The Data Printer$*$

Role of Robin Adler,

Proprietor of Adler Office Machines

by Leonard Greenhalgh

You are the owner and operator of an office

machine sales and repair service that has been in

business for $25$ years in a small town. Fred Gates, a

young repair technician, has been working with you

for $2-1/2$ years since his graduation from high school.

He has proven to be reliable and resourceful, and has

quickly learned to do high$-$quality repair work.

One of your oldest and steadiest customers has

been the Pufahl Manufacturing Company, presently

under second$-$generation management. Pat Pufahl

runs the day$-$to$-$day operations as general manager,

but still ultimately reports to the patriarch of the

family and founder of the business $(45$ years ago$),$

Otto Pufahl. Otto is nominally the President but now

lives in Florida. He keeps in touch by phone. Otto has

always been a little gruff, but you knew him well and

respected and admired him. Beneath the crusty

exterior was a warm, sensitive man whom you felt

you could always trust.

You're not so sure about the current generation

of Pufahls. Pat is unpredictable, and seems to have an

uneven temper. Business education did not seem to

have been much of a maturing experience; Pat seems

to look only at short term costs and doesn't give much

attention to the long$-$term business relationship.

A good example of this myopic view was Pat's

purchase of a printer for the company's

mini$-$computer. The computer $--$ a good one $--$ was

supplied without a printer or other peripheral

hardware. However, the company needed a printer

primarily to print out inventory and payroll data.

Your company sells an excellent line of peripheral

products that includes a good quality,

reasonably$-$priced printer. But the overly$-$educated

and insufficiently experienced Pat went to the city

and bought a used Datronix printer with much more

capacity than the company really needed. Worse,

anyone who knew anything about peripheral

equipment knew that the quality of that brand of

equipment was untrustworthy; as evidence, Datronix

has since gone out of business. You have to service

the printer every time it stops working. You have

been quite willing to do this, despite the headaches.

After all, Pufahl manufacturing has been a major

customer of yours since you started your business.

Your last repair job led to an unfortunate dispute

with Pat, which you have yet to resolve. Pufahl's

printer broke down in the late afternoon of last

Wednesday during an end$-$of$-$quarter inventory run.

You told your repair man, Fred, to drop everything

and go over to the Pufahl Company office to see if he

could fix it on the spot. Pat's call sounded urgent; that

Friday was the end of the fourth quarter and Pat

wanted to prepare some figures for $$the old man,$$

Otto Pufahl. Fred found that a steel bracket had

broken off the printer. He needed to bring it back to

the shop to re$-$weld and replace the delicate printing

head that had become damaged as a result of the

impact when it dropped.

Pat had asked your repairman, Fred, for an

estimate of the time and cost of getting the printer

back into service. Fred did a quick inspection of the

obviously broken parts and gave Pat a ball$-$park

estimate on a torn sheet of printout paper:

Parts $$250$

$12$ hrs$.$ Labor $$300$

TOTAL $$550$

Fred said he could probably get overnight

delivery of the replacement printing head, so that the

printer should be back in service on Friday afternoon.

Fred came back to get the service van, and drove

to Pufahl Manufacturing to pick up the printer, which

Pat had wheeled to the front lobby. Pat emphasized

the urgency of getting the printer back in service as

soon as possible, a point that had already been made

quite obvious.

The work took longer than Fred had thought it

would. Before hitting the floor, the printing head had

jammed the paper$-$drive, shearing off a bolt and

stretching out the toothed belt that advances the

paper. This additional damage did not become

evident until the printer had been disassembled. Fred

called Pat Pufahl on Thursday afternoon and left a

$2$ DataPrin$/$Adler$.$pdf

message with Pat's secretary$.$ The message was that

the replacement printing head had arrived but he had

$$run into some snags.$$ With some extra effort,

however, it would be fully repaired by the end of the

next day $($Friday$).$

The work proceeded and Pat Pufahl stopped by

on Friday afternoon at $4$:$45$ PM to make sure the

printer would be ready for pickup on Monday

morning. You had just finished making out the bill:

Parts $$272$

$15$ hrs$.$ Labor $$375$

TOTAL $$647$

Pat read the bill and immediately became very

angry, and in the ensuing tirade talked loudly about a

$$rip$-$off,$$ a $$fleecing$,$ unethical business practices,

and lawsuits. You became angry because these

remarks were overheard by two of your staff and a

new customer. Furthermore, you felt the tirade was

particularly inappropriate since Fred had set aside his