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Going 4 months without pruning a client's overgrown oak because they kept saying 'maybe next week'
Last month I finally got back out to a job in Cedar Grove I had put off since early spring. The homeowner kept telling me she wasn't sure the oak in her front yard needed work. I stopped by last Tuesday and found three dead limbs hanging over her driveway and one big crack in the main crotch. I climbed it, took out the hangers, and reduced the two heaviest leaders to lower the weight. Took me about 5 hours and I handed her a bill for $850. She stood there quiet for a minute and said she had no idea it was that bad. How do you folks handle clients who keep pushing a tree back before something drops on a car?
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alice33616d ago
That line about her saying she had no idea it was that bad really hits home. I read an article a while back from a co-op extension about how homeowners just don't look up at their trees, so they don't see the risk building. The trick is to put the danger in plain terms, like telling her those dead limbs were hanging right over where her car sits and a windy night could drop one. Some folks still won't move, but once you say it that way they usually come around. I've also started taking phone pics of the bad spots and texting them over, because seeing a crack on a screen lands harder than hearing about it.
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