Class is in Session

Careful customer education is a time-consuming task, but pumpers say it pays off in better-planned septic system maintenance

There’s nothing like a little one-on-one visit to build trust and credibility with your customers, and pumpers know this better than most service providers. But everyone takes a slightly different approach to educating homeowners about their septic systems, as these operators share:

Joe Walton of Agree Septic Service, Bremen, Ohio, doesn’t just care about homeowner septic system education: He’s an evangelist. After more than a decade pumping systems in and around his small bedroom community on the southeast side of Columbus, Ohio, he knows how to make his customers care, too.

“I initiate the conversation, both when people call and again when I get on site for the service. I’ll talk about (septic system health) to just about anyone who will listen,” he says. “I’ve had people call me just for a price, and I’ll end up talking about this stuff for ten, 15 minutes.”

He believes this way of showing he cares about potential customers and their tanks provides a sense of bonding, and likely results in more callbacks to schedule service.

“Most people appreciate the time I take with them in this education. And once they realize that’s a living thing there in the ground, they want to take care of it. They’re usually pretty surprised and think it’s interesting. I tell them the basics: my recommendations for what to put and not put in the tank.”

Walton shares knowledge he’s learned through professional development courses, such as those offered at the Pumper & Cleaner Enivornmental Expo International. He often visits the Web sites of Expo presenters and downloads information sheets and diagrams offered there. These he prints out as needed and shares with customers.

Steve Howes also hands out educational materials to his customers for septic pumping, drainfield care, repairs and inspections through Big Foot Pump Service Inc., St. Cloud, Fla. In addition to downloading ready-made information from the Web, he also avails himself of literature or CD-ROMs provided by his vendors, and passes those along. “We get a lot of different stuff imprinted with our name on it, and we pass that along.” Big Foot also acts as a conduit of verbal information between his vendors and the end-user.

He finds that such education is important, given that a majority of his homeowner customers come to Florida to retire from northern cities. “Most of them have never even seen a septic system, much less used one,” he says.

“We spend a lot of time with them to let them understand their septic systems. We talk about how it’s affected by the type of soil they have, how it works.” He believes the educational effort is rewarded by people requesting to be scheduled a year ahead of time for regular pumping. He welcomes this attitude, which makes scheduling, staffing and budgeting of jobs easier and more timely.

“Most people are really ignorant of what it takes to maintain their septic systems, because a lot of them, when they’re buying the house, are told they don’t need to pump regularly,” laments Tony Lusch of Lusch Excavating & Sanitation Inc., Salem, Ill.. “I generally tell them that by the time they’re finished with me, they’ll know more about septic systems than they ever wanted to know.”

Lusch hands out general information about septic tank operation downloaded from the Internet. But he finds his greatest challenge is educating homeowners about the tight clay soils in his area, about 70 miles west of St. Louis.

“We have very poor percolation. Most of the systems put in 20-30 years ago before we had perc tests, we’re replacing those now. But people have learned to live with failing systems. For some of them, it’s just a way of life. But when you tell them they don’t have to live like that, that you have something that will work, they’re ready to hear that.”

He handles most consumer education in one-on-one conversations. It’s more labor-intensive than handing out literature, but Lusch doesn’t mind. “I spend a lot of time with people because most salesmen don’t. People appreciate it.”

“We hand out brochures to customers when we go out on a pump job. They give a pictorial on the way septic systems are laid out and how they’re designed to work,” says Darlene Penner. Her AA Septic Service is located in a southwestern suburb of Indianapolis.

“We tell them the typical timeframe for regular pumping is every 3-5 years, keeping in mind whether they’re using a garbage disposal, how their soil percs, and how they use their system. We use the guidelines provided by the state of Indiana.”

She orders pre-printed brochures from a company in West Virginia that include a glossary of terms such as “sludge” and “graywater.” She finds this helpful in making sure the customer understands these terms when they come up in discussions about their tanks. It’s an expense that Penner is willing to absorb because “it makes us look more professional, and helps them trust us as people who know what we’re doing.”

Penner encourages people to be present when their tank is being pumped to understand their system’s capacity or so technicians can suggest usage changes that might be helpful. For instance, the installation of risers to make the pumping job faster, easier and less disruptive to the customer’s lawn. “That’s when it’s handy to refer to the brochure, so they can understand what we’re talking about when we say ‘riser’. They like the idea that we don’t have to rip up their yard every few years.”



Discussion

Comments on this site are submitted by users and are not endorsed by nor do they reflect the views or opinions of COLE Publishing, Inc. Comments are moderated before being posted.