Poor communication skills. Poor ability to schedule. Poor / scheeming use of contracts. We hired them to get rid of mice. Part of this contract involved removing and replacing ALL contaminated insulation in attic and basement. However, when the tech's came (one worked inside - he was super lazy and kept trying to get the other guy to leave, the other worked outside: this guy (Dennis) is a hard worker and was the tech to return for follow up visits. Dennis was great, and always worked his hardest. Giving kudos where they are deserved) they discovered we have Vermiculite /asbestos type insulation underneath the "newer" type, and gave a super dinky discount (10%) to compensate that now I have a contract signed with them that doesn't include 1/3 of my home, but that 1/3 of my home includes probably 80% of the insulation they said they'd replace, which was quite frankly a selling piece.
The salesman NEVER brought up the topic of asbestos, and when I called him back on his cell phone number on his business card (because that 1-800-blah blah number to the call center is a NIGHTMARE that makes it impossible to get anything done unless you're giving them money, of course), he negated my concerns telling me they "didn't sound right" when I complained about the one lazy technician, and then told me he'd call me back but never did. For three weeks.
It took me 6 weeks and about as many phone calls that I documented each time for reference to make any headway in this amorphous corporate blob before I got a hold of someone who listened. My goal was initially to (1.) clearly understand what this contract would / would not or could / could not do to service the mice I could clearly hear scuttling in my attic since the salesman was negligent in bringing this up as a limitation to the contract, and then (2.) to have the service contract extended to compensate for the attic limitation or to have the price of the contract discounted by 30% to compensate for the third of the house they could not treat.
This was all written up in a report that was "escalated" up the chain of command to the Servce Manager of the local branch for the salesman who sold us the contract. When I did n't hear back from anyone after 8 days, I called "the blob" again, and the poor gal who had only been working there for three days told me the report can been resolved and closed - hubbawhat???? No one called me or told me anything?!?!? Quite the "resolution", yet? Turns out, Chuck closed my ticket...
The Service Manager (Chuck) had very poor phone manners - he spoke to me like I didn't know what I was talking about, tried to tell me that mice don't usually live in attics anyway (when the salesman showed us pictures of huge and gross mice nests IN ATTICS), told me the contract was "Iron Clad" but when I asked him to reference a copy of my contract to prove it he told me he wasn't a lawyer and that I'd need to speak to their legal department, raised his voice to me when I asked him to explain his statements further, told me the contract I paid for was only an "inside" contract even though Dennis had come to service my house twice already and had serviced both the attic and the basement (not to mention that the words "Outside Contract" were printed on the paper) - I mean, if you wanted a conversation that was a classic "Don't do This to your customers" phone call, it was the one I had with Chuck Semar.
At this point I decided I just wanted to cancel the contract and get money back for the next 9 months that I ddn't want them to come back to my home.
So, I was able to speak to Chuck's supervisor Adam (return phone call and solution still pending), who again tried to tell me nothing was wrong with the contract, but finally said he'd do some research to figure out a "fair and reasonable refund" for the remainder of the services I no longer wanted TERMINIX to do. He only changed his mind once I mentioned the other bad reviews for this particular branch on Yelp and Angie's list.
All this came to a head just as the news was reporting on the company's use of Methyl Bromide on the house in St Thomas that landed a whole family in the hospital with paralysis Fromm use of neurotoxins and an $87 million settlement that did not include medical expenses.
Needless to say, I would not recommend this branch or this company to anyone. Which is sad, because we used them at our previous home and were quite pleased. But, once bitten, twice shy - especially for mice and $1500 + dollars, and the risk of neurotoxins. read more