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rchawla80

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hi there,

can a dealer do me a huge favour and program an IR code into my system. My dealer is offering to do it for a huge amount. This is getting quite ridicolous as my dvd players broke down. I am going to throw C4 out the door and feel like working with a system that I can change around.

Any thoughts?

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hi there,

can a dealer do me a huge favour and program an IR code into my system. My dealer is offering to do it for a huge amount. This is getting quite ridicolous as my dvd players broke down. I am going to throw C4 out the door and feel like working with a system that I can change around.

Any thoughts?

You can call just about any dealer here..

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Oh I already replaced them. MY dealer is charging me $150 to come in and change the IR codes from Toshiba to Sony!

As Codeman stated that can be done remotely if you have a 4Sight account.

I don't believe anyone here would charge that much.

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I would guess that all that needs to be done is removing one DVD player from the program, adding the other in and doing the bindings. As long as the homeowner can handle plugging in the cables and gluing on an IR bud, and to Intellisol's point if the driver exists in the C4 database (which would seem to be the case with most Sony DVD players) then it could likely be done remotely.

rchawla80, did your dealer specifically indicate that he needed to create a driver, or might he have been referring to just replacing one driver with the other. Better yet, what model DVD player are you trying to add?

--Jason

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He said to do it remotely if the driver exists it would be $70 bucks, and to come in and build it, it would be $150. Is there anyway I could do this myself? I am willing to hell become a dealer!

Can someone please help me! Please email me at rchawla80@gmail.com

Thanks a lot everyone.

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are you kidding me? 70 dollars to go in remove 3 devices and add them. My 5 year brother can do that ... that is what I am frustrated with ... maybe the other dealers are better but all my dealer does is find some way to charge me money. I told him I would buy dvd players from him, he quoted me $140/player for the same I got for $50 and then he would do the install for free!

Ripping people off if you ask me. Anyways, no disprespect intended. I just think consumers should be allowed to change things at their own risk. If they break it, they can call a tech in and pay for it. Not to add components.

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Our fee schedule looks like this:

$60 per hour remotely.

1/2 Hour Minimum after the first 10 Minutes.

$75 Truck Roll within 25 mile radius

$100 Truck Roll outside radius Max 60 miles

TBD after 60 mile radius.

Simply giving an example.. :)

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Our fee schedule looks like this:

$60 per hour remotely.

1/2 Hour Minimum after the first 10 Minutes.

$75 Truck Roll within 25 mile radius

$100 Truck Roll outside radius Max 60 miles

TBD after 60 mile radius.

Simply giving an example.. :)

I would have to say that your pricing is VERY reasonable.

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Assuming everything works without a hiccup, this is 5 minutes. But we all know that hiccups do occur, if you hook up a cable wrong, or if you have to start explaining to your dealer what you did different with this DVD player vs. the old one then this quickly becomes more than 5 minutes.

You should also consider that there is a reason why this is 5 minutes for the dealer, they received training and have experience. I have had the opportunity to play around with the Pro version and a lot of things are simple, but there are a lot of things which are not obvious and that's when you need the experience and training of a dealer.

My dealer quoted me $85 per new device to be added, so in my mind you are already getting a deal.

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Not to mention the dealer has opportunity costs for those 5 (more likely 10) minutes. That is, if they have to pull someone off of a different project to do that 5-10 minutes on your project, even if it's remotely, that's likely to disrupt more than 5-10 minutes of another project.

Also, you can think it should work however you think. That does not change the fact that Control4 is a dealer-installed system. Your choices are to pay your dealer, find a new dealer, or become one.

RyanE

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Not trying to stir the pot here, but Ryan, your last comment grates on me. Just because a customer needs 10 minutes of support, why should that customer pay an extra disruption fee for another job... afterall, and as everybody is quick to point out here, this is a dealer-only supported product, CORRECT? If it is only 10 minutes and a frickin' disruption for the dealer, let me do it myself. If some dealers were more reasonable and supportive after the initial sale, such as K&J, when adding a couple of small pieces, maybe there wouldn't be as much bitching and calls for doing it yourself.

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From my perspective I think the fact that C4 enables ANY dealer to log in remotely and work on ANY system (obviously with the owner's approval) means they've done a good job at protecting consumers from gouging. Compare this with, for example, companies that grant exclusive territories to a single dealer. There can then be no price competition, other than someone deciding not to buy the product at all.

Dealers (and mind you, I'm not one) deserve to be paid for their skills, and if I think my dealer is charging me too much I've got other dealers in my area I can call. If they're all charging me too much I can request referrals or even a competitive bid in a community like this. If there were a way for someone to cost-effectively do the job, pay for their training and overhead, make a profit AND only charge me $30 for the job, I'm confident someone will do so. If the price for something is in the $75 ~ $100 range, then I have a reasonable confidence that that's probably what it costs to do the job and make a reasonable profit on it.

I'm specifically talking about service/labor here, equipment might be a little different in that I'm not sure whether C4 *requires* dealers to charge MSRP or if they give dealers some flexibility there.

--Jason

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K&J, so if you were able to do something remotely in 5-10 minutes how much would you charge?

Your rates do sound very reasonable btw.

Folks here's my thought on the rates... Am gonna get rich off 1 customer.. NO.. I really try and build a large customer base.

We pride ourselves on our Customer Service.

If it were really that simple to take care of. The 5 - 10 Minutes would be on me. Now, Please Keep in Mind that someone cannot call me up at any time and expect that. Be reasonable. Don't expect something for free at Your Time.

If it would take longer than the 10 than I have listed our fees.

I'm am not aware of what the other dealers charge on this forum. I do know there are a Bunch of us that really try and go the extra bit to assist others.

A few of my customers are on this forum and have even spoken up.

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I agree with K&J, which isn't always the case :)

We try and treat customers fairly, and charge a cheaper rate for remote work, but it cannot always be done remotely. And to be honest with you some dealers are just faster than others at doing the work. But we all have to keep the lights on. We have had 3 go bankrupt in our area. 1 doing poor work gouging the customer, 2 were good, but just couldn't manage a business. If you need something remotely many dealers on the forum are willing to help, but they are in business to make a living. In my opinion what has been quoted as the remote rates is very fair.

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I appreciate everyone's candid reply on this forums and I appreciate that we are all out to feed our families and take care of ourselves.

I have no issues paying for service if there was a level of "confidence" in it.

As far as the DVD players are concerned, I bought them, installed the connections, the IR cords and the power and synched everything. To go in and remove 3 Toshiba's and add 3 Sony's is a joke process and any dealer here that claims that it takes 30-45 minutes is not competent and is gouging. I called my dealer and he ignored my emails and phone calls until I agreed to give a credit card. This is what I am dealing with after giving them over $25k of business. I wish I could get my hand on a composer for dealers and then I would just bother "dealers" for actual "work" cause this is not considered work. (Ps I bought these because the dealer quoted me 3x the price of retail).

I wish I had the dealers on this board in my area, I would switch in a second. I am tempted to throw C4 out the door and just get logitech remotes with a simple audio distribution system.

The goal isn't to nickle and dime customers, you will not build a base that way. Infact, if you help along like a good dealer, you will get tons of referral. We are in the process of building 5 new houses now for sale, no way we are contacting this dealer for any services.

My issue is with this process. I can appreciate the need for a dealer for installation, troubleshooting and issues. But simple changes to the system a user should be able to make whether that be adding or removing devices and changing IR codes. I am not saying that every consumer can do that but the ones that can should be allowed to AND if they do screw up something in the process, they should then have to PAY for it.

C4 as a whole has devised a product that like "home" edition that is utterly useless. I cannot even change zone names in it. The only thing I can do is schedule and add media.

I hope someone from C4 is reading this and passes this on to management.

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