Leaves Grass Senility

This is one of the things that sucks about my job.

We cut the grass for a lot of really old people, see. Generally, it's pretty smooth, kids step in and start handling finances, when they die or go to nursing homes. Houses get sold, whatever. It's fine, mostly.

Once in awhile, we get some poor old lady who's slowly going senile, and gradually becomes sort of a lunatic. I'm dealing with that now. She's been a customer for 10+ years, we haven't raised her prices, she's been on a pretty regular schedule, and my husband cuts her all sorts of breaks.

Well, now the new season is upon us. Daily, I've been getting angry phone calls from her, because he didn't do a good job on a cleanup (that he did in September) because there are leaves in the yard. I wanted to schedule her for a spring cleanup, and she freaked out, saying he has to go there and do it again, because she payed 85 bucks, by god. (Generally, there's a fall cleanup, AND a spring one, some people opt for only one). The regular price for a job her size would be $125, but since she's old...we cut her a deal. I told her all that. She's angry. She's German. She's going crazy.

Every single day. She calls. For maybe two weeks, now. "Get these leaves out of my yard, I pay you good money!" She's pissed. I don't even pick up the phone anymore. I see her name on the caller ID, I dodge.

I called her in early March, to see if she still wanted her grass cut, and she said yes, so that's cool. It started growing, and now she's two cuttings in the hole, refuses to pay, he's not going there any more to cut it, because she's not paying, and now this bullshit about the stupid leaves. Hasn't paid us a nickel since that $85 in September.

I know the woman, she's always been sort of a pain in the ass, but a good customer, and a paying one, which is nice. We're ready to cut her loose, but we know she's got no one really, to take care of her, and find another landscaper. Plus, in this day and age, she's gonna get hit up for a lot more than 20 bucks a cutting. We can't keep taking hits like this though.

Such a dilemma. It genuinely sucks.