It’s late, and I’m going through this quickly, so please bear with me. I had an existing account that was shared with a Direct Branch. The Direct Branch held the majority of the placements, while we had three units in a satellite office. One of those placements was a 135-page-per-minute production system.
I had maintained a good relationship with the manager for eight years and had been in touch with him about the lease's end.
My contact mentioned that Direct would also be quoting a new production system, as they had a color unit at the same location. I knew my chances of retaining the account were slim, but I put my best foot forward, submitting a highly competitive proposal five months before the term ended (as did my competitor).
After hearing nothing for quite some time, I followed up with my contact. He told me that Jed in IT was now making all the decisions. He hadn’t heard anything either and suggested I reach out to Jed. He gave me his contact information, and off I went.
I left my first message, noting that we’d submitted a quote and needed to follow up on the end-of-term obligations for the existing system and get an idea of where we stood with the new lease. A week passed, and nothing—so I called again, leaving a similar message. Again, no response. This continued, with the same message each time, but no callbacks. All in all, I left at least seven messages for Jed. I got nothing! Typical, I thought.
About a month later, I had a dream that I’d lost the deal. Lo and behold, the next day, I received notification from our service dispatch that “my guy” had called about removing the system. I thought, “That SOB has my number and couldn’t call me directly?” Then I realized he probably didn’t want to speak to me directly because I’d ask, “What happened?”
The next day—WTF—I get a call from Jed, the IT guy. He’s asking me for a copy of the cost-per-page lease and wants to see if we can remove the equipment. I replied that I’d be more than happy to comply, but he’d need to call the leasing company and arrange it with them. I then asked, “Why did you go with the other company?” He said it was a pricing decision. I could live with that. Then I asked, “But why didn’t you return any of my calls?” His answer: “I’m not obligated to call anyone back.” I lost it! I said, “We’re an existing vendor, and we wanted to inform you of your end-of-lease obligations, and you’re telling me you’re not obligated to return calls?” He continued, saying he doesn’t check his phone because they’re all sales calls, but he does check emails. I thought, “You rotten $#%!” I called this facility many times and couldn’t even reach a person to pick up the damn phone, let alone obtain or request an email address.
In hindsight, I probably should have asked my guy for Jed’s email address. But who knew this person felt they weren’t obligated to call back an existing vendor?
The moral of the story? They entered into a new contract, and since they didn’t call me, their cost-per-page lease rolled over for another year—with some 2.5 million pages attached! I’d love to be a fly on the wall for that conversation when they realize they’re now paying for two production systems for at least a year! But who knows—maybe they’ll keep it forever, as their ineptness will likely prevent them from notifying the leasing company when the renewal comes due again!
-=Good Selling=-
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