Notes

Every watchmaker has notes that don't belong in a service record.

The discovered technique you want to remember next time. The hand-made part you're monitoring to see if it holds up. The comeback where you couldn't recreate the issue.

And the problem customer. You know the one.

Most shops use pen and paper. There's usually a notepad right on the bench, and honestly it works.

I use Day One, a diary-style app on my phone. It dates entries automatically, lets me categorize by watch or situation type, and I can search it. Years of bench notes, findable in seconds.

What do you use to capture the stuff that doesn't go in the service record?

— FZ

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The Trust Account

Every warranty claim is a deposit or a withdrawal from the trust account. Most service operations don't know which one they're making until the client stops coming back. The two scripts When a client walks in with a warranty question, there are essentially two opening lines:

What Breaks When You Do

What Breaks When You Do

My dad ran his watch shop for years on memory and paper. Job statuses, promised dates, parts on order, callbacks pending. All of it in his head or in a pile on the bench. Then a client called on a Thursday. His anniversary. The watch was done Wednesday. My dad

FREE battery service?

A colleague once told me how he handles customers who can't afford the store they walked into. Client comes in, looks around. Budget is tight. SA notices his Citizen quartz is running behind. Offers to set the time, and finds out the battery is dead. Client gets embarrassed.

a priceless watch

Some watches aren't for sale.

Not because of what they cost. Because of what they mean. A dealer can price a reference. He can't price a memory. He can't price the feeling of putting on a watch that spent decades on someone else's wrist before it landed on yours.