Dealings with Customers:

"A false balance is an abomination to the Lord, but a just weight is His delight." Proverbs 11:1 "Wealth gained by dishonesty will be diminished, but he who gathers by labour will increase." Proverbs 13:11 Clients will only be charged for the services or products they receive. Pricing structures will be simple, and consistent for all clients. A "time & materials" service contract will not include phone calls etc to/from other clients. These are to be allotted in 15 minute increments.

"Diverse weights and diverse measures, they are both alike, an abomination to the Lord." Proverbs 20:10 "Diverse weights are an abomination to the Lord, and a false balance is not good." Proverbs 20:23 In all its business dealings, the business shall be fair and honest. It shall not try and extract "every cent it can" from its clients. Prices for products and services shall be set modestly. Service costs must be balanced between the persons wage, and what is a fair charge out rate. This may occasionally result in an experienced person being charged out at a zero or negative margin, because he does not have the skill set that the client requires.

"If the axe is dull, and one does not sharpen the edge, then he must use more strength." Ecclesiastes 10:10 This is obvious once you know that the axe is blunt. In our industry, there are many times that people use the wrong tool for the job, simply because they believe that any use of a computer will improve their efficiency. Many have lost sight of the fact that the computer is here to serve people, yet there are many installations where the opposite is true. If a task can better be done manually, or by a competitors product, then let us say so, for if we don't, then we do not have our clients best interests at heart. In this day and age it may seem quite perverse to recommend a competitors product, but if we do, then we shall immediately gain the respect of the client, and ultimately the respect of our competitors. Lets be realistic: Is this the last potential customer - If it is, then we should have closed our doors and sold up a long time ago.

"If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat; and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink; for so you will heap coals of fire on his head, and the Lord will reward you." Proverbs 25:21-22 For what purpose was this business formed? To provide quality, value for money application engineering products and services. Do we have a monopoly on these? Of course not. Whose interests do we place first: our clients or our own? If we put ourselves first, and go for every dollar we can make, then we will loose some clients along the way because of our greed. So if we put the client first, and give some away because it is better for them, what have we lost in comparison? We haven't lost our honesty, but we have gained respect, and thus goodwill. So if we need to give the occasional client away, we will have at least gained their respect, and maybe their future custom.

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