All-Star Was I Wrong??

Since it's cp's aunt that usually brings her, could mom have been upset that she had to be there in the first place? Maybe this made the extra ten minutes even more frustrating for her. You were more than kind and generous with the offer of the free lesson. Hopefully, aunt will bring cp next time!

I don't think you were wrong.

I find myself on both sides of the fence with this scenario.

As a coach, I think you were more than fair. Actually offering a free session is going above and beyond IMO. Yes, when you schedule a private with someone, your attention should be 100% focused on them, but the reality is that gyms are busy and unfortunately for you, there aren't enough hands to play all the instruments. As a coach, I could understand if the parent got upset because you went and conducted a full out gym orientation with this other parent, but it was 5 mins to take a payment. That's hardly neglect in my eyes. You could have put her on break before she even did her first stretch. Instead, you tried to keep her active by having another coach step in. From a coaches stand point, I think you handled the situation well. Although, a 5 min break does not constitute a free private.

Now.....as a parent, I can understand her frustration. I think keeping the athlete past the end time would have added fuel to my fire. I am paying for a service for one full hour and I expect your full attention until my hour is done. Now personally, my frustrations would have been eased a little since you sent someone to fulfill your role until you were done, but some parents aren't so easy going. I believe this is truly a case of "you can't please everyone".

But kudos to you for at least attempting to meet them halfway, too bad it wasn't received in the manner that you intended. You live and learn........

I think that you had the best of intentions for rectifying the situation. It was very generous for you to offer a free private to make up for the past one. Having said that, I would have been upset as well. You stated that you were in a "lose, lose situation and that either way someone would be mad." If your gym owner is unable to keep the front desk staffed then unfortunately the customer at the desk is the one who needs to wait...and possibly end up angry. A family paid you for 30 minutes of uninterrupted private training. They deserved that. I have been the parent who was held over because our private was interrupted or even started late. My schedule is very hectic and I am usually out the door from one activity, and headed to another one for another child. Every minute is precious and I don't think it is right for you to decide that the customers at the desk who aren't paying you are more of a priority than the ones who are paying you. At the least the mom should have been consulted. If you had asked her if Susie could work with Coach X while you took the other customers payment she might have been willing to comply. Sometimes us cheer moms just want to feel like our time, money, and opinions are valued.

@Just-a-Mom - Look what you started! LOL!

FamousRudags said:

@Just-a-Mom - Look what you started! LOL!

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I didn't mean to.

So first off, I will say that I see there is more to this than what I was thinking. The only problems we've had were at huge gyms where plenty of people were working and someone just said "Can you spot me?" and that turned into 10 minutes of my kids standing around (or being told "Just keep doing that...I'll be right back"). In this case (or something similar) I think I'd be OK. Even I understand that things come up and the whole world doesn't actually revolve around me (boy was that a tough lesson to learn!!! )

I think my favorite thing about this board is that I get points of view I'd never seen before I joined.

I want to say thanks to everyone for giving me a different look on the situation.

I was able to talk to the cp's mom and aunt over the weekend and they apologized to me before I could even get a word out. The mom said that she was in a bad mood because she did not even want to come down to the gym that day. Cp wanted to work on her tumbling and begged her mom to bring her and when she waited those extra 10 minutes it just "set her off" as she put it. I told her that I should have not assumed that it would have been ok for me to keep her over. The mom even told me that she would have been ok with me letting her cp go on time even though she would have not gotten the entire 30 minutes. I told her that it will not happen again and she seemed ok by the time we were done talking. The cp's aunt was more mad at her sister than me.

I did also get a chance to talk to my co-workers and told them that when I have a private and someone comes to the office to ask them to wait till I'm done or they should leave their number and I will call them then I get done. They all seemed cool with that......now if someone could give me some good ideas to convince my boss to hire someone to work the office that would be awesome!!!!

Tell the parent to get over it. You had someone else cover the 5 minutes you weren't there AND doubled the time you were gone extending her private.
Absolutely not wrong on your part.

ctwings said:

With all the talk about privates, today I had a parent get upset with me for the first time. I coach teams. classes, privates AND work the front office. I have been asking my boss to please find someone to cover the front office when I am on the floor but he has yet to do so.

So today I was teaching my private and i was pulled to the front to help out new parents for about 5 minutes. I had another coach work with my private for those five minutes and even kept her over for 10 minutes. When I was talking to her mother when we were done, I told the mother how sorry I was for being pulled out for those five minutes and she was very upset.

I told her that I do understand how much privates are and that I want every second to be worth it. That's why I had another coach work with her, instead of making her take a long break and I kept her over to make up for that time. But this was not enough for her, so I said that I will do the next private for free.

So my question is.....was I in the wrong???

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The mother must have been off her meds. I think keeping her over 10 minutes longer in the private is sufficient enough. That was very nice of you to offer her a free private. I know I would not have expected that.

I was at a gym in the past that used 2 older athletes in the office. (I believe they were 17) They worked opposite days from each other, and instead of receiving a paycheck they received free tuition and classes. Have you brought up the situation that occurred with the owner? A good businessman should realize that being understaffed could potentially cost him customers. I hope it all works out for you!

satxchrlvr said:

I was at a gym in the past that used 2 older athletes in the office. (I believe they were 17) They worked opposite days from each other, and instead of receiving a paycheck they received free tuition and classes. Have you brought up the situation that occurred with the owner? A good businessman should realize that being understaffed could potentially cost him customers. I hope it all works out for you!

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I have been asking since last season about having someone in the office....I even asked him would go to a business that says they can do hair, nails and give you a make over or would he rather go to just some place that are really good at doing hair. He looked at me and said...some place that can focus on my hair....I told him that right now I am that place that does it all, I am doing everything just good enough but not %100.....I asked about a person who helped me alot last year who wants to work at the gym but everytime I bring it up he just changes the subject. I told him that at my teams first practice I was on the floor for 30 minutes of the 2 hours....his answer, that's why I put another coach with you

This reminded me of a question they asked me when I applied to work retail at VS:
You are the only worker on staff and the store is busy. You are trying to ring up a woman at the register. Suddenly, the phone rings: you answer, but continue to scan the woman's things. The woman on the phone asks you to do a price check on an item that is not within reach, but is very expensive (more than what the woman at the counter is buying). She says she wants to purchase it later. You are the only one in the store still, and a line is forming behind the woman at the register. Who do you help first?

The correct answer was the woman at the register, because she was there, in person, and paying. Who knows if that woman on the phone would have come in to buy that item? If you didn't deal with the customers in front of you, they would leave and you would lose 'guaranteed' money.

Granted, your situation was a bit more complicated than that. I agree with you in that it seemed pretty lose-lose. The mother doesn't want to come from the beginning (which is odd if she's the one paying all this money for her daughter to cheer, yet doesn't bring her to her classes?), you're being pulled in two directions, BOTH of which involve 'guaranteed' money. Yes, you were payed to work with her personally, but you DID get a coach she also works with personally and loves, and it was during warm-ups. It might have been a bit different if it were a coach she's never worked with before. I don't know if there IS a right answer for this one, because who's to say you wouldn't have gotten in trouble with your boss for ignoring the other parent and they left? On the other hand, if the other people who wanted to pay got angry and left, it might have just shown your boss that you REALLY need someone at the front desk because he's going to lose business.

Anytime a coach has stopped during my private they offer to extend my private by the time they were gone so I get my money's worth

Perhaps one lesson to take from this is that if you plan to offer the extra few minutes to double check with the parent first? (I know it may not be practical in every scenario though.)

Glad it seemed to work out. If I were the parent I would have been more than OK with what you offered.

Every situation is not going to be perfect in the gym. When something happens that inconveniences someone, the best you can do is be respectful and offer some type of compensation. It's not unreasonable to expect the customer to be respectful in return.

For your boss, I think that you can respectfully explain to him/her you are trying to maintain high standards in the gym and that disctractions during privates or practice takes away from that. In the future you will not leave a private and that may mean a customer up front leaving when their questions gets answered. Then tell him that you would be happy to train some inexpensive help up front unless he would like to lower his standards with customers.

It's up to him after that, but at least then you can tell customers that when you leave a private it is because the gym owner told you to.

I hope it doesn't come to that, but regardless of what happens with you, you sound like a respectful and conscientious worker, so you can feel good about yourself for that.