Do The Right Thing

As you may have heard, I work on a loan program that helps people put in new furnaces, boilers, hot water systems, windows and insulation. It is an awesome program, with the one drawback being that you get to see how jerky some contractors get. Customers get cranky too, but it's generally the kind of cranky that only hurts their own case, whereas a lot of these contractors completely screw up the process for these folks and delay their work.

On the other hand, sometimes you get to see people being completely awesome, upstanding folks.

I got a call a couple days ago from one of my favorite customers (I am a sucker for senior citizens who refer to me as "honey," etc.) that sounded like it was headed for a disaster story. The old boiler had been removed, and as the contractor went to put in the new one, they managed to crack the cast iron casing of the unit. Uh oh. The contractor immediately apologized, and told the customer that he would be able to get a new unit from Rhode Island if the customer would be willing to accept an upgrade. Obviously, the question was what "accepting an upgrade" meant. The contractor answered that the replacement unit would be a new, super-awesome System 2000 EK-1, which was more efficient, but would cost the contractor about a thousand bucks more. What would be the cost to the customer? "Nothing, since it was our mistake." Obviously, the customer could hardly believe it. He pressed the contractor a little more, and they continued to say, no no, it was our mistake, there won't be any cost to you. The system was in the next day.

Needless to say, the customer said that the oil company would be HIS oil company until he croaked. (Which is what he actually said, which is awesome.)

Isn't it awesome to hear about a company doing the right thing? Especially on that kind of scale? I wanted to run out and hug the contractor, but instead I'll tell the story here and tell you that the company was Albert Culver Oil, and they are based out of Rockland, MA. Their number is 781-878-5050 and if you live in the Rockland area, I highly, highly recommend them. They have had a couple other customers go through the loan program and they are always courteous and professional, and get the paperwork we ask them for in almost instantaneously.