Here's To The Maintenance Techs!

Our Maintenance Tech, who has been in this position since 2005, came into the Office yesterday morning pretty upset. When I asked what had gotten him to riled up, he asked me if I get alerts to one of the apartment ratings sites.

"No, why do you ask?"

"I got on last night! I can't believe what someone wrote on there. I'm gonna write back and tell them what I think of them!"

I looked at him and told him I did read it last night, too (wondering how we were on the same page at the same time!!!) and I wasn't concerned about it. I asked him who he thought it was and then I asked him if we could have handled their issue better. Apparently, this particular person has had a couple of issues with the air conditioner and was not happy about it. They complained that they pay a higher rent and - this is what upset him the most - they wondered how the Maintenance Guy could afford to live here, too. It was a pretty rude kind of observation to make let alone to post it was not very nice, and it apparently hurt his feelings. It actually hurt my feelings, too, because of its condescending tone.

I told my Maintenance Tech that I was planning on writing a reply that morning, which I did. I posted a reply explaining how we handle work orders, etc. and I supplied my email address and telephone number for follow up contact purposes and thanked them for the opportunity to understand their concerns and address them. He read my reply and agreed that it was probably a better public response than what he would have posted. :-) Of course for the next twenty minutes we discussed which Resident we thought had written the original post and could not agree on any one person. And I told him I guess it doesn't matter who wrote it, but it does matter how we respond to all the work order requests. We must be proactive; we must be efficient and prompt. We must continue to provide excellent customer service every day to all our Residents.

So, I was thinking that it is time to TOAST the Maintenance Team here! I think for the entire month of August, I will have a Treat-of-the-Week for them,  some special little surprises sprinkled throughout the month, too, and publicize it to all our community Residents, vendors and the whole city itself. It is time to celebrate our unsung heroes in a big way. They do work hard and they all deserve more appreciation.