How Portable Toilet Companies Lose Money

A company can lose money to many sources. Some common ones are competition, economic downturns, equipment failure and poor inventory management. What I would like to discuss in this column is loss due to employee actions. Some of the most common ways an employee can cause your company to lose money are:

Deliver a Second Unit Without Paperwork

This is the case when a customer calls and asks for a second unit or asks the service route driver for a unit and it is dropped on site and serviced, but never invoiced. Yes, never invoiced. Your company does all the work, but gets none of the money.

Extra Service

You get a call that a roofing crew is on site and the units need an extra service. You send a driver out to clean the units and write a note to yourself to invoice the customer. The shirt you are wearing is in the wash along with the note. Work completed, invoicing never done.

Service Route Unit Count Drops

This is common during between seasons. Unit totals on routes can drop to 10 units to be completed in an eight hour day. The service route driver come in every day and cleans the units and goes come at the end of the day. He/she may even put in some overtime because the few units he cleans are so spread out that it takes ten hours to drive the service route. This is one of the most expensive ways an employee’s actions can cause significant losses. You lose not only productive time, you also incur vehicle expenses, labor costs and other work that could have been done. Ouch!!!!