On Mon, 25 Jul 2005 21:10:39 -0400, Ian <ian.to(UNSPAM)@sympatico.ca>
wrote:
>What do people think about the idea of driving around
>a neighborhood, finding homes with insecure access points,
>and then offering to fix the problem for a flat fee?
Most would consider it an intrusion on their privacy. Were someone to
bang on my door with that line, I would immediately ask how they found
me, what other info have they extracted from my computer, and why are
you bugging me during dinner? If you simply leave a document
indicating what you've found, my guess is you'll get about a 10%
response rate, of which only 1% will be paying customers. The problem
is that most home computer users seem to think that "support" is free,
and that the only time they need to pay for services is for repair or
for the ISP. That means you'll need to convince them that their
system is broken, something that few are going to admit. Also, just
about everyone has a "friend in the computah business", whom they will
want to consult before dealing with you. More than likely, the friend
will setup the security for free as it's not particularly difficult.
The few customers that are interested will create a liability
situation. When you work on a customers computah or network, you
effectively inherit a service contract on their system. Anything that
remains broken, remains unfixed, or happens in the immediate future is
your problem. You have to fix everything, or get the customer to sign
some kind of release claiming that you only worked on the wireless and
not the computer. Since about 80% of the computahs that I see for the
first time have viruses, worms, trojans, spyware, and insufficient
updates, you may need to expand your business plan. I would not let
some stranger work on my machine, and I don't think any of your
potential customers would either.
I actually had a similar business plan many years ago. Most of the
old IBM mono monitors belched so much RFI, that I could hear it on a
short wave receiver outside the building. It was fairly easy to
determine which houses had computers. My plan was to bang on the door
and solicit a potential customer. Total failure. Almost everyone I
tried considered it an intrusion.
When I disclosed how I found their computer, many went into panic
mode. The problem was that I had selected to do this is the city of
Capitola. Their brilliant city council decided that it was time to
enforce their ban on operating a home business without a license.
They were going around issuing zoning violations to anyone that
appeared to be operating a home business in the city limits. That
didn't last long, but it sure ruined my business plan.
When I switched to businesses, I discovered that just about every
business already had a staff or outside computer expert. They would
not let me even see the computer without first consulting their
expert. I did manage to get one business as a customer, but that was
only because they were dissatisfied with their existing computer
expert and wanted a change anyway.
Flat fees in the repair business are suicide. I used to sell service
contracts when I was in the commercial 2-way radio business. It
wasn't because I thought I could make more money, but because the
banks treated contracts as continuous income and would therefore issue
an accounts receivable loan with the contracts as proof of income. I
lost my ass on the contracts because customers would abuse the
contract. It's the same way with computers. Too many trivial
problems magically become a crisis if the customer knows they're not
paying extra. I get this now even when I bill for time and materials.
I get called to fix a problem, and find myself faces with dozens that
nobody told me about on the assumption that only the initial complaint
would be billable. It always starts with "oh, by the way...". Do it
with time and materials and only switch to flat rate if desperate.
Incidentally, I suspect you'll run into a stupid problem. Many
customer can't remember or find their ISP passwords. As these are
inscribed in the router configuration, you may not be able to properly
setup the router. If you do this at night, many support organizations
are closed, so you can't easily obtain a new password. Of course,
after you're done, and the customer again forgets their password,
guess whom they're gonna call first?
Are you sure you want to do this?
--
Jeff Liebermann
jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us
150 Felker St #D
http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060
http://802.11junk.com
AE6KS 831-336-2558
business fixing insecure wifi? 
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