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Shaking (and shirking) hands on a deal

Seems like it carries no meaning now, or at least not to me.

Had a new company doing some fitting up work for me a few weeks ago. They were very good admittedly. They had some demo gear with them that I liked and I said I’ll buy that off you (it was new kit). We agreed a price and shook on it. They left it with me.

I sent them an email last week asking them to send me an invoice. They’ve been quite busy, so just responded now....

Apparently it was “last years price” that we shook on/agreed and this years price is now ‘x’. Of course if I’m not happy with that they’ll come and collect it...

Now ‘x’ is over 20% more the price we shook on. The total price isn’t huge - less than £500 - but it leaves a bad taste in my mouth when sh!t like this happens.

#whenadealreallyisnt
 
Do you have a witness to the verbal agreement?
Witnesses? Yeah the two blokes working in my yard from the company. There's no dispute what was said / agreed at the time.

Reneging on a deal in this way is a pretty poor reflection of character - or maybe its an exact reflection of their real character. Just not cricket as said.

I'm not going to bother wasting my time. If this is their attitude, they can keep it.
 

Mursal

Member
Just chancing their arm, reply confused and state clearly the price agreed in the deal.
Why would you pay this years price and it now older than when you struck the deal, madness .................

But when in conversation don't even try to get your head around what they are saying, act confused and stick to the original deal, by E-Mail.

No one has a word now, cant trust anyone
Feckers ...................
 

Muck Spreader

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Limousin
Witnesses? Yeah the two blokes working in my yard from the company. There's no dispute what was said / agreed at the time.

Reneging on a deal in this way is a pretty poor reflection of character - or maybe its an exact reflection of their real character. Just not cricket as said.

I'm not going to bother wasting my time. If this is their attitude, they can keep it.

It's a poor do, if they are reneging on a deal. One can only assume these operatives were never in a position to talk deals in the first place. If it were me I would just tell them to come and pick their equipment up and then put the name of the company on here and leave it at that.
 

Robt

Member
Location
Suffolk
Pheasant, I thought you’d have been dealing with farmers long enough to know how to handle this!
I agree, call their bluff!
I’ve been fortunate to spend a few days on a dealers stand recently. He trades on a handshake and his word is his word... that is why he is doing very well and has repeat customers!
If it’s only £500, what did they leave to demo? Must be a small item so little profit for them?
A tweet in the right direction is all that’s needed! Shouldn’t have to come to that but from my experience as much as some think how corrupt the farm machinery game is... it’s really one of the few industries that’s actually not!
 
Seems like it carries no meaning now, or at least not to me.

Had a new company doing some fitting up work for me a few weeks ago. They were very good admittedly. They had some demo gear with them that I liked and I said I’ll buy that off you (it was new kit). We agreed a price and shook on it. They left it with me.

I sent them an email last week asking them to send me an invoice. They’ve been quite busy, so just responded now....

Apparently it was “last years price” that we shook on/agreed and this years price is now ‘x’. Of course if I’m not happy with that they’ll come and collect it...

Now ‘x’ is over 20% more the price we shook on. The total price isn’t huge - less than £500 - but it leaves a bad taste in my mouth when sh!t like this happens.

#whenadealreallyisnt
The other way to look at it possibly is- 1 you said they made a good job so you may be keen to use them again -2 if they made a good job and there price was good maybe they are not making a huge margin on there services so therefore cannot afford to actually lose money on a deal?
-3 use your knowledge of the services and products involved to make an informed decision, if they are overcharging then tell them to pick it up but if on the whole they are a good business at decent prices then let them know it is not normally the way you do business but on this occasion you will pay (you do say it is a sub £500 item total)
4- we as an industry are loosing suppliers and there services at an alarming rate and support needs to go both ways I think to ensure we all stay in business nowadays as soon it will be just a couple of suppliers left controlled by supermarket, it is very easy to cut off your nose to spite your face
 

Overworked

New Member
Unfortunately this is how things are, we all have similar stories I think.

I got down to the nitty gritty on a tractor deal, £51,500 to swap on a Saturday, albeit over the phone, but to me 'a deal is a deal', by Tuesday he had bad news!!! "Sorry I've used an old price list, it's £12,500 more than I said". Needless to say we didn't proceed.
 

rusty

Member
Livestock Farmer
Unfortunately this is how things are, we all have similar stories I think.

I got down to the nitty gritty on a tractor deal, £51,500 to swap on a Saturday, albeit over the phone, but to me 'a deal is a deal', by Tuesday he had bad news!!! "Sorry I've used an old price list, it's £12,500 more than I said". Needless to say we didn't proceed.
How old was the price list to be 12.5k out!
 

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Webinar: Expanded Sustainable Farming Incentive offer 2024 -26th Sept

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On Thursday 26th September, we’re holding a webinar for farmers to go through the guidance, actions and detail for the expanded Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) offer. This was planned for end of May, but had to be delayed due to the general election. We apologise about that.

Farming and Countryside Programme Director, Janet Hughes will be joined by policy leads working on SFI, and colleagues from the Rural Payment Agency and Catchment Sensitive Farming.

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