We do not have regular phone service available where the shop is located, therefore we have to use VOIP. The trouble with VOIP is that if we lose power the router goes down and the phone can't ring. We have a battery backup for things so we don't lose all the settings and programming on the router but it's setup so that the phone won't ring because otherwise it kills the battery and we have to reprogram all the stuff again.
Tuesday was nasty high winds and we lost power several times during the day. Calling during one of the hours that we didn't have power means that nobody can answer the phone. I forgot to post a comment about it on facebook because I was busy with a bunch of other things.
VOIP isn't new and just because it's an Oklahoma City area code has nothing to do with the location of the shop. I don't know how a VOIP number has spawned a new conspiracy but the phone works, I have called it myself to check and I've heard the phone ring nearly non-stop all day today and yesterday.
Phone hours are observed pretty strictly here because otherwise we get far less work done and the backlog never goes away. That's why we have phone hours posted on the website and facebook.
That's also fair and reasonable, it should be standard practice to give the final bill when the build is ready to ship and not sooner since the deposit is meant to already cover costs that cannot be recovered for the company.
I agree but we've never charged that much of a deposit which is why we have also adopted the policy of non-refundable deposits.
When someone is given a final bill on a Nucleus barreled action they have paid $250 towards the job while we have put over $1100 in parts towards the job already before any work is started. For years we didn't have an issue with it but we had a number of folks try to make changes or cancel after work was completed last month. That's not a tennable solution hence why people have been invoiced and told "your work is starting, here's the bill". Typically the turn time on an invoice is 3 business days and by the time it's paid the work is complete or nearly complete.
We have a bottleneck in final QC right now because the guy who meticulously checklists through the assembly and functions of the barreled acitons or the complete rifles is answering the phone most of the day (going back to why we have phone hours posted). That's being handled but it does take time.
I will make updates here as often as I can. Typically that's every few days.
