Worst customer service experience ever! Upon referral from a neighbor, I met with Kevin (the owner) to contract his company's services for lawn mowing. After agreeing on a price, in March, Kevin said he would e-mail a Welcome package (which I assume would have the contract, billing terms, etc.) After following up via e-mail twice, the Welcome package never arrived.
On April 17, 2019, Rootland did a wonderful job in cutting the lawn, it was well trimmed with a diagonal cutting pattern. Then, things went way downhill. The next cut was poor, and I am being generous. A whole mower width of grass was not cut, and fortunately I was home at the time so I could tell the crew where they had missed, and they were able to cut it. If I were not home at the time, I would have come home to a big stripe near the front of the house. But the mower also gouged no less than a dozen places on the lawn. Kevin came out and I showed him the damage, and he said it was due to the mower deck floating and this just happens. He said he would raise the deck for future cuts.
Then came the third cut, and it was disappointing again. Kevin promised that each cut would have a different pattern, but this cut was on the same pattern and there were areas where the mower rolled over the same grass and it was not cut. His crew also used leaf blowers to tidy up grass clippings, but in doing so, they blew mulch in two spots onto the lawn.
I called Kevin to note these missteps for the purpose of helping his crew learn from their mistakes. At this point Kevin informed me that Rootland will not be able to meet my expectations (my expectations of course being that the lawn get cut in rotating patterns and that mulch does not get blown on top of the fresh cut), and that I should look for another landscaper. I found this odd, as he is just starting this business and would want to input customer feedback. He also indicated at this time that he was not making much money on this job. He also never offered to remediate the damage.
A few weeks later I got an electronic bill for Rootland's "work". I thought to myself...you have a business not deliver on promises and tear up the yard, and they expect to get paid? I then replied to Kevin in the same terminology that he used on me, that being as far as the bill getting paid, "I won't be able to meet his expectations".
At this point you think Rootland would take their loss and move on. Quite the opposite. Kevin sent me an e-mail saying he was sending the invoice to collections. I replied that after doing a poor job and tearing up the lawn without remediating the damage that he still expects to get paid? I concluded my reply with let's just agree to disagree and he could use this as a customer-service learning experience. But not letting it go, he replied with another e-mail that he does not care how much money he gets from a collection agency, and I quote "My only mistake was continuing service after the original complaint"
WOW! One customer complaint and he no longer wanted to do business? And after walking out on the job he expected to get paid...I wonder if Rootland provides this customer experience to all of it's customers? I'll let you be the judge. read more
