Federated Handy People

For any Handyperson, small jobs shouldn’t be a big deal. It’s kind of what we signed up for.

Restoration of an original curtain rod in this case brought a lot of joy to the customer. Personally, I could tell why another handyperson—who promised to do this job—didn’t do it. I was glad to pick up the slack and get it.

In some cases, a handyperson gets too popular and their “dance card” gets full; they have to start saying no when they want to say yes. It’s better for people who hire out handiwork to assume this is the case and just move on to the next handyperson to see how it goes.

Sometimes, as I think it was in this case, the situation causes a handyperson to not be confident they can find a path to success. It looked to me like the removal of a large valence and curtains didn’t go well. In one of the old fastener holes, the screw had broken off on the way out and was still there blocking my use of that location. Many of the holes were too stripped out to receive the original fasteners. The brackets in some cases had been bent into a state of disrepair.

I was lucky enough to assume some things might go wrong with an easy job that other handypeople didn’t want to do. I brought the tools I needed to make adjustments to deformed metal brackets and a medium variety of miscellaneous screws just in case things went a bit sideways.

To be a good customer, you should be prepared to give your handyperson some history of the situation and be able to send pictures that help them envision their path to success with your job. It’s very hard to describe things correctly to other people, but it’s worse to not try at all. Sometimes doing a Facetime/Zoom thing from your Smartphone to theirs is what is needed. It can make everything go better saving you both time.