this post was submitted on 27 Feb 2026
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Dotcom days, my company charged a venue $30k for an "emergency change" to disable a form and all links to it.
The dev already had a system switch for it. $30k, 10-second change.
My ex brother in law is a commercial refrigeration tech. He did a emergency call to a restaurant that was losing temp on thier walk in freezer. Loaded with food that needed to be kept under freezing. Time was of the essence or all the food would be tossed due to health codes.
He came out diagnoses it. Qoutes a few grand to fix it. Approved. Then he fixes it in like 15min. Just tightened a single screw.
The owner was pissed he paid a few grand for 15min and a single screw tweak.
Tech looked at him and said he paid for it to be fixed. The fact that the fix was a single screw and which screw needed tweaking was specialized knowledge. He paid for the knowledge not the time.
I took that lesson to heart working in IT or really any field. Even when hiring people to do stuff for me. Sometimes it's not just the labor it's also the knowledge.