Commercial and Residential, Tucson Arizona
Heating and Cooling, Air Conditioning, Custom Wine Storage
Sales * Service * Installation

Opinion by Richard Ducote: Arizona Daily Star
'Customer Comes First' is more than just a slogan !

It's all in the cards.

Scores of purple cards nearly cover a wall in the back room at Temco Air Environmental.

Service techs gather in this room before heading out for the day's service rounds from the yard on East Grant Road near North Country Club Road.

The cards keep score from previous customer encounters. Service techs leave cards with every customer in the field.

Temco owners Marshall Dennington and Cathy Rankin don't just accept feedback from customers, they hunt it down. If cards don't come back, the customer gets a call: "Was everything satisfactory?"

The owners are not looking for satisfied customers. They want all the boxes checked under "very satisfied."

Some customers just don't give up "very satisfied" easily. Like a French ice dancing judge.

I grabbed a handful of these cards right out of the in-mail box the other day, and they were eerily uniform. "Very satisfied" and an infrequent "satisfied" was the nearly unanimous verdict. This in a business that often starts with an irate, overheated customer surrounded by a crabby family.

A tech arrives and may have to pronounce a system dead that will cost thousands to replace.

At minimum, it may take hours to fix and cost hundreds of dollars.

These people seem to be adept at leaving customers smiling, or at least satisfied.

It seems to be due to a combination of attention to technical detail and focusing on the customer.

The Better Business Bureau of Southern Arizona ranks heating and air conditioning businesses No. 1 in total inquiries year-round. Thousands of phone calls and Web clicks each month look for information on cooling contractors.

The BBB's Tom Collier says Temco's record of one complaint, since resolved, in three years is "very good" for that business category.

Temco's Rankin says it boils down simply to the "Golden Rule" of business - "We treat our customers like we want people treating us. In every case, all the time."

Dennington has been in the air conditioning business fo r more than 25 years and started Air Environmental in 1996. That small, two-person company grossed about $100,000 in its first year. Very soon after starting, the company got unexpected exposure as one of the contractors on the Tucson production of the PBS series "This Old House." The company later merged with Temco and later bought some assets of another firm.

Dennington and Rankin, who are married, say the company may break the $2.5 million mark this year and currently averages about 20 employees.

The driving mantra for the company is "do what's right for the customer."

"Whatever the issue, you err on the side of the customer," Dennington says.

"Business is simple. You do what you said you would, when you said you would, at the price you said," he adds. Sometimes that costs the company money.

Often, it results in good words from an existing customer to a potential one. Referrals drive the business, especially since advertising budgets ha! ve been cut to a minimum in favor of better training and pay for staff, Dennington says.

Roughly 80 percent of new customers are personal referrals from existing customers. That's good for Temco, because the cost of getting a customer through referral is about one-tenth the cost of getting one through regular marketing.

"Most organizations advertise and send messages one-way, and that's wrong," says Robert Lusch, head of the marketing department at the University of Arizona's Eller College of Management.

But a company that engages in conversation and dialogue has a much more intelligent approach, Lusch adds.

"The customer really is the expert. This is a much more informed approach. It sounds like that's what Temco is doing."

Instead of marketing to customers, you market with them, he adds.

Dennington says the company never has a shortage of applicants because pay for experienced service techs starts in the range of $20 an hour, on the high side for the industry in town. But hires are rare and turnover is low. It costs a lot to keep a good employee trained.

And technical skill is not the most important aspect of a good worker, he says.

At the top of the list is attitude - a natural inclination to help people solve a problem. Techs have to be friendly, courteous and neat. They go into people's homes. A perfect technical job won't count for much if they leave a mess behind.

All this takes attention to detail, of course. And the cards keep coming in to keep score.

The SEER (Seasonal Energy Efficiency Rating) on your heating and air conditioning system basically equates to system efficiency. The lower the SEER rating the higher your electric bill …every month for the life of the system! As of January 2006, the Federal Government requires a MINIMUM 13 SEER rating for all heating and air conditioning equipment manufactured. Note:  this is the MINIMUM not the OPTIMUM (some new models boast up to 19.5 SEER). 

We have received numerous calls from homeowners who are concerned they may not be able to get service and parts for their existing systems that do not meet 13 SEER. Not to worry! Manufacturers are required by law to provide replacement parts for 10 years after the last date equipment was manufactured.

When shopping for a new system, be sure you understand the SEER rating of the equipment. Know that SEER for you’re a/c is like gas mileage (MPG) for your car. If you don’t maintain your car (proper air in the tires, clean fuel filters…) your actual gas mileage may be impacted. With your air conditioning system, there are specific configurations and maintenance required in order for you to realize the optimum SEER rating for that system. Also, know that contractors are allowed to “sell off existing inventory” of systems that are BELOW the new minimum standard, so beware. Be sure you understand what you are buying BEFORE you make the investment. 

If you have additional questions about the SEER requirement, or on the phase-out of R-22, call Temco Air Environmental office (520) 622-2909 and ask our staff to mail you the “Regulatory Changes in the HVAC Industry” report.