Mistakes. They’re the Only Thing that You Can Truly Call Your Own.
Please raise your hand if you send out proposals to clients. Please put your hand down if you have ever made a mistake with pricing on a proposal. For the record my hand was up and now it’s down.
Unfortunately, I believe everyone who sends out proposals has probably made a number of pricing mistakes over the years. The question for me has always been:
How do you handle it?- What do you say to your client or prospect?
- What do you say to your boss?
I have always said there is a tremendous amount you can learn from a mistake. Clearly how you handle that will determine how your clients view you in the future.
Last year, US Airways accidentally sold flights for the low, low, low price of $1.86. Guess what? They honored the mistake and their customers and the business community really appreciated that and clearly respected them as a result.
Back in September during a four day period, Holland America accidentally sold cabins on ten sailings aboard the Noordam from January to April for well below cost. Cabins that normally cost $1,399 a person showed up for $849.
You are probably asking yourself, so what? They would do the right thing! They would do the same thing that US Airways did!
This is the part that is unbelievable!
The cruise company has notified passengers they will be required to pay the difference in the fare. Some customers were notified a month before their cruise that they owed $1,100. The only choice they were given was pay or not to go. The cruise line did give customers a $100 shipboard credit for their mistake.
I was shocked! In fact, I am still shocked. Weren’t we all brought up the same way—that your word is everything? Stand behind what you say! Stand behind what you do!
When someone at M/A/R/C misses the boat (no pun intended) on a proposal we discuss how/why it happened and what we learned from the situation. We never have discussed charging the client more!
I haven’t heard if Holland America has changed their minds and honored their commitment, but my hope is they did.
Has this happened to you?
How did the company handle it?
I look forward to your thoughts and comments.
January 8th, 2007 at 10:39 am
Your word is your bond - UNLESS the mistake will make you bankrupt. In business your word counts more than the contract - you can’t enforce the damn things anyway no matter how much time you spend with lawyers. So sticking to your word is critical no matter what the cost - unless it’s absolute ruin.
Of course the client has probably made the same mistake themselves….we all do it and we all then learn to get proposals proof read !
andrew
January 11th, 2007 at 6:19 am
I have believed for years that what separates great companies from good companies is how they handle mistakes. It takes serious effort to deliver quality products and services - never an easy task. When it comes to handling mistakes, it is philosophy and approach that makes the difference and this comes from leadership. You can have the greatest dining experience and walk out of the meal impressed, but when you have a lousy dining experience and the restaurant comps the meal or does something special to try to fix the situation, you will talk about it forever. Things happen and life is not perfect, it is how we react to the problems that is remembered. I have made some menaningful business relationships off of issues that were resolved the right way, earning us respect and a business friend for life.
January 29th, 2007 at 10:51 am
Mistakes in proposals happen, and we usually honor our honest mistakes. After awhile you learn to do a sanity check by pricing things at a very high level to see if your price makes sense. When you price in details and price in total the prices should match. Here is a law: Time = Quality, converse is true No Time = Mistakes. If you do not find mistakes the first time you price you did not look close enough. Usually I can look at a proposal and say, in this area, the mistakes will be costly.