PLUMBER
THERE WAS A MESSAGE ON THE WALL FROM A LADY WHOSE HUSBAND IS A PLUMBER. HER POSTING AND MY ANSWER HAVE DISAPPEARED?
The advert posting from the plumber was removed as they felt it correct to comment about the way the site does its charity fund raising by charging 3€ for leads.
We feel this a very small amount of money for any business to pay when you compare it with the cost of advertising and also due to the amount of profit they can make from one of our Leads
We have many local tradesmen who buy every lead they are offered and have done very well from them, it just seems others feel its their right to have everything for free.
What Spanish Life overlook is the fact that most people who ask for assistance in finding a tradesman, Is that what they most of all need is someone who is reliable and will do the job properly and at a fair rate, so they ask members on this site for advise in finding that person. What you offer to supply is someone who is willing to buy your lead regardless of just how good they are at the job.
If you really want to stop people giving out telephone numbers of trades people, who may be needed by someone, why not just delete the telephone numbers of those involved, and add a note at the bottom of the comment saying why it was deleted. Better still why not arrange a private or personal system to be used on this site.
I have nothing against giving to Charity, But I want to pick which ones to support, That way I can follow the advancement of that Charity. Nothing has been mentioned on this site about which Charity or Charities you give these 3 Euros to , or what they have achieved with this money
If you look at other posts you will see that if a member asks that they are looking for advise or a good tradesmen and other members answer with contact details they are left on as that is the aim of the site.
The plumber in question posted an advert on the forum for himself and at the same time stated he was doing this as he did not like to pay for new business that he gets though our lead system as he thought it should be free to him.
You will also see that we always allow the bars and eating houses to post all contact details and events free as we feel this is very important to the local people.
I am sure Alan that you are happy to give to charities and understand that you would like to know where the money is going and what is being done with it.
We do not ask for your money and do not want it as we do not except donations so have no need to tell you what we do and what we achieve
Spanish Life,
I have no intention of getting into a pointless argument with you.
But to get a couple of things straight. The original comment made, was, I believe made by the wife of a plumber, and she did state about the payment you required. my point on this is that perhaps if she knew where the 3 euros were going, she may well of been quite pleased to have 'donated' to this charity and been willing to of paid the going rate. But what does get to me, is that in the past certain people have taken the opportunity of naming and berating other people on this Forum, using it as a public platform to berate other people, some of these comments have been showing pure hatred, in these cases you have not taken any action by deleting these so called comments, even when asked to by other writers.
This just makes it look like as long as you or your charity are not missing out, You have no problem with anything being said about anyone else, regardless of the pain it may cause that person or people.
Yes I do donate to Charity,and I do not advertise that fact, The difference is it is my time or my money being used, Where as with your Charity/ Charities, you state quite clearly that it is someone elses money being used
I think you fail to realize Alan that when someone pays for a lead on this site or takes out a banner advert then they are paying for a service its a fee, no different than going to the local newspaper and giving them money for an advert.
When we are paid this money we decide to give it away, its ours to do with what we want. Where did you get the money from in your pocket ? I am sure you worked for it. So does that not make it someone else's until its yours and then you decide to donate it.
why would we advertise to the local tradesman that if they pay for the lead then we can help others, its that not a form of black mail?
If the local business can not see the benefit of a new customer and the profit they can make from it then its up to them, why should they then be able to go on to the forum and say "I am not going to pay for advertising I can post on here and get it for free"
Can you remove Select Air Conditioning from the Services Section please. I do not use the id or the email address it was originally set up with and therefore I cannot delete the adverts myself. Its still quoting 18%IVA and prices are out of date. I'm also wary that customers may be trying to contact me and it will look like I'm just ignoring them.
Spanish Life
I did say that I would not get into an argument, So I will take this as a discussion.
I will concede that the link I mentioned, could be taken as an advert ,it you were likeminded to believe that,But I am still sure that it was not the Plumber making the advert, but his Wife. Although technically it was an advert.
I am also pleased that you appear to say that if someone wants a name of someone who would give good service in a particular field, this information and the results of it would not be with held by Spanish Life.
As for your saying that Banner Adverts and Newspaper adverts etc. are the same as your selling names for potential jobs by individual tradesman are all the same, I am sure that on reflection this statement was a bit light hearted.
As for your saying the bit about my money, Sorry I cannot understand what you are getting at, I have in the past, on this Forum stated what types of charities I give money to and why and how I choose them, and as you say I choose where and when to give. Where as the money you donate, technically was never yours as you always state the money given to buy business is all given to Charity, Where would you stand if a dodgy geezer paid your charity 3 Euros and then made a cock up of the job, or did a runner with money paid upfront for the job, I bet you say something like 'I only gave you the lead ,its not my problem if its a dodgy geezer' Do you vet these guys and get recommendations of their work?, For 3 euros to charity I doubt it.
You win, the money we make as a business is not ours it belongs to other people and we have no right to give it away, you can do what you want with the money you make but we can not we have to spend it on fast cars and nice meals like most people do then this would mean its our money.
And you are right every company that advertises on this site should be investigated and if they pass all the checks we will sell them a lead.
This is of course is done by every newspaper before they print an advert on their pages, to make sure that if someone uses that company and are ripped off then the customer can not go back to the newspaper saying I got the details from you so you have to give me some money.
Spanish Life,
Shame you want to win a discussion so much, I am satisfied with having my say and letting you convince me that I am wrong, unfortunately you are failing in that respect.
As I was clearly saying that banner adverts and newspaper adverts are entirely different to your idea of charging for potential punters. People know when a newspaper advert is an advert,if it is in any way printed, so as to look like it is a news report etc. The word advertisement must appear with that advert,as with banner adverts,they are also printed as to make clear that they are the thoughts of the advertiser and not the printer.
As I see it your 3 Euros charge surely makes you an Agent for the tradesperson, whom you contact .
If you cannot see this, Or even think about it. Then I concede you are 100% correct (if only in your own mind)
ASL,this ''discussion'' started because you removed a post criticising ASL , I quote '''The advert posting from the plumber was removed as they felt it correct to comment about the way the site does its charity fund raising by charging 3€ for leads.
We feel this a very small amount of money''''' do you remove every comment criticising ASL,are you not big enough to take criticism, fair criticism I might add,, we criticise and disagree with each other all the time on here , doesn't matter if it's 1 eu 3 eu or 100 eu everyone is entitled to have an opinion/criticise , ASL don't try and be a dictator. are you going to remove this post?
I already know Dave the Plumber and his wife Maz so I was pleased she put the posting up as i had mislaid their phone number. I quite agree with what you say Alan. All I say is big businesses can afford to give three euros but, if someone is just trying to make a living whilst helping out people with small jobs then, obviously, the three euros would have to be put on to the price of the job. If I donate 3 euros to any charity I want to know what that charity is all about. I think it should say on the top of the page that, if you contact these tradesmen, through this forum then, if the tradesman does not pay 3 euros, you don't get a reply to your enquiry. Does it state this?
If you open your eyes you will see that many comments have been made by Alan today but he will I am sure confirm none have been removed.
As for Fair criticism would you like to explain more.
my eyes are open otherwise I would not be able to type this !!!! the fair criticism is that you charge 3 euros for a lead ,if anyone does not agree with that they should be able to say so, it's called a democracy , we are not in Russia .
Caroline we are all trying to make a living and you need to understand life is not free for anyone. Let us try to explain once more that YOU and no one else is donating money to charity, WE ARE
This is how it works.
A client goes to services and fills in the lead form at the bottom of the page.
We offer this lead to the advertiser and ask for a payment of 3€
The business that has listed on the site is not charged
They are not asked to pay for any of the costs involved.
If they want the lead and make the payment we get 3€
Now this money is OURS not yours, not theirs they have spent it on a service they have bought a lead and then will go on to make a lot of money from the customer. ITS CALLED BUSINESS.
Now we have 3€ what do we do with this money?
Buy meals, go to Florida, buy a nice new car, well you see its ours, we have SOLD something it belongs to us.
No we give it to charity, yes its us that give it not you not the business US
HOPE YOU UNDERSTAND
GOONERPETER I think you have got it, you can post on here to say you are not happy with paying 3€ for a lead, but I think you call it "talking the piss" in your country when you also say "we are not going to pay 3€ a lead so we will post an advert on here with our details"
no,,,,it's called taking the piss, the 3 euros doesn't apply to me, just annoys me when people can't criticise/have an opinion free speech and all that,,,,,as long as it's not nasty,,,, if you need a plumber speak to Caroline, have a nice day
A friend of mine took up one of these leads for doing some work (about a year ago now),....but he agreed to pay 5% commission of the profit he made off the job on completion of the work,....this was accepted by ASL. My friend then met with the customer and the customer accepted the quote for the work, my friend then started to do the work at the property while the customer was away back in the UK,...yes you guessed it right!!,,,,,,,, the customer never came back to the area and left my friend high and dry with an outlaid expense of 500€,...and as if that was not bad enough my friend was then harassed by ASL (the former site administrators) for their 5% "charity" donation, as you can well understand my friend told them where to go,...hence he was then banned from the site, (this was not in the la marina area)....Possibly vetting needs to be done on both sides on ASL's behalf,..but I guess the outlaid time would not be beneficial in respect of a 3€ donation. As for bars getting their advertising for free "to help the local area and economy", Who does ASL think spends the money in the bars other than people luckily enough to be drawing in their pension? That's right ! the tradesmen and workers they are charging to pick up work, how arse about face is that? (not that im having a go at the bars) This charging for leads is a total waste of time,...there are plenty of free sites to advertise in on facebook where you get to see recommendations from people on the tradesmen/women and also photographs of the trades peoples work.
Caroline,
Regarding your comment.
It may well be that 'A Spanish Life' rules the waves.