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That is a good question. Mostly it is a losing situation but making the customer "whole" is part of developing a loyal customer base and sort of correcting the image of repair techs and shops being worse than shade-tree mechanics and rip off artists. I usually charge based on a weighted scale of how much the item should have cost to repair and the ability to pay and split the difference. But then again, my current small repair shop is part hobby and my main income is from another business. In my old, very large shop, we pretty much charged $65/hour with a 2 hour max and being the owner, ate it on anything over that. Those real monster rebuilds of hack jobs sometimes cost me hundreds of dollars in shop overhead for the 2 hour repair price.
I know that does not make sense for some but I just feel somewhat responsible for the work of other shops, in regard to rescuing otherwise good units. That is one reason I am pretty hard on "techs" who are trying to do commercial work without a clue or without a means to properly diagnose or repair a unit. If someone who owns the unit is asking for help, I'll spend the time to assist but when a tech is using the forum to avoid having to learn what the hell they are doing, and risking the reputation of all techs, and ripping off the customer, I have little patience.
Here, the problem of hack techs or "masters" as they are called, is doubling bad since there is no repair support industry for pro audio, no cooperating distributors who will sell parts and no western manufacturers who will send parts to Russia. That means every unit is likely to be a hatchet job, previously done by someone with a big soldering copper on their kitchen table which burned off all the traces of the pc boards or made elaborate mods just to get around not having access to the correct OEM parts. Even back in the States where there is a severe lack of science or technical training for non-scientists or engineers among those growing up after the 70s, it is rare to see the kludges I see here everyday.
I know that does not make sense for some but I just feel somewhat responsible for the work of other shops, in regard to rescuing otherwise good units. That is one reason I am pretty hard on "techs" who are trying to do commercial work without a clue or without a means to properly diagnose or repair a unit. If someone who owns the unit is asking for help, I'll spend the time to assist but when a tech is using the forum to avoid having to learn what the hell they are doing, and risking the reputation of all techs, and ripping off the customer, I have little patience.
Here, the problem of hack techs or "masters" as they are called, is doubling bad since there is no repair support industry for pro audio, no cooperating distributors who will sell parts and no western manufacturers who will send parts to Russia. That means every unit is likely to be a hatchet job, previously done by someone with a big soldering copper on their kitchen table which burned off all the traces of the pc boards or made elaborate mods just to get around not having access to the correct OEM parts. Even back in the States where there is a severe lack of science or technical training for non-scientists or engineers among those growing up after the 70s, it is rare to see the kludges I see here everyday.
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