The Doorphone

A customer was up to his ears trying to solve the problem of his doorphone. Apparently, his contractor, after the completion of his house, was very difficult to get through. I was not surprised as this is the usual procedure of anyone who had done their job and received all their money: Run.

So, by a stroke of luck, he discovered one of my customer has nearly the same doorphone as his and we were then referred to this guy. Once I came over, I discovered why the contractor does not want to pick up his phone. The is the problem with most contractors. Of you want a gate, he will get you a gate but he will never let the gate people deal with you directly. He might be aftraid you would discover the real cost of the gate and so on.

I have seen the problem and I will quote him another unit but we're not going any further than that. This was because if the cables were faulty, repairing them or pulling a fresh one would be a very difficult job. Moreover, since this is a house, do not expect to them to pay industry prices.

The contractor has stupidly cemented
the whole unit into the wall. After
digging the hardened cement out
for the screw, it still would not
budge. Time to call for more
reinforcements

The next few days, I got one of my guys
to use a chisel to remove most of the
cement. And what we found was not
encouraging; everything in there was
wet. But the cables seemed OK...

Just looking at the back of the
unit was enough to tell us that
it would need a replacement

Still, I was kind enough to redo his push button
doorbell. This one uses radio frequency to
activate the doorbell inside the house. All
you need is just a 12v car alarm battery.
But I stop at putting cement to cover the
sides. Still, if the customer wishes to buy
the replacment unit, the next time I go
there, I will also fix a small metal splash
shield for this doorbell