Doesn't anybody fix anything any more?

[disneysteve]

At my office today, somebody went to use the hole punch and it jammed. The immediate response was to tell the person who orders supplies to get a new one. Nobody bothered to try and fix it. Nobody bothered to see if something had gotten stuck. Nobody bothered to try lubricating the spring. It's broken. Buy a new one.

Obviously, I didn't like that answer. When I had a break in my schedule, I took the hole punch, grabbed a hammer and screwdriver, and unjammed the stuck part. I worked it up and down a few times. I want to grease it a bit but need to bring in some WD-40 from home, but even without that, it is working again just fine. It took me less than 5 minutes and no advanced mechanical knowledge and saved us from trashing a perfectly good item and spending $15 or so to buy a new one.

It just boggles my mind how wasteful people are both with stuff and with money.

[bjl584]

I see the same thing where I work all the time. I try to fix anything that breaks. I was able to fix my vacuum cleaner once for free. I also repaired my garage door opener with a $15 part. I've fixed several things on cars over the years as well.

[JoeP]

That is my observation as well.

Some rationalize that behavior, saying that time is money, and for the time it takes to attempt to fix it, they could have gone out and bought a new one. This is usually accompanied by a statment such as, "Cheap Chinese junk, lasted only <insert time period here>!"

If you're going to freecycle it, I don't really have a problem getting another, because it usually prevents the item from going into the trash. I've seen first hand someone who keeps a bunch of broken stuff because someday they may need it, or will get around to fixing it. Neither ends up happening most of the time.

I try to get as much life out of items as possible!

[disneysteve]

If you're going to freecycle it, I don't really have a problem getting another, because it usually prevents the item from going into the trash. I've seen first hand someone who keeps a bunch of broken stuff because someday they may need it, or will get around to fixing it. Neither ends up happening most of the time.

I don't have a problem with replacing something that is actually broken, but just because something stops working, doesn't necessarily mean it isn't something simple and easily correctable. This hole punch didn't need a new part or a repair or anything. It basically needed a firm knock to loosen a part that had gotten jammed.

You make a good point about keeping broken things, though. Saving things that are actually broken and unusable because "someday" you're going to fix them can result in a very cluttered house. I've been guilty of that myself over the years and have really been making an effort to clear out all of that "someday" stuff I've been saving. Just last week, I trashed a hand shower that I don't even recall why I was saving. I went to Home Depot and bought and installed a new one. So now the shower works fine and there is some extra space on the basement shelving unit.

I also like the idea of giving away items that you can't or don't want to repair because someone else might be able to, or might be able to scavenge for parts.

[GREENBACK]

I think the current throw it away mentality comes from being able to buy cheap electronic stuff that's easier or cheaper to replace than to repair. The mentality seems to have transferred to other things. This is supposed to be the era of "green" everything but I wonder sometimes.

[disneysteve]

I think the current throw it away mentality comes from being able to buy cheap electronic stuff that's easier or cheaper to replace than to repair. The mentality seems to have transferred to other things. This is supposed to be the era of "green" everything but I wonder sometimes.

Sometimes it is actually cheaper to replace something than to fix it, sometimes significantly cheaper. For example, when the rechargeable battery for my electric razor finally died and couldn't be charged anymore, I went online to buy a replacement batter because the razor worked just fine. Turned out that a battery cost as much as a whole new razor, so I bought a new razor.

If you have a broken item and have to call a service person to come fix it, like a washing machine for example, what they charge for a service call is obscene and often makes it not worth fixing. When our washer broke, I think they wanted well over $100 plus parts and labor to come out and repair it. At that point, the washer was 10 years old. I was worried that I'd spend the money only to have something else break later, so for a few hundred, we bought a brand new one.

[SnoopyCool]

We are much more likely to fix something than to replace it, unless cost to replace is less expensive. With resources on the Internet, it's really easy to Google how to fix something and fix it yourself. We've done this countless times and saved who knows how much money.

[thesimplemoneyblog]

I think part of the problem is who is paying. Often, if someone else is picking up the tab, then people get the feeling of 'why bother fixing it, let's just replace it.' If it were coming out of their own pocket, then their response would likely be a little different.

For those of us that are independent minded and financially responsible, the first person's reaction to just replacing the hole punch is ludicrous.

[bUU]

I think it goes deeper than that: I suspect that fixing office equipment wasn't your job, Steve. (If it was, then what the heck took you so long? ) The ethic about waste in the workplace, like all workplace ethics, is crafted by management. Management in the US has generally become increasingly penny-wise and pound-foolish, or more generally, short-sighted. An example: When I got here, there were two people in IT. One of them was actually the handyman, which often involved assisting the hardcore IT guy with running conduit and such. But if a florescent light went out, this handy guy took care of it. If there was a broken desk drawer that didn't operate well, this handy guy would fix it. And so on. Money got tight, and they let the second guy in IT go. His contributions to keeping this place working well and efficiently using the company's resources were undervalued by management, sacrificed in favor of showing a bit better bottom-line. Now, in our case, the rest of us do kick in and fill the gap as we can, and I wholeheartedly support that concept, but I also see why some view management's failure in properly valuing the contributions of the second IT guy as projecting a message that waste is acceptable and proper, here. More over, it is management's responsibility to set the tone - not to tell people that they need to fix their own desk drawers - that's unreasonable - but rather to have a mechanism in place for registering problems to be fixed, rather than "buying new", if that is the ethic that they want to prevail in the workplace. They don't do this, I suspect, because they don't want a long queue of things to be fixed to make it so clear that they haven't adequately resourced the operation. The accountability, in the workplace, for fixing things must be placed on management, though, not people who were hired to do bookkeeping, writing documentation, or selling things.

(Don't ever put a screwdriver in my hands. Just ask my spouse!)

[thesimplemoneyblog]

More over, it is management's responsibility to set the tone - not to tell people that they need to fix their own desk drawers - that's unreasonable - but rather to have a mechanism in place for registering problems to be fixed, rather than "buying new", if that is the ethic that they want to prevail in the workplace.

This can also be extended to a number of other concepts in the workplace including: work-life balance, overtime expectations, if they are family oriented, etc. It comes from the top!

[creditcardfree]

My first instinct is always to fix something myself. I don't want to part with my husband's hard earned money too quickly! Depending on the situation, there are times where getting new (or calling a professional) makes the most sense from a time and money perspective.

Glad you got that paper punch working again!

[bUU]

This can also be extended to a number of other concepts in the workplace including: work-life balance, overtime expectations, if they are family oriented, etc. It comes from the top!

You betcha.

[disneysteve]

I think it goes deeper than that: I suspect that fixing office equipment wasn't your job, Steve.

I disagree. I work in a small office. There are 5 of us. I think everything is my job, and everything is everyone else's job, too. If something needs to be done and you are able to do it, you should do it. If the phone is ringing and the receptionist is busy but I'm free, I answer the phone. If a chart needs to be pulled and the medical assistant is occupied, I pull the chart. If there is no toilet paper in the bathroom, I go to the closet and get a roll of toilet paper.

I think the problem is that most people don't have that kind of work ethic. They want to come in, do their job and their job only. They will sit and listen to the phone ring non-stop but won't pick it up because that isn't their job. They will let their trash can overflow because emptying the trash isn't their job. Drives me nuts.

[bUU]

With a small office perhaps everything is your job, but I maintain that it isn't a bookkeeper's job to replace a hard drive in a RAID array.

I don't even buy into the phone example you gave. We have three different product lines in our office. You don't pick up the tech support line for product line X unless you're qualified to provide tech support for product line X. It is superior customer service for the call to go voice mail, so the customer's time isn't wasted talking to someone fumbling through trying to make it look like they can be of assistance.

You tried to tie this to a matter of work ethic. I think that's ridiculous. Sticking your nose in where it doesn't belong, taking time away from your own job to do a job you're not quite qualified to do, etc. -- these are not responsible actions. They're self-promoting arrogance. Now I don't really believe what I just wrote, but saying that what you support is a matter of "work ethic" is just as offensive as what I just wrote in response. It is essential that we all - including those who advocate that everyone should be superheroes - to acknowledge that our perspectives are our own, and that other people perspectives can be reasonable without it being violation of an ethic.

[disneysteve]

With a small office perhaps everything is your job, but I maintain that it isn't a bookkeeper's job to replace a hard drive in a RAID array.

I don't even buy into the phone example you gave. We have three different product lines in our office. You don't pick up the tech support line for product line X unless you're qualified to provide tech support for product line X. It is superior customer service for the call to go voice mail, so the customer's time isn't wasted talking to someone fumbling through trying to make it look like they can be of assistance.

You tried to tie this to a matter of work ethic. I think that's ridiculous. Sticking your nose in where it doesn't belong, taking time away from your own job to do a job you're not quite qualified to do, etc. -- these are not responsible actions. They're self-promoting arrogance. Now I don't really believe what I just wrote, but saying that what you support is a matter of "work ethic" is just as offensive as what I just wrote in response. It is essential that we all - including those who advocate that everyone should be superheroes - to acknowledge that our perspectives are our own, and that other people perspectives can be reasonable without it being violation of an ethic.

I think we're comparing apples and oranges. When I mentioned someone letting the phone ring, I'm talking about doing something as simple as saying, "Hello, doctors' office, please hold." Everyone can do and should do that if the phone rings more than 3 times. That is very different than your situation where you have a voice mail system. We don't. If nobody answers, the phone just keeps ringing until either somebody does answer or the caller hangs up.

As for the work ethic issue, I agree with you. It really didn't support my original point about waste. I'm not saying that I expect the person who encountered the broken hole punch to fix it. I would expect them to come to me or my partner and say, "Hey, the hole punch is broken. Can you take a look at it?" That would be an appropriate response, not "Buy a new hole punch. This one is broken."