After years of patronage, I'm very disappointed with our last experience with Mike's. Check my post history; I've raved about this company before, but now....
I called some weeks ago on Friday to schedule some tree work. There's a new person in the office, but found it weird she stated she had no record of having been at our home previously, although Mike's has been here 3 - 4 times. She gets us into the system and I explained that my mother is newly widowed. This is her home and she's paying, but I'll be here and will be part of the conversations as she's obviously got a lot of big things going on for her right now. I explained there's one specific tree that I really need Mike to look at because she loves it, but I'm not sure if it's roots are impacting the foundation to the house at all and we could really use a professional to tell us if there's any concern. The admin tells us that Mike will call in a few days to set up a consult. Well Mike called before 8 AM the next day, a Saturday, and nobody let me know. My mom had the conversation with him alone and showed him 5 trees/bushes she wanted cut. I don't know how that conversation went because I wasn't kept included as I had requested, but that's partially on my mom, too. I will say that Mike did have empathy for us having just lost my father, and that he was kind and offered my mother a discount. But after this, everything just got complicated and stupid.
The appointment was for Tuesday, and there was horrible weather and heat waves around the same date. I can't recall exactly which was the cause, but our services were cancelled that day. I wasn't surprised they were cancelled, but I was surprised nobody called to tell us that. I called the next day to ask when we could expect to be rescheduled. The same admin as last time was apologetic and she accepted responsibility for the fact that nobody called us on Tuesday. She said that she would call us back, but my mother ended up having to be the one to call in to them each time to see if there was an update. It wasn't like this with the last office manager, we never had ANY issues with lack of communication or scheduling.
A week and half to two weeks after the original date, the team shows up. Again, nobody told us they were coming. I saw the proposal Mike drew up, which they had with them, and I confirmed with the guys each of the 5 areas they would be working. They did the work and left. The tree guys are great, no qualms with them, except that they missed the biggest tree, and the one I specifically mentioned was the biggest concern. They didn't touch a branch on it. There's not a bit of sawdust on the ground, they just totally skipped it. I immediately took photos and emailed the admin back showing her that they missed an entire tree. That was on June 26. Today is July 10. Guess who has never replied to that email or called my mom to follow up on this? Never heard from the administrator or Mike about this.
My 81 year old widowed mother, not wanting to be a deadbeat, paid Mike's anyway, despite the incomplete job. Despite the terrible scheduling experience. Was it because of the discount that we were no longer priority and we have to do all the communication work? I don't know. But she's paid for a service that wasn't completed and this doesn't sit right with me, so this will be our last time using Mike's Tree. read more