Soon after moving into my current home, I'd had Bachman's Roofing replace the ridge vent on my roof, and asked for a quote on new flooring for a porch. The roofing job was performed quickly and well, and they knowledgeably explained the work and materials that would go into the porch refurbishment and provided a written quote shortly thereafter with no fuss. So when the time came recently to ask for quotes for a whole new roof, they were the first company I called. When the salesman arrived, he was friendly and polite; I told him that I was ready to move ahead with the project, and was getting quotes from several contractors but had called Bachman's first due to my prior positive experience with them. He started with a thorough inspection of the current roof, adding chalk marks to areas of concern and photographing them. We then sat down inside my home and I was shown the photos and samples of the materials they used (alongside samples of the inferior materials that their competitors supposedly use, one of which had been cut out very raggedly to make it look bad next to the perfectly-cut-out Bachman's sample -- I pointed this out just to let the guy know up-front that I wanted straight talk, and indeed I'd already made several comments about the fact that I work with high-end businesses where high-dollar sales are handled very respectfully and with no games). I started to realize that this presentation was going to drag on for far longer than expected when I was given a paper with photos of four other Bachman's employees, and the salesman went over what each person would be doing for me... this really wasn't necessary. I knew full well what he was doing when he tried to get me to choose a roof color before I'd even seen the price (this is to change my thought process from "am I buying a roof from this company" to "what color of roof am I buying from this company"), but I played along. When the pricing was finally revealed to me, he used what's known as highballing or price-anchoring: I was first shown a very high figure, then told that there was a "monthly special" lowering the cost by several thousand dollars (and that next month's special might not be as good), and finally that the price would drop by thousands more if I would agree to sign up today -- this is the time-limited or FOMO ("fear of missing out") technique, which is intended to apply high pressure to the customer. Immediately I felt stressed and annoyed -- I'd previously thought of Bachman's as a high-end company and had never expected their salesman to attempt to twist my arm. I expressed this very clearly, and said that there was a second person on the deed, and I would be relaying the information and we would be making a decision together after receiving all the estimates. He then suggested that I call my relative right then and there! I was shocked by this flagrantly rude and coercive behavior (where coercion means convincing someone to do something against their will or best interest) and flatly refused. Fully intending to review all the quotes before making a decision, but curious about how aggressive this guy would get, I asked if the "today" price would still be honored if I called him later that afternoon; he made noises about how hard that would be to arrange, wanted to know what time I'd call, and said he'd have to speak with someone at the company about it (and actually proceeded to pull out his phone and supposedly make a call in front of me to someone else at Bachman's about this). Then his tone and expression changed from friendly to subtly domineering as he slowly and pointedly asked me "how serious are you about getting a new roof?" Wow, was this ever disgusting... he was clearly trying to put me on the defensive and make me feel guilty, as if *I* were wasting *his* time, despite the fact that I'd clearly informed him from the very start that I was getting several bids. I really should have thrown him out of the house at that point; but I remained polite, and asked him to send me the figures he'd provided (I'd asked for pricing on two options, and he'd then given 60-day, "monthly-special", and "today" pricing for each). He told me that his system would only let him send me the 60-day amounts (??), so I went to my computer and had him read off the numbers one-by-one while I typed up a chart. When he finally got up to go (he'd been here for over two hours at this point!), he asked if he could sit in his truck in my driveway for a little bit, and I said that was fine -- but he remained there for quite a long time, which kept me from heading out to run errands and made me feel even more uncomfortable, and I was relieved when he finally drove off. Considering how manipulative and condescending he'd become when he didn't get an instant (and astronomically-priced) sale -- despite my having been quite clear about my intentions from the very start -- I will never allow another Bachman's employee on my property again. read more