But you HAVE TO help me

I may have touched upon this subject before and it is occurring again with greater frequency.  I got a call this morning from a frantic buyer who wanted to see a listing RIGHT NOW.  She never mentioned she had an agent, but the second she gave me the mulitlist number, I knew she did.  I returned her call but got put into voicemail.  Four hours later, her "agent" called.  It was 4:15 and she just finished her day at her job in downtown Atlanta and wanted me to race over to my listing and let her buyers in.  I explained I was busy with clients myself.  "But you HAVE TO help me, I need to pick up my child and get home quickly because the babysitter's coming.  I've had a rough week and we go out to dinner on Friday nights."  I suggested she call her backup agent at her office.  Silence.  She didn't know what that meant.  I told her the client actually belongs to her brokerage house, call her broker to assist the clients. 
 
Whenever I leave town which is rare, I have about four other agents covering for me.  In the event Agent A is busy and can't assist either my client or someone inquiring about my listing, Agent B should be able to assist.  I still have two other "go to" agents in the event I can't get the first two on the first ring.  If your agent doesn't have a backup agent or agents, at the very least, their broker should assist you.  Furthermore, you are not working with a professional agent if he/she does not have a system in place for contingencies such as coverage while I'm out showing other clients, illness, vacation, and so forth.
 
There is a term called "procuring cause" and another called the "threshold rule."  Since I ask up front if a person has an agent, I probably won't inadvertently be taking another agent's client out to see property.  If I take your client over the threshold of a house and show it to them, it will be logged into the lockbox on the door establishing when and what time I took them over the threshold.  If I take your client over the threshold of a listing, you are not getting paid.  I'm quoting now from the National Association's Board of Directors adopted Official Interpretation 31 of Article I, Section 2 of the Bylaws amended in 1977 providing in part: [T]he Board or its MLS may not establish a rule or regulation which purports to predetermine entitlement to any awards in a real estate transaction. If controversy arises as to entitlement to any awards, it shall be determined by a hearing in arbitration on the merits of all ascertainable facts in the context of the specific case of controversy.

The moral of the story is....if you want a career in real estate that pays really well, you have to work it!