Using Service Stickers to Generate Repeat Work.

It can show your business, the date of the visit, when the next one's due (if there's a good reason), who did it, and how to get in touch. It shouldn't promise anything or suggest a legal deadline that isn't one.

• Service sticker: a sticker on an appliance showing who serviced it, when, and your number.
• Service reminder: a message telling a customer their service is due.
• Direct marketing: any message promoting your business. It has its own rules.
• Opt out: an easy way for someone to stop your messages.

Use a suitable spot, and a sticker that can come off if needed. Never cover the manufacturer's label, warnings, safety information or an earlier engineer's important notes.

• Your business name
• Your number or website
• The date of the service or check
• When the next one's due, only if there's a reason
• Your name or reference, if useful
• Room to write clearly by hand

Carry the right stickers and a permanent pen. At the end of the visit, fill it in from your job record, check the date, ask the customer, and put it where it won't cover anything important.

• Write dates the same way every time
• Don't guess the next due date
• Copy the details into your own job records
• Replace your own sticker if it's damaged
• Use a new sticker for a mistake, don't scribble over it

A sticker helps the next engineer, but it doesn't replace certificates, reports, invoices or the records you have to keep.

A plain reminder about their own appliance, like a service being due, isn't marketing. Add an offer and it becomes marketing, with its own rules. Check the ICO guidance, what you told the customer when you took their details, and give an easy way to opt out.