when it comes to this kind of stuff, so the reviews are completely useless. They will rate the craftman who is the most sympathetic to them as the best and most reliable one, yet he might be the one who uses the cheapest materials and does work in such a way that it looks good at first but has no permanence, or in such a way that if you need to ever do repairs you have to tear everything us because everything is glued/cemented together.
  - caseysoftware 4y ago
    And the worst work gets buried anyway.. I had to sue a contractor a few years back who not only did bad work but lied about its status and falsified documents from inspectors. To get any settlement in the 2.5+ year battle, I finally had to agree NOT to post reviews of his work on a specific list of sites. Unfortunately for him, my own personal site, Twitter, Facebook, etc were not listed.
    - moneywoes 4y ago
      What sites were banned
      - sgerenser 4y ago
        Most likely yelp, angieslist, Google maps, etc.
mattgreenrocks 4y ago
Yeah, it kind of taints the whole transaction. We got our house insulation replaced and I could never really get the salesman to talk frankly about the marginal benefit of dense pack insulation on the sloped portions of our ceilings. When the sale was in the initial stages and might not go through, he was fine saying it could be omitted from the work order. After I partially committed and asked him what the marginal benefit was, all I could get was, "it might be cooler in the rooms without it...its your house." Some would say, "what did you expect?" but for a not-small job I'd hoped there could be a bit more rapport. Also, there's a very real scarcity mindset right now due to economic downturn.
deleted 4y ago
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HWR_14 4y ago
> If I buy literally any kind of consumer product, it has planned obsolescence built into it. Some do, but plenty don't. And plenty have "this part is rated for X hours of use" where X is all designed around some common expected lifespan. > If I go to a wealth manager, they will try to sell me the investment/pension fund that gives them the best commission. This is true of some managers. It's also why some advertise that they are fee only (that is, they only make money off a fee you pay them with no commission) and why there are laws if they advertise themselves as fiduciaries (they are not allowed to consider their commissions). > If I go to a dentist he will try to sell me on treatments that will earn him the most money. I mean, all medical (and legal among others) professions suffer from the fact that the person selling you something knows better than you do what services you need. This is a real problem, and is often dealt with by professional codes of conduct and oversight boards. At least dentists seems so in demand that they don't need to invent work, since most people don't verify a cavity exists.

CuriouslyC 4y ago

That's not true of craftsmen as much because they live and die by reviews and referrals, and people raving about your craftmanship, punctuality and politeness lets you charge a premium relative to your competition. Cutting corners and slap dashing work gets you 3 and 4 star reviews.

numbers_guy 4y ago
Most people cannot tell their ass form their face when it comes to this kind of stuff, so the reviews are completely useless. They will rate the craftman who is the most sympathetic to them as the best and most reliable one, yet he might be the one who uses the cheapest materials and does work in such a way that it looks good at first but has no permanence, or in such a way that if you need to ever do repairs you have to tear everything us because everything is glued/cemented together.
- caseysoftware 4y ago
  And the worst work gets buried anyway.. I had to sue a contractor a few years back who not only did bad work but lied about its status and falsified documents from inspectors. To get any settlement in the 2.5+ year battle, I finally had to agree NOT to post reviews of his work on a specific list of sites. Unfortunately for him, my own personal site, Twitter, Facebook, etc were not listed.
  - moneywoes 4y ago
    What sites were banned
    - sgerenser 4y ago
      Most likely yelp, angieslist, Google maps, etc.

mattgreenrocks 4y ago

Yeah, it kind of taints the whole transaction. We got our house insulation replaced and I could never really get the salesman to talk frankly about the marginal benefit of dense pack insulation on the sloped portions of our ceilings. When the sale was in the initial stages and might not go through, he was fine saying it could be omitted from the work order. After I partially committed and asked him what the marginal benefit was, all I could get was, "it might be cooler in the rooms without it...its your house." Some would say, "what did you expect?" but for a not-small job I'd hoped there could be a bit more rapport. Also, there's a very real scarcity mindset right now due to economic downturn.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

HWR_14 4y ago

> If I buy literally any kind of consumer product, it has planned obsolescence built into it. Some do, but plenty don't. And plenty have "this part is rated for X hours of use" where X is all designed around some common expected lifespan. > If I go to a wealth manager, they will try to sell me the investment/pension fund that gives them the best commission. This is true of some managers. It's also why some advertise that they are fee only (that is, they only make money off a fee you pay them with no commission) and why there are laws if they advertise themselves as fiduciaries (they are not allowed to consider their commissions). > If I go to a dentist he will try to sell me on treatments that will earn him the most money. I mean, all medical (and legal among others) professions suffer from the fact that the person selling you something knows better than you do what services you need. This is a real problem, and is often dealt with by professional codes of conduct and oversight boards. At least dentists seems so in demand that they don't need to invent work, since most people don't verify a cavity exists.