Ep 291 - Replay - The Secret to All Star Electrician Diagnostic Calls

Hello and welcome to Electricpreneur Secrets, the Electrician Podcast. We're here five days a week to help you master sales, simplify pricing and deliver premium-level service. Today is absolutely no exception, as we unveil the secrets to all-star diagnostics with, as always, my esteemed partner and co-host, joseph Lucani, and, of course, I'm Clay Neumeier. Guys, if you're not in our Facebook group on the inside, engaging with us live, you ought to get there and you ought to let everyone you know that is an electrician know about this podcast, as we aim to help all ships rise. Joseph, how are you doing today?

I am effing great. I feel awesome today. I'm so pumped and ready to knock this one out.

All right. So let's talk about. The biggest problem that we see contractors face, honestly, is in these diagnostic demand calls showing up. And what if it's just a trip breaker or a trip to GFCI and next thing you know, 10, 15 minutes go by, especially when you don't have a process to engage your clients well and extract and really understand what else could be going on in this home for opportunities and current needs, desires, problems, and so it just feels like hey, we're billing a full hour or our minimum charge out rate, that diagnostics fee, and we haven't fulfilled our obligation to really give some value. And I know a lot of you have been feeling this. It's been talked about many times today. We're really going to dive deep on this with Joseph here and explore how to add value to these situations so you never feel that pull again or, dare I say it, the guilt.

There we go, cause the guilt is real because, at the end of the day, very few of us very, very few some of us exist, but very, very few people are out there who got into this trade just to make money. For the most part, we got into it because we genuinely wanted to help, or maybe we're just the kind that need to work with our hands, and that's okay. But, being one of the most educated trades, guilt shouldn't be something that we associate with because we have an immense amount of technical knowledge. But what I want to do today is teach you how to leverage that to actually assist and help the customer at a higher level. You down to fire this off Absolutely All right. So I'm going to jump right into it by giving you an actual scenario of a call that I went to and I'm going to explain what the previous person could have done versus what we did and why it works. Love it, let's go, all right.

So we were called down and it was a home in Greenwood Lake, which is an area nearby to where we are, and the customer called because there was an upstairs light and I think it was a bathroom light that was flickering. And they called and said, yeah, this light's flickering, we just don't know why it is. Check the switch, check the dimmer. It's not that we don't even know Wiring, there's good, we're not sure, right, naturally. What does the typical contractor do? He goes up, he says, yeah, I'm gonna change the fixture, just an LED probably bad LED bulb. You know I'll put an incandescent in. You know this is what it is. And now what did they do? They build their one hour plus material and customer goes away.

The problem is is that they did a drastic disservice by not inspecting things further. If you follow a process properly, like we instruct, that we do, and we actually followed it we would go to the panel first and let me tell you what I found when I went to the panel and this is what's going to teach you how to do all-star diagnostics. We need to understand how the system as a whole works, and a lot of us understand that from a technical perspective, but we don't actually piece those pieces together when it comes down to how do we serve the client. So I remember I went to the panel first and the first thing I noticed was everything looked fine until I opened the cover. When I opened the cover, I found on the left-hand side of the breaker or left-hand side of the panel. All the breakers had a stream of rust on one side of them and it looked that there was no knockouts missing. But it looked like there was water in the system and we didn't find any pipes. There was no missing knockouts, there was no condensation, there was no humidity.

So ask yourself where did this water come from? Well, the first thought is how many of you guys are familiar with SEU and SER being a water type conduit? I mean, it's rated to be weatherproof, but does that mean, if water gets into it, that it can't get out? Wouldn't that make logical sense? So the first thought is then how can you further check? Well, would it not justify you looking at the meter? Next, I would say Because some of you might be saying well, I mean, if it's underground, what could you do? Okay, fine, if it's underground.

It's possible, though, that you still have water leaking in from. Maybe the wood behind the meter maybe was not replaced and it's spongy and old and it's absorbing water. Maybe it's not sealed correctly and it's getting through the conduit that way. That could be a justification, but the most common is when it's overhead. We all recognize that the point of attachment needs to be below the weather. It needs to be above the weather head, right, or sorry, other way around. The weather head has to be above the point of attachment. The reason being is that, if it rains, what ends up happening is, if it's the other way around, water will go along from the feed lines, physically drip into the weather head and, because it's a weather-tight conduit, it would physically carry down via gravity, into the meter.

Would it make sense that if you've got a pipe on the top and a pipe on the bottom, and water were to drip from one, that it could go into the other? Wouldn't that be logical sense? I would say yeah. The thing was, is this actually proved to be the point? Because what was happening is, when I went outside to look at the meter, I found a softball-sized rot hole in the bottom of it, and what was happening was, because it was exposed to the weather and water was consistently dripping, because the weather head was consistently getting water into it, because it was mounted sideways and under the point of attachment, water was filling in. It was physically rotting away the meter and it was getting water so much so from there that it was actually bleeding into the panel itself. Now, with this information, what do we?

logically, do Well, just like in prior episodes, we definitely and forgive me for going back here we definitely need to check the panel first and make sure we understand that electrical system Correct. I hope that's where you're leading back to, because that's where I went.

Yeah, my first thought is we understand the electrical system. Now, if you were this person who's opening up the panel and doing this thorough diagnosis, you have justification now to offer a service replacement, right? The customer called you for a flickering bathroom light. The reason it was flickering was because the breakers that were feeding it were literally getting rotted away. Now we would have looked and been like, oh well, it's an old panel. Of course, it's probably just a little old, I'll change the breaker. That's what would happen if you said I'm not going to look at the meter.

Could you imagine being the electrician that got called back out to that job and you said, yeah, I checked it and it was good, and you had to tell your boss that you didn't check the meter. Now I can imagine some of you might say well, of course, why would I look at the meter? They called me for bathroom light, but you could logically piece it together from a technical perspective. Doesn't it add up? It does? You found that the first thing we checked is the panel. We found water detection. We didn't know where the water was coming from. So wouldn't the logical step be look outside? So there, you go.

So, following that logic, we now have the justification to offer things. Now this logic applies to many other aspects in the industry. Too many times what we end up doing is we try to focus on the problem, meaning the problem that the customer is experiencing, aka the symptom. We need to always be treating this like a medical professional. You don't just walk in and say well, you got stage four, do some cutting. It's like no, we're going to go and do a thorough diagnosis before that happens and we're going to offer you a range of solutions to fix your problem. That could be intense radiation, that could be chemo, they could be all these different things, but it's lastly probably not going to be. Let's get a scalpel and start cutting things away. That's the equivalent of what you're doing when you do a poor diagnosis. When you only focus on the root problem or you only focus on the symptom.

What ends up happening is you're actually shortchanging the customer. You may think that you're trying to help them by oh, I'm doing this on an economical level. They probably don't even want me looking at these things. But imagine it was your home. Even if you wouldn't buy, at the very least would you want to know. Yes. So, at the end of the day, can this logic hold water? Can you blame me? Or was I wrong for wanting to do a more thorough diagnosis? Was I wrong to do a further inspection on this? What customer is going to tell you, no, I don't want you looking.

So the moral of the story behind it is this we have an extremely in-depth technological brain. We understand the systems. We are one of the most educated traits, but we don't use that. Unfortunately, we tend on assuming that the customer knows everything about their system, but they don't, and we can't blame them for not knowing. So the key to an apex diagnostic is to not look at just what the customer is telling you, but to also look at what you believe is the reason why it happened in the first place.

And if you want to go even further with it, say to yourself if I were to leave this job right now, what would I kick myself for not looking at, Just at the very least? What would I kick myself for not looking at, just at the very least? What would I kick myself for not looking at? If I was called back to this within a year, what would I want to look for? Did you take the device out of the enclosure and check the wiring behind the box. How many of us reset a GFI without taking the cover plate off? Wouldn't that be a safety concern? Like we're just re-energizing something that tripped for a reason.

Yeah.

Or how many times we open it up and we realize you know what? Actually, half the box was blown out and someone just fixed the wire through it. There are things that we can look at if we're willing to take the time to investigate. The goal behind the apex diagnostic method is being willing to say I'm willing to admit that I don't know everything. Until I know it, I don't believe I know everything. I truly don't. I'm actually learning more every single day being among individuals like Clay and esteemed entrepreneurs like yourselves. I learned from you, and the goal is to say that you can learn just as much from these calls. So why aren't you taking the time to open the devices?

In fact we actually had a conversation sitting around the fire yesterday that was very much in parallel to this that we should discuss and that is trying to do your diagnostics on the way to the house. It's very important that we don't do that. It's very important that we don't go oh, I bet you this is just a trip to GFCI. I bet you it's just that because then you're holding yourself accountable to just run in and do the quick fix without properly exploring and properly diagnosing what could be going on in this home and beyond just the complaint again, as you said, understanding that electrical system is a primarily for your safety but be primarily for theirs too.

You actually just reignited a spark in me and I love you for that. All right, but Clay said something that really got things going and don't pre-diagnose. So how many of us do that? We have on our work order that the customer said that the countertop wasn't working or the bedroom fan isn't working, or you know, ever since we had a power store, my fridge died. We know what. We don't know what it is, but we can suspect. And when we suspect, we're putting ourselves in a box. That's why the first thing we say when we get there is what inspired you to call us today? Or what are you hoping to accomplish today?

You want to go into this assuming you have no idea what's going on in this call, because when you do, do you allow yourself to be open to surprises, and sometimes the surprises are pleasant. As an example, I've gone to calls before that were diagnoses that I knew that the customer had a problem and they told us oh yeah, my low voltage lighting on that side. How was I working? And I said, okay, so what are we hoping to accomplish today? And it was the other spouse that was there, not the one that made a call. They're like're like. Are you here for the water heater? What's going on in the water heater? Well, for some reason, the breaker keeps tripping. Were you here for that, I can be.

Let's take a look.

Yeah, please, let's go, yeah, by all means. So if you can go to the door not blinded by what you think the problem is, but instead being willing to be open-minded to say I need to still be convinced. I don't know what this is and I don't know this home, but I do know the customer probably knows it better than me. So let's figure out what was going on and what caused this and how it's affecting them. When you know how it's affecting them, you can line up with an emotional solution.

Yeah, prepare to run the play, Don't pre-diagnose. And and know the difference between the two preparing for a process versus preparing for an assumed diagnosis Very different things.

Yeah, because if we think about the prepared diagnosis, like let's, let's go through that in your head, you know that. Let's say this is a four o'clock call, so last call of the day, and it's Friday, like today, what ends up happening? What do we do? Well, we are trying to figure out how this call is going to go. We've pictured the customer. We figure where they're standing, we know what they're wearing, we know what the house looks like based on the area. We assume whether they're going to want to move forward, based on what kind of car we see in the driveway.

We have all these assumptions but we could be dead wrong. We could be wrong on every single aspect of all of it. But because we have these blinders on, we won't see the customer, and when we don't see them, they won't see us as anything more than a commodity. Big mistake, and that is the real key of the apex diagnostic. When you can apply yourself and all the technical knowledge that you have and you can position it in a way to where you're using it to solve an emotional problem the customer didn't realize they had, or using in a way to solve problems before they happen, you have become an invaluable asset to their life. You've become the safe bet because they'll invest more with you now to not invest later.

Yeah, and you know what they say about assume, as you said, the assumption earlier.

Yep assumptions make an asset of you and me.

Yeah, absolutely so. There's one more thing I wanna tie into this, because there's a common question around this too. On the inside track with us, we encourage and provide a 10 point critical visual home inspection. Now, some people tend to do this by memory or it written into their process, or some, like our people, tend to enjoy having a document to inspect by, but not everything is going to have that or be included around the focal point of the reason this customer called you. So a lot of times the question comes up should that be mandatory or should it be optional? And where do we draw the line on inspecting what, such as smoke detectors?

So I've actually gotten an unusual stance on this, because I can see the logic in both arguments. Right. There are some things that I believe are non-negotiable and there's some things I think you could pause on Now. Non-negotiable we will look at the panel. We will look at the emergency shutoffs, we will look at the smoke detectors, but why? Because no matter what you're going to have me do, it is going to have to be involved in the panel and, as a justification, anything that's connected to it.

So if I look at your panel and I see there's water, I am justified to look at your meter with due process, regardless of anything being wrong in the panel. You want me to go to your ceiling fan in the master bedroom. Shouldn't I make sure, if I'm going to install something new electrically, that I'm not leaving you in a situation where you could be in a hazard? The very least, are there batteries in your smoke detector? Is there a red light? I'm looking at right now. Is it 40 years old? And it's like the old tan ones that are sitting there they're collecting cobwebs and they're like oh yeah, it stopped beeping about when I moved in five years ago. It's like well, yeah, it stopped beeping because it's dead. There's nothing in it.

So I believe that those are non-negotiables. Where it can become a little flexible is where you say I'm going to look at the water shock protection points. Like your GFCIs, I'm going to ensure you have the AFCI protections. I'm going to make sure that we've gone through and checked for all three prong points. Those are all important things. Where I feel like they can have the middle ground is whether you insist on mandatory or complimentary. If you're not comfortable making it mandatory, at the bare bare minimum you need to be able to say this is a complimentary safety inspection that we provide to every one of our clients to ensure that they've received the absolute best in quality, safety, reliability and customer service. Was I wrong to want to offer that today? Or was I wrong to be willing to provide that as a complimentary service? Just to ensure there's nothing blatantly unsafe in your home? What person is going to say, no, I don't want you seeing if there's anything blatantly unsafe.

Only the people that absolutely are still determined to believe that you're trying to sell them something. Even in that case, we've seen the stories, In fact, from interviews. One of our people, Jacob, on the inside, actually has a great story about this where eventually the gal who owned the home he was serving caved and said fine, I'm coming with you. And he said perfect, let's go look. And the first place they went to was the panel and they recognized that the water bonds were not connected and pretty important place to be connected.

Exactly. And the thing is is now, how does that tie into the customer safety? If you're thinking about it right now, every time they were to take a shower and there is no way that water could ever have in contact away from them? Theoretically they're in a major hazard because that water bond protects you at so many points. When you're washing your hands, when you're using the shower, I mean hell, any kind of contact of water, any slop sink you have, any laundry machine you have, you need to be sure that there's no trace voltages back. That water bond protects you on. I mean, what is it? 0.05 amps is what it takes to stop a heart.

It's not much. I think it might be less than that 0.05? I mean.

Either way, it's a minimal amount of power that are required to hurt you in a very drastic way. Why are we not looking for such things? Is it almost a disservice?

Yeah, it really is. I mean, the reality is, when was the last time an electrician was in their house and when's the next time? And most times we put an arbitrary number on that, but we don't know. For the most part we don't know because houses tend to flip faster than electricians can get in them. That's been my experience anyway.

Yeah, I mean people move in and out within every seven years because they get their seven year itch. But let's say you met them at year five.

Are they going to call you back at year two? They would if you offered a yearly maintenance plan. Do dilly, do dilly is what it comes down to, absolutely. So let me just ask you this, and then let's try to wrap this one up. If I were someone that was struggling with the 15, maybe 20 minute call and that shame, that guilt around it, god, this is just going too quick and people are going, why are you charging me so much for so little? And now we did go to the panel first and we did inspect these mandatory items. At the very least. How long should this call take?

Realistically, if you're doing this the right way, it should take about an hour. And let me explain why. Right, Unless you're about six, eight and you can just reach the ceiling without having to stand on a ladder, you're going to have to carry a ladder throughout the home to check the smoke detectors, right, Very least you know that. You know that in order to check your GFIs, you're going to have to actually have your plug point and, if nothing else, you should at least open up to check the enclosure. So now you're opening up, let's see four, because you've got two kitchen circuits, so probably two GFIs on each side.

So you've got four GFIs. You've got your laundry room, You've got your outside, You've got your pool. You've got all these different points. Are you opening up each one? If you're not, or you're just doing a plug test? If you're doing that and you're saying you're checking all the GFIs in the home, all the smoke detectors, the panel, the meter and everything in addition on our safety inspection list, and you're doing it in less than an hour, I'm going to question you as an electrician. I'm going to say are you really doing the due diligence or are you just trying to do a dog and pony?

show yeah, Is it that rush? That's what service providers tend to do. I mean, we feel it every day.

The people that serve us you can definitely point them out. They're in, they're out. They wanted to get our money and they're gone. So we can't be that. We can't.

So let's hit them with some action as all-stars. You got it all right. So action item is this at the very bare minimum I'm saying bare bare minimum is you're checking the panel, you're checking the smoke detectors. The justification is is that anything that you would touch connects to those systems, either A it's being powered by or B it's being protected by? If you have no smoke detectors in the home, do you really have a safe home? If you don't have a safe panel, do you have a safe electrical system? Neither of those things can be said yes to if you didn't check it. That's your bare minimum.

If you wanted to go for the all-star action I'm going to give a little plug here Do it and you say you can contact us for our 10-point inspection piece and we can tell you exactly how to hit the all-star action. But it's going to require you going through all those individuals checking your GFIs, checking your smokes, checking your panels, checking all the individual points. And as you've gone about doing that, you say this is mandatory. Why do we say it's mandatory? Because if we're going into your home, we need to insist at the bare minimum. We've ensured that we're not leaving it in a worse condition. It protects you, the customer, and also protects us as a service provider, because as a professional, I have an obligation to tell you if there's anything unsafe. Am I wrong to want to uphold my professional obligation?

Not at all. Not at all. So how would you like to proceed? Oh yeah, powerful stuff, guys, and, as you can tell, we're quite passionate about this one. This is something you should be training in your business on the inside role playing for yourself and for those that you influence again in your business.

I know we do. We're offering classes on this and other things like generators on the inside track. So if you guys want to get a look at that, all you have to do is reach out to us from our facebook private group, the entrepreneur group, the electric Podcast, where everyone's engaging All our electricpreneurs are engaging with us in each one of these and or you can also leave comments, reviews and invite others to join us in the podcast. Where you found it Spotify, apple, google, wherever. That is OK. So we're here five days a week to help you guys master sales, simplify pricing and deliver premium level service and, as you can tell, we throw out all the fancy shit in favor of just showing up for you guys and get behind the windshield with you each day this week and next and the one after, and the one after and the one after that I'm clay newmeyer.

This is joseph lucani. Can't wait to see you guys again, looking forward to it.