Tattoo Complaint Gets Under Our Skin



Tattoo Complaint Gets Under Our Skin Posted Wednesday, May 16, 2012 by RJM Tattoo Complaint Gets Under Our Skin I’d never say that complaints to the Better Business Bureau become “mundane” for our staffs, but there are certainly types of disputes that routinely find their way into our mailboxes. A new roof is leaking. A car broke down just days after it was purchased. The plumber wrote a bill for double the estimated amount. The store is out of the advertised product. Whatever the circumstances, whoever the consumers, whichever the business, complainants are, for the most part, trying to get some help reaching a fair resolution with the company, and feels that the process will benefit from the BBB’s involvement. Maybe the complainant has gone as far down the road with the business as he can, and needs the assistance of a trusted third party to take the matter farther. (Of course, there are a few customers out there who expect something “more than fair,” or are otherwise suffering from bad assumptions, but I consider them to be in the minority.) Today, one of our staff members took a call that is, in my near-twenty-years of experience, unique. A guy called to complain that he was halfway through the process of getting a tattoo at the local flea market when the artist and his booth disappeared. This customer was put out for any number of reasons – he paid for the entire piece of body art prior to its completion at the artist’s insistence and the artist sold the job by proclaiming he has a full-time desk at one of the better-known and respected parlors in town – but mainly, he just wants his tattoo finished and he doesn’t think it’s fair that he should have to pay any more money to get it done. The customer is in a tough spot, and to be honest, he put himself there. I know that people tend to react to one extreme or another where body art is concerned: You love it or hate it. Think about it, though: As far as consumer transactions go, few investments are more permanent. Selling your house is likely less painful and, one might argue, less expensive per square inch than removing a tattoo. For those of you unfamiliar with the world of epiderm artistry, even a simple, one-color, palm-sized tattoo can cost hundreds of dollars. (Next time you pass a trucker with a skull tat on his forearm, notice the barbed wire ringing the bicep of your daughter’s boyfriend, or are in line at the supermarket behind a young lady with a “tramp stamp,” maybe you’ll have more of an appreciation for the investment those pieces of art represent. I have prized pieces of framed artwork on my walls that have cost less than the average tattoo.) Artists themselves tend to charge according to a number of factors, including their own experience, the complexity of the piece, its location, the number of colors…and, I suppose, factors known only to them. There’s no universal chart concerning what Popeye anchor on the forearm should cost, no MSRP for a rose on the ankle of a 20 year old on Spring Break. It’s a highly subjective field, one in which I suspect haggling takes place and tips are donated by satisfied customers. It appears common for the artists to freelance, especially if they own a set of guns, inks and tools, and it seems only natural that a good tattoo artist – even one established at a widely-advertised shop – would be tempted to pick up some under-the-table cash by moonlighting. I don’t want to get into the relative wisdom of getting a tattoo or piercing done at a flea market, nor do I pretend to be an expert at anything, but reputable tattoo parlors tend to boast about the safety and healthy atmosphere of their shops. Tattoo parlors deal with a certain amount of blood: That’s the plain truth of the situation, and for those electing to have body art created, hygienic conditions should be a consideration, shouldn’t they? I don’t mean to sound like a wimp or a hypochondriac, but the practical consideration is that a “bargain tattoo” isn’t such a bargain if it comes with a free infection or Hepatitis ala carte. There’s something wrong, in my mind, with conducting this business in a stall next to the lady selling Beanie Babies on one side and the guy hoofing rusty farm tools in the next. The mere fact that most flea markets refer to the booth space as a “stall” should be enough to scare you off having your skin breeched in that venue. But I digress…. Our staff member didn’t ask what the specific subject of the tattoo might be, and I’m a bit curious. It may color (no pun intended) the potential outcome of the complaint. “Halfway through” a design can mean anything – virtually any graphic can be translated as a tattoo these days, and just about anywhere a human being has skin. Not even “skin” serves as an appropriate limitation. Get around enough, and you’ll meet someone with a tattoo on the inside of their upper lip, although I’ll admit that the purpose of that one escapes me, as do “black light” tattoos that are pretty much invisible until you expose them to the purple glow of the appropriate lamp. You can get anything from your favorite cartoon character through a shaded, three-dimensional portrait of your children to the standard “Mom” surrounded by roses and anything in-between. But…we were talking about being “halfway” into the process. It could mean that the background sketch complete and all that’s needed is to add the colors, like a fresh page in a coloring book. It could mean that the portrait is drawn, but the necessary shading is incomplete. Who knows? It surely matters to the would-be complainant, who is walking around with a lighter wallet and incomplete art. Besides the lost cash, he’s out his investment of time and (to whatever degree) self-imposed pain. We can’t help this gentleman, and that’s in direct conflict with our staff’s obligation to assist those with legitimate disputes. Ordinarily, the resolution of complaints is a big chunk of what the Better Business Bureau does. (And, in fact, it’s something we do hundreds of times each year.) Why can’t the BBB help this consumer? The problem would appear to be straightforward enough. If we reduce it to its most basic terms, the guy bought a service from a professional artisan that went unfinished despite the customer paying the full amount for it to be done. If we were talking about a car repair or home improvement, we’d be eagerly asking the gentleman to put the story in writing and telling him to suggest a deadline for the completion of the work. Does the fact that it’s a piece of body art make a difference? Or that the price was likely arrived at through some negotiation? No, neither of those factors enter into the inability of this office to process the dispute. The problem is more complicated than we might first assume. If you took your car to a well-known transmission garage, got an estimate, and decided that price was more than you were willing to spend, then asked the mechanic (or were approached by one) if he might be able to handle the project on his own time in your driveway…that would be closer to the consumer’s situation in this case. Going with that example, if the freelance mechanic showed up at your house Saturday morning and accepted cash payment for the job (parts and labor), took the transmission apart, then took off at noon to get parts and never came back, that would be a little closer still. And if you went back to the garage where you met the guy and found that the mechanic and all his tools never came back to work after the weekend, we’d be about even with the tattoo artist’s situation with his half-done customer. Would it be reasonable for someone to charge his complaint against the transmission shop because it employed the “completion challenged” mechanic? I don’t think so. You and the mechanic made arrangements to work outside the shop to cut corners and save a few bucks, and now you want to hold the shop responsible for the mechanic’s disappearance? That hardly seems fair to the transmission shop, does it? A store manager is not responsible for what his employees do off the clock, and might even be spitefully unwilling to finish the work even if he was going to receive full payment for it – after all, you tried to cut him out of the job in our scenario. Same thing for our half-tattooed friend: Going outside the store for a bargain not only leaves him with no one to blame at the tattoo parlor, it leaves the tattoo parlor in the position of choosing whether or not one of their more loyal artists should be saddled with the unfinished project. In this case, the customer met the purveyor of services in a flea market, not an established business. That raises even more questions. The flea market’s owner doesn’t get contact information for his tenants, most of them rent space by the week, and there’s little point in pursuing any sort of damages from that point. The owner isn’t responsible for his transient tenants in a venue where the design of doing business is fairly liquid by its nature. Even if not, the BBB couldn’t in good conscience file a complaint against the flea market because a tenant skipped town. To file a complaint, there has to be at least a reasonable dotted line to the responsible party. The tattoo artist has disappeared, and the “tattooee” has no contact information for him. Somewhere between the fact that we’re not talking about an established business, that entity has disappeared, and may in fact be out of business is the BBB’s inability to champion the customer in this case. Worse, it feels like this customer is looking for someone to blame since he can’t get at the actual artist involved, and we’re not going to help him find a scapegoat with a tattoo gun to finish the work. At best, the tattoo artist was acting like an independent business operating in the unconventional setting of a flea market; that business appears closed, and if we were talking about any other sort of company, that would be the end of the discussion. Once a company closes, sad as it is, no one is responsible for lost work, ordered products, and cash payments. If the artist was acting as an individual, the BBB would not be an appropriate venue for the complaint. We deal with disputes between businesses and consumers. We couldn’t handle this dispute any more than we could one filed between an individual with a “For Sale” sign on his truck and his customer down the street. Ultimately, the artist is out of business (if we can even say that he was “in business” in the first place, whether or not he was offering his services for a fee), and the BBB can’t hold any other party responsible for his work. Doing business with a guy who has no contact information short of a transient business address, working “under the table,” and operating under highly questionable conditions isn’t an arrangement the Better Business Bureau can deconstruct and mediate. Any of the same pre-purchase rules we’d recommend for just about any purchase of services would come into play in this situation, and the customer failed in just about every aspect of his end of that deal. Sometimes, it doesn’t pay to cut corners.

Tattoo Complaint Gets Under Our Skin

I’d never say that complaints to the Better Business Bureau become “mundane” for our staffs, but there are certainly types of disputes that routinely find their way into our mailboxes. A new roof is leaking. A car broke down just days after it was purchased. The plumber wrote a bill for double the estimated amount. The store is out of the advertised product. Whatever the circumstances, whoever the consumers, whichever the business, complainants are, for the most part, trying to get some help reaching a fair resolution with the company, and feels that the process will benefit from the BBB’s involvement. Maybe the complainant has gone as far down the road with the business as he can, and needs the assistance of a trusted third party to take the matter farther. (Of course, there are a few customers out there who expect something “more than fair,” or are otherwise suffering from bad assumptions, but I consider them to be in the minority.)

Today, one of our staff members took a call that is, in my near-twenty-years of experience, unique. A guy called to complain that he was halfway through the process of getting a tattoo at the local flea market when the artist and his booth disappeared. This customer was put out for any number of reasons – he paid for the entire piece of body art prior to its completion at the artist’s insistence and the artist sold the job by proclaiming he has a full-time desk at one of the better-known and respected parlors in town – but mainly, he just wants his tattoo finished and he doesn’t think it’s fair that he should have to pay any more money to get it done.

The customer is in a tough spot, and to be honest, he put himself there. I know that people tend to react to one extreme or another where body art is concerned: You love it or hate it. Think about it, though: As far as consumer transactions go, few investments are more permanent. Selling your house is likely less painful and, one might argue, less expensive per square inch than removing a tattoo. For those of you unfamiliar with the world of epiderm artistry, even a simple, one-color, palm-sized tattoo can cost hundreds of dollars. (Next time you pass a trucker with a skull tat on his forearm, notice the barbed wire ringing the bicep of your daughter’s boyfriend, or are in line at the supermarket behind a young lady with a “tramp stamp,” maybe you’ll have more of an appreciation for the investment those pieces of art represent. I have prized pieces of framed artwork on my walls that have cost less than the average tattoo.) Artists themselves tend to charge according to a number of factors, including their own experience, the complexity of the piece, its location, the number of colors…and, I suppose, factors known only to them. There’s no universal chart concerning what Popeye anchor on the forearm should cost, no MSRP for a rose on the ankle of a 20 year old on Spring Break. It’s a highly subjective field, one in which I suspect haggling takes place and tips are donated by satisfied customers. It appears common for the artists to freelance, especially if they own a set of guns, inks and tools, and it seems only natural that a good tattoo artist – even one established at a widely-advertised shop – would be tempted to pick up some under-the-table cash by moonlighting.

I don’t want to get into the relative wisdom of getting a tattoo or piercing done at a flea market, nor do I pretend to be an expert at anything, but reputable tattoo parlors tend to boast about the safety and healthy atmosphere of their shops. Tattoo parlors deal with a certain amount of blood: That’s the plain truth of the situation, and for those electing to have body art created, hygienic conditions should be a consideration, shouldn’t they? I don’t mean to sound like a wimp or a hypochondriac, but the practical consideration is that a “bargain tattoo” isn’t such a bargain if it comes with a free infection or Hepatitis ala carte. There’s something wrong, in my mind, with conducting this business in a stall next to the lady selling Beanie Babies on one side and the guy hoofing rusty farm tools in the next. The mere fact that most flea markets refer to the booth space as a “stall” should be enough to scare you off having your skin breeched in that venue. But I digress….

Our staff member didn’t ask what the specific subject of the tattoo might be, and I’m a bit curious. It may color (no pun intended) the potential outcome of the complaint. “Halfway through” a design can mean anything – virtually any graphic can be translated as a tattoo these days, and just about anywhere a human being has skin. Not even “skin” serves as an appropriate limitation. Get around enough, and you’ll meet someone with a tattoo on the inside of their upper lip, although I’ll admit that the purpose of that one escapes me, as do “black light” tattoos that are pretty much invisible until you expose them to the purple glow of the appropriate lamp. You can get anything from your favorite cartoon character through a shaded, three-dimensional portrait of your children to the standard “Mom” surrounded by roses and anything in-between. But…we were talking about being “halfway” into the process. It could mean that the background sketch complete and all that’s needed is to add the colors, like a fresh page in a coloring book. It could mean that the portrait is drawn, but the necessary shading is incomplete. Who knows? It surely matters to the would-be complainant, who is walking around with a lighter wallet and incomplete art. Besides the lost cash, he’s out his investment of time and (to whatever degree) self-imposed pain.

We can’t help this gentleman, and that’s in direct conflict with our staff’s obligation to assist those with legitimate disputes. Ordinarily, the resolution of complaints is a big chunk of what the Better Business Bureau does. (And, in fact, it’s something we do hundreds of times each year.) Why can’t the BBB help this consumer? The problem would appear to be straightforward enough. If we reduce it to its most basic terms, the guy bought a service from a professional artisan that went unfinished despite the customer paying the full amount for it to be done. If we were talking about a car repair or home improvement, we’d be eagerly asking the gentleman to put the story in writing and telling him to suggest a deadline for the completion of the work. Does the fact that it’s a piece of body art make a difference? Or that the price was likely arrived at through some negotiation? No, neither of those factors enter into the inability of this office to process the dispute. The problem is more complicated than we might first assume.

If you took your car to a well-known transmission garage, got an estimate, and decided that price was more than you were willing to spend, then asked the mechanic (or were approached by one) if he might be able to handle the project on his own time in your driveway…that would be closer to the consumer’s situation in this case. Going with that example, if the freelance mechanic showed up at your house Saturday morning and accepted cash payment for the job (parts and labor), took the transmission apart, then took off at noon to get parts and never came back, that would be a little closer still. And if you went back to the garage where you met the guy and found that the mechanic and all his tools never came back to work after the weekend, we’d be about even with the tattoo artist’s situation with his half-done customer.

Would it be reasonable for someone to charge his complaint against the transmission shop because it employed the “completion challenged” mechanic? I don’t think so. You and the mechanic made arrangements to work outside the shop to cut corners and save a few bucks, and now you want to hold the shop responsible for the mechanic’s disappearance? That hardly seems fair to the transmission shop, does it? A store manager is not responsible for what his employees do off the clock, and might even be spitefully unwilling to finish the work even if he was going to receive full payment for it – after all, you tried to cut him out of the job in our scenario. Same thing for our half-tattooed friend: Going outside the store for a bargain not only leaves him with no one to blame at the tattoo parlor, it leaves the tattoo parlor in the position of choosing whether or not one of their more loyal artists should be saddled with the unfinished project.

In this case, the customer met the purveyor of services in a flea market, not an established business. That raises even more questions. The flea market’s owner doesn’t get contact information for his tenants, most of them rent space by the week, and there’s little point in pursuing any sort of damages from that point. The owner isn’t responsible for his transient tenants in a venue where the design of doing business is fairly liquid by its nature. Even if not, the BBB couldn’t in good conscience file a complaint against the flea market because a tenant skipped town.

To file a complaint, there has to be at least a reasonable dotted line to the responsible party. The tattoo artist has disappeared, and the “tattooee” has no contact information for him. Somewhere between the fact that we’re not talking about an established business, that entity has disappeared, and may in fact be out of business is the BBB’s inability to champion the customer in this case. Worse, it feels like this customer is looking for someone to blame since he can’t get at the actual artist involved, and we’re not going to help him find a scapegoat with a tattoo gun to finish the work. At best, the tattoo artist was acting like an independent business operating in the unconventional setting of a flea market; that business appears closed, and if we were talking about any other sort of company, that would be the end of the discussion. Once a company closes, sad as it is, no one is responsible for lost work, ordered products, and cash payments. If the artist was acting as an individual, the BBB would not be an appropriate venue for the complaint. We deal with disputes between businesses and consumers. We couldn’t handle this dispute any more than we could one filed between an individual with a “For Sale” sign on his truck and his customer down the street.

Ultimately, the artist is out of business (if we can even say that he was “in business” in the first place, whether or not he was offering his services for a fee), and the BBB can’t hold any other party responsible for his work. Doing business with a guy who has no contact information short of a transient business address, working “under the table,” and operating under highly questionable conditions isn’t an arrangement the Better Business Bureau can deconstruct and mediate. Any of the same pre-purchase rules we’d recommend for just about any purchase of services would come into play in this situation, and the customer failed in just about every aspect of his end of that deal.

Sometimes, it doesn’t pay to cut corners.