AZ woman pays it forward to volunteer handyman - WTVM.com-Columbus, GA News Weather & Sports

AZ woman pays it forward to volunteer handyman

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GLENDALE, AZ (CBS5) -

After a Valley woman had her copper pipes vandalized, she was strapped for cash, until a stranger lent a hand.

"I walked out my front door and I noticed that there was water all over the ground and I looked and my pipe was spraying water everywhere," Nancy Ochtman, of Glendale, said.

Ochtman had to spend all of her extra monthly money on new pipes and had very little left over for a steel cage to protect her investment.

At the time, she didn't tell that to Chris Follin, a manager at Empire Metal Products, but he must have seen it in her face.

"We don't normally do installations. That's not part of our business, but I offered to do it aside from the company, after work, to put it in," Follin said.

"I said, 'how much do I owe you?' and he said, 'No, I told my boss about your situation and he said, don't charge her anything,'" Ochtman said.

"I was so amazed, I started crying actually," Ochtman said.

In order for Ochtman to get Follin back to her house to pay it forward to him, his boss, Sal Farina, told him he was in big trouble.

He told Follin that Ochtman was very unhappy with his work and that she had even called a news crew to grill him.

But when Follin arrived, Ochtman awarded him with $500 and thanked him for his kindness.

"I got set up pretty well, I thought we were walking into a pretty upset customer for an emergency scene over here, so it was quite a surprise," Follin told CBS 5 News.

"You don't really find a lot of people who are willing to go the extra mile and when you do, you really want to thank them for doing it," Ochtman said.

"Really it's just the appreciation of the people that makes it all worthwhile, but this is fantastic," Follin said.

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