Last-Minute Grabs

One of my friends was recently negotiating to do a job for a contractor. It wasn’t a particularly difficult assignment, and the general parameters of the agreement were known in advance. He agreed with the contractor to do the work for the same fee he had been paid in the past, pending the workout of the language.

And then, after the arduous prospect, the other side suddenly decided that my friend should be paid $100 less than he had on the other job.

I’m not kidding. The contract was for several thousand dollars; it had taken weeks to work out the deal, and in fact the contractor actually needed to have the work done pretty quickly. The contractor had actually intended on negotiating over a smaller sum, but had made a mistake during the preliminary stages of the negotiation. Of course, the contractor didn’t admit that there had been a mistake; he just presented it as a take it or leave it.

Now to be honest, my friend would have settled for less money than the agreed figure during the negotiations because there was slightly less work involved in the job. What angered him was the fact that the change was made at the last minute, after the deal was set. He interpreted the sudden price reduction as a macho game by the contractor.

Weighing everything, my friend decided to go ahead with the contract. But guess what? He was so mad that he relegated the work to one of his assistants, giving it decidedly less of his own attention than he ordinarily would have. The job was done, but to lesser standards than it would have had the last-minute switch not occurred. And a long business relationship ended.

Was a relationship that had worked well and profitably for many years worth $100? Was the fact that the assistant took a few days longer to put up all the drywall—this was a house—and maybe missed in a few places, more important in the big picture than a hundred bucks?

I guess only the person who ended up not buying the house after a second walk-through could say for sure.