Listening Is Priceless

(A customer comes in to ask about a large printing order. I inform her that printing her order will take a few hours, but that we could have everything copied by the end of the day. She agrees to place an order with us, as she is in a rush and no other copy center in town could get the prints done in less than seven days.)

Me: “Do you know approximately how many pages you have here?”

Customer: “No… Why?”

Me: “Well, it’s just that the color copies are far more expensive than black and white, and I wanted to give you a quote before we begin. The color ones add up fast!”

Customer: “No, no. Just go ahead. My boss told me he’s being reimbursed anyway, so it doesn’t matter what it costs.”

(I’m skeptical, but she insists. As it turns out, ALL of her documents are in color. As she’s printing training manuals and reference books for a group of 26 employees, she ends up with over 8,000 printed pages of color documents.)

Customer: “And could you assemble them and put them all into binders for me?”

Me: “We sure can! If you hold on just a moment, I can give you a quote for the entire order, including assemb—”

Customer: “No. I don’t want a quote. Just go ahead and do everything.”

Me: “Are you sure? Because you have quite a lot of copies here, and assembly adds an additional fee.”

Customer: “No quote! I’ll be in to pick these up on Monday!”

Me: “But they’re $0.49 per page to start, and you’ve got—”

Customer: “Oh, well! My boss just wants everything done in color, and by Monday.”

(I go along with what the customer wants, but I’m still pretty certain she’s going to flip out when she sees the total, despite my attempts. Sure enough, Monday morning rolls around and the customer arrives…)

Me: “Okay! Your total for copies, tabs, binders, assembly, and all comes to approximately $2400 after tax.”

Customer: “What!? $2000!?”

Me: *sighs*