Category Archives: Working hours

A few notes about my availability page

I like having a ‘Leeds Piano Tuner’ availability page on this website. It’s convenient for the customer to have an idea of how I can work around their schedule. At the moment, I can only update it while I’m home and at my computer, so I while I aim to update it daily, it’s sometimes out of date by a date or two. This is because, for various reasons, I sometimes stay over at my parents house after a long day. Or sometimes, if I have a lot of piano repairs on top of piano tuning to do I might not be home until 11:00 PM at which point I’m too tired to turn my computer on and start updating the website (in those cases I set my alarm earlier so I can update it before setting off for work the next morning). I would say, if you’re just visiting the website for the first time, please check the page and by all means choose an available slot – but if it says it hasn’t been updated in a day or two there’s a slight chance another piano tuning appointment might have been booked during that short space of time.

Another point is about my availability on weekends – at the moment if you’re in desperate need of a piano tuner as soon as possible, I can offer weekend bookings. I’m happy to do this if it helps the customer. Generally speaking, if you’re not in such a rush to have your piano tuned and serviced, I’m usually busy for a week and then my schedule becomes flexible after 7-10 days (most piano tuning bookings are at short notice). If you’re willing to wait a week or so I can be much more flexible with hours.

  • – Richard Lidster, Leeds Piano Tuner

Plan of action this Christmas

December is here. I’m more or less working a typical schedule this Christmas – despite the pandemic, things won’t be drastically different to other months. I’m only taking Saturday and Sunday off to celebrate Christmas with family, and the rest of the time I’ll be piano tuning or wrapping presents. The week between Christmas and New Years Eve I hope to pack more piano tuning in… although that all depends on what is going on in Leeds and Bradford.

More weekends hours open for piano tuning

My ‘Leeds Piano Tuner Availability’ page is best used as a guide to find an hour that fits your work schedule. I also work early mornings on a regular basis although these are ‘hidden’ piano tuning hours that I offer when no others suit you; they tend to be offered to theatres, schools, commercial venues and the like (usually in Leeds, Bradford, Wakefield or Harrogate), but if you’re an early bird like me then a home booking at 7 AM or 8 AM might be your first choice. Piano tuning can be done at any time of day, as long as it isn’t disturbing a neighbour or relative, although I personally feel most energetic in the morning, afternoon and early evening.

As Christmas draws near, late evening bookings could be an option. While my stated last booking is usually 7:30 PM, I sometimes have a piano tuning booking at 9 – 10 PM as well if it meets the needs of the customer. I always like to have 2 hours available for each customer, even if it doesn’t take that long – this allows enough time to tune the piano and make any required adjustments to the mechanism.