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Why Homejoy Failed

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Re: Why Homejoy Failed

#281

Post by a3voices »

mattmanser wrote: post #259
datashovel wrote: post #254

I operate my business on such a tight budget it seems almost criminal for a business to fail with $40 million to work with. I could spend many lifetimes growing my business with that kind of money. IMO you don't force a market to grow. You accept what the market gives you and then you grow into the market as it allows you to grow. Not the other way around. This is one of the biggest flaws in how investors expect thei…

That's the old bootstrap vs VC money argument, but bootstrapping doesn't work for a lot of business. You can't make an Uber or Google or Facebook or Twitter without VC money, it simply can't happen.

I disagree. You can make a Google without VC money if you start in 1994.

Re: Why Homejoy Failed

#282

Post by jonknee »

robotresearcher wrote: post #270
jonknee wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well one easy way would be to not charge a cancellation fee when you don't provide the agreed upon service!

Did/does Handy promise to provide a particular individual?

If they hadn't they wouldn't have been getting in touch to say that the particular individual wasn't going to make it. If anything, the OP should send Handy an invoice for a cancellation fee, not the other way around.

Re: Why Homejoy Failed

#283

Post by pbhjpbhj »

philh wrote: post #34
forgetsusername wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The difference with Uber is that it requires a lot more trust to give someone access to your home while you're away to clean it. In one case you're risking personal items and privacy; in the other your life is actually in that person's hands.

With a driver, your life is in the hands of someone who has nothing to gain from getting in a car crash. With a cleaner, your possessions are in the hands of someone who might have plenty of incentive to steal your stuff and sell it.

Have a bit of imagination, there's got to be plenty of ways for a driver to exploit you being in their car for criminal profit too. Provide wifi and slurp data; kidnap you; notify an accomplice that you've left the house empty and it's ripe for burglary; clone a payment card (and/or steal a pin) when you pay; take your DNA to plant at a crime scene for blackmail purposes ... erm, what else, clearly I'm not nefarious enough ...

Re: Why Homejoy Failed

#284

Post by jonknee »

robotresearcher wrote: post #280
function_seven wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They may or may not. I don't know. But there is a means of requesting a specific person, and they obviously take it seriously enough to send notifications. But it's not good customer service to notify your client that their request can't be accommodated when it's too late for them to do anything about it. If the notice was prior to the cancellation-fee period, then sure, charge the fee if canceled within 24-hours. Bu…

I checked the TOS and they do not guarantee the same individual.

But they make a point to allow you to book the same individual (or Professional in Handy parlance).

https://www.handy.com/help#/315d90/a4db36/19c48c

If they let you book a Pro and that Pro cannot make it on late notice, it is absurd to charge a late notice cancellation fee.

At least Amex is great about not giving a shit about awful TOS. If you screw your customers over and accept Amex you'll soon find out that you won't be getting paid.

Re: Why Homejoy Failed

#285

Post by saalweachter »

potatolicious wrote: post #220
prostoalex wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If your business plan is to skim money off of workers who could do their jobs and get paid without you Lead generation is a viable business, as demonstrated by Yelp (and previously Yellow Pages), it's just not hot and fast-growing.

Lead generation is IMO white-hot, maybe not for VCs but certainly to the stakeholders involved. Lots, and lots of legacy businesses yearning for new methods of leadgen, and lots of money involved for someone able to solve it. The problem was precisely that Homejoy was a leadgen product but attempted to extract a cut of the action for the rest of time , rather than one-time as most leadgen goes. saalweachter is right…

It's worse than that, IMO: Homejoy was effectively a leadgen middle-man. Homejoy was itself relying on other lead generators, namely Groupon. I think if they had been doing better lead generation themselves they might have had a better chance of getting more rounds of investment. When you aren't doing good lead generation and aren't providing good value to your customers/contractors, what is really left to invest in?

This doesn't change what you said; they may still have had a viable business if they had been structured for a one-time transaction.

Re: Why Homejoy Failed

#286

Post by robotresearcher »

jonknee wrote: post #282
robotresearcher wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did/does Handy promise to provide a particular individual?

If they hadn't they wouldn't have been getting in touch to say that the particular individual wasn't going to make it. If anything, the OP should send Handy an invoice for a cancellation fee, not the other way around.

This text is on the form you use to choose an individual:

"We'll do our best to match you up again on your new booking, but please understand that as an independent contractor, it is up to the discretion of the professional to accept or decline your booking. In the event we cannot match you, another professional will be assigned."

If you don't like that deal, don't take it. But don't be all pissed off when they do exactly what you agreed to.

Re: Why Homejoy Failed

#287

Post by unclebucknasty »

robotresearcher wrote: post #279
chipotle_coyote wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Figuring that out is kind of integral to Handy's business model. they're essentially playing matchmaker between customer and service provider, which means their business begins and ends with customer service. If you pay for Bob to come over and clean your kitchen because you know Bob does great work, it's perfectly reasonable for me to call you up and say, "Bob's sick today, can I send Jed over instead?" But it's als…

I agree that is a better level of service. But it may be reasonable if that's the agreement we already entered into. Here is the relevant clause from the Handy TOS: "Handy cannot guarantee that the same Professional will be scheduled for each Recurrent Service appointment"

Then, they shouldn't assign a cleaner and notify the customer who is assigned, as it essentially sets customer expectations that are inconsistent with their TOS.

Next, they make it worse by charging a fee for the pleasure of being disappointed. Pretty bad customer experience.

Re: Why Homejoy Failed

#288

Post by secabeen »

dkharrat wrote: post #181
cm2187 wrote: post #5

The difference with Uber is that it requires a lot more trust to give someone access to your home while you're away to clean it. Not sure I would want to subscribe to a service where I would have to trust any local dude to visit my home. It's like a nanny. Picking someone to look after your kid is a very personal thing. It's not a lowest bidder thing.

Doesn't Airbnb fall in the same category? Renting out your property for a few days to complete strangers requires a lot of trust, and yet from what I can tell, Airbnb seems to have overcome this hurdle. I do agree there was a trust issue with Homejoy (I've personally tried them once and had similar concerns). But, I don't believe the issue was that they were in an unviable business where trust can't be gained, but ra…

Most people who rent out their homes to AirBNB strip the home of small, valuable items who's theft would not be noticed. I've never been in an AirBNB that contained jewelry, bank statements, blank checks, or other personal items.

For large valuable items, they inventory them before the rental, and check the inventory when the rental ends. As such, a thief trying to steal from an AirBNB can only take large expensive items (like the TV), and will be immediately caught during the check-out check.

Cleaners can quietly lift the pearl necklace you only wear for the holidays and you might not notice for a few months, at which time you might have 6 homejoy cleaners as possible suspects. People don't want to theft-sanitize their homes every time a cleaner comes.

Re: Why Homejoy Failed

#289

Post by jonknee »

robotresearcher wrote: post #286
jonknee wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they hadn't they wouldn't have been getting in touch to say that the particular individual wasn't going to make it. If anything, the OP should send Handy an invoice for a cancellation fee, not the other way around.

This text is on the form you use to choose an individual: "We'll do our best to match you up again on your new booking, but please understand that as an independent contractor, it is up to the discretion of the professional to accept or decline your booking. In the event we cannot match you, another professional will be assigned." If you don't like that deal, don't take it. But don't be all pissed off when they do ex…

I'm not the OP and have no horse in the race, but it sounds like the Professional accepted the booking and then cancelled with less than 24 hours before the appointment. The OP sounds fully within common sense and again I applaud Amex for listening to reason over a grey area policy.

The reason the cancellation policy exists is because if you cancel the Professional doesn't get paid and it's too late to rebook them to someone else. According to Handy, the cancelation fee goes to the Professional who you cancelled on. In this case the Professional cancelled, why should they still get paid?

A cancellation fee makes perfect sense in many cases, but sometimes companies take their own policies by the letter even when it's infuriating and bad for everyone. A better tack is to instead think about what the policy's intent is and how to handle it like adults. Usually in these cases the customer just shuts up and pays the fee and will never use the company again, but at least this time they had the follow through to take their money back (and if there's one thing a company notices it is their merchant account sending money in the other direction). A win for the little guy, great job OP!

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