[spazzyfry123]

Does anyone have any form of legitimate contact at TruGreen?

My story:

Started having quality issues with TruGreen in late December (technician drove through my lawn and didn't treat about half the yard). Started calling to no avail and no one would return phone calls/e-mails/chats/etc.

Fast forward to February-ish and started noticing some concerning issues with the lawn health as we started warming up in the season, so I started the contact TruGreen dance again. After about a month of unanswered voicemails and unfulfilled promises for a call back from a manager, I finally get a salesguy that calls me out of the blue responding to a voicemail I left one of his colleagues probably a month+ prior. We start the back and forth with how my lawn is really looking pretty rough and we need some resolution. Followed up with him probably four times with each time saying he would get the manager's contact when he got back into the office. It never happened.

I'm not exaggerating, but I would say I have had 50+ outbound forms of communication trying to get resolution. About three weeks ago, the service manager FINALLY came out (keep in mind that is about mid April when I have been trying every form of communication since December) and he agrees that the yard is toast and will need renovation. He left on good terms with an apparent resolution.

I have now left his cell phone with five or six unanswered voicemails with each one stating to call me back to discuss. He would randomly send me a one sentence E-mail and appears to be the only way he can communicate - few word responses that address effectively none of my concerns with no call back. In his latest "email" he promised to be at my house on Friday (today), but I can not get a hold of the guy to make a schedule and it's now 3:00pm with no attempt to contact me.

Their contact center has two hour waits - when I DO get a hold of someone, they express concern and will get operations manager, general manager, service manager, etc. to call me back. HAS NOT HAPPENED ONCE.

Their chat feature promises xyz will happen and it never does.

The few direct phone numbers I have do not answer nor call back to dozens of voicemails.

I am completely and entirely desperate and at a complete loss. I estimate ~$8 - 10k for new sod work and TruGreen has recognized fault. See attached pictures to show what I'm going through. Bare dirt in areas. Erosion issues are present from lack of root system. I have asked multiple times for a stop of service as each time they come up the issue worsens (third parties have all said a result of over-fertilization), but they just keep showing up and performing service.

In the pictures you can see the hard line at the property lines of TruGreen-treated and not. Threw in a "before" picture of what it looked like before I enlisted TruGreen.

Is there anyone on here that has any form of REAL contact to get something done? This is my first experience in farming out work as I always do DIY, but with our newest addition to the family, I figured I could take one thing off my plate. Boy was I wrong...never have I worked so hard for a phone call...

I'd love to cut my losses and get this fixed myself, but I paid them for a year's service up front and am now left with thousands of dollars in required renovation. TruGreen must make this right, but I have a serious communication barrier keeping me from the people to make this right.

[upstatedoc]

I had Trugreen for years. Finally gave them the boot if they were charging me hundreds and hundreds of dollars for basically nothing. Maybe contact the Better Business Bureau or at least threaten them with it?

[nyalpine90]

ouch!
thats sucks, and very upsetting when you rely on big companies to do the right thing.
find a local landscaper that can renovate your lawn.
try getting your money back from Truebrownshit.

[Joekerr]

Wow, that sucks. And they know it will cost more for you to take them to court than to just give up so they'll probably just string you along for good.

Sadly, I think you are out of luck on this one. Do you have a small claims court or something that you can represent yourself in and try to exact say $5K out of them?

[vreihen16]

File a lawsuit and serve them. Bet they return your calls pretty quickly after that.....

[spazzyfry123]

Originally Posted by upstatedoc

I had Trugreen for years. Finally gave them the boot if they were charging me hundreds and hundreds of dollars for basically nothing. Maybe contact the Better Business Bureau or at least threaten them with it?

BBB filed today

Originally Posted by nyalpine90

ouch!
thats sucks, and very upsetting when you rely on big companies to do the right thing.
find a local landscaper that can renovate your lawn.
try getting your money back from Truebrownshit.

It's going to require a full till and removal of dead grass. Relevel, and new sod. I'm probably looking at $10k to complete.

I've started the dispute process with my credit card company, but I've put pause on that process while I see how this unfolds. I do not want to give any reason for TruGreen to have an out. So much of this could be avoided with a phone call back.

Originally Posted by Joekerr

Wow, that sucks. And they know it will cost more for you to take them to court than to just give up so they'll probably just string you along for good.

Sadly, I think you are out of luck on this one. Do you have a small claims court or something that you can represent yourself in and try to exact say $5K out of them?

You hit the nail on the head! That is exactly what I think is going on. I gave them a bit under $1k for a full year's service and they know it will cost well beyond that to resolve. Their bet is I'll fold and figure it out on my own.

Originally Posted by vreihen16

File a lawsuit and serve them. Bet they return your calls pretty quickly after that.....

I'm waiting on BBB response before I make my move, but if it comes to it, that is the best I can do. I have spent hours and hours trying to resolve this. Sleepless nights.

[unluky]

Originally Posted by spazzyfry123

BBB filed today



It's going to require a full till and removal of dead grass. Relevel, and new sod. I'm probably looking at $10k to complete.

I've started the dispute process with my credit card company, but I've put pause on that process while I see how this unfolds. I do not want to give any reason for TruGreen to have an out. So much of this could be avoided with a phone call back.



You hit the nail on the head! That is exactly what I think is going on. I gave them a bit under $1k for a full year's service and they know it will cost well beyond that to resolve. Their bet is I'll fold and figure it out on my own.



I'm waiting on BBB response before I make my move, but if it comes to it, that is the best I can do. I have spent hours and hours trying to resolve this. Sleepless nights.

I always thought BBB was kind of a joke, but then I sued them once for a auto purchase discrepancy and I got immediate reaction after I did. I was shocked. BUT that business had a great BBB rating and didn't want to tarnish it. Have you checked their local rating? If it is already trash - they may not care. BBB does not have a lot of weight - unless they have a nice rating and want to keep it. I agree though - give them a few days to contact them.

You can also escalate to the State Attorney Generals office if need be. I had ours sicked on us by a customer over $26.99. Once I sent in the documentation they dropped it as we were CLEARLY right - but I was impressed they got involved for that much $. Again - it a nice letter from a state agency that requests a response. I don't know what teeth they have if you toss it in the trash, but all you are looking for is a response at this point. Especially after admitting fault.

I agree they are ghosting you and hoping you will drop it. Stay on them.

[zx10guy]

Don't understand people's blind faith in the BBB. The BBB can't do squat. If the company is hell bent on screwing you, they won't give a crap what BBB says or posts on their website. The BBB has no regulatory power and gets it's funding from businesses that want to be a part of their program or from donations.

I just looked up info on if Trugreen is registered in my state as a licensed and bonded contractor. They in fact are. That's where I would go to get any real action.

I had trouble with Trugreen in the past but not to your level. It took me threatening to cancel service before a manager came out to inspect my lawn. He even did the treatment and gave me some application intervals for free.

[XutvJet]

This sucks for sure, but I do have to question $5K to $10K to get the yard back. Unless someone came in and applied some long-lasting herbicide, a simple tilling of the yard, grass seed, and daily deliberate watering for 2 to 3 weeks will get the yard back very quick. You can rent the equipment cheaply.

My neighbor routinely kills off his 0.5 acre yard with Roundup every 5 years, rototills it, plants seed, and waters for two weeks and has it back to life in about 4 weeks. He says it costs him about $800. I think he's crazy for doing that, but it's proof to me that it doesn't take much effort or cost.

[TheWatchGuy]

geeze howd you go from full lawn to dirt and grass clumps over just a winter? did they come through and spray grass killer on your entire lawn?

[translux]

Fire off an email to the executive team.
https://www.elliott.org/company-contacts/trugreen/

[TiMSport]

I don't trust ANY of those major lawncare companies. I think you'd be better off finding a smaller, local outfit that truly wants your business. You know, the type that truly cares about your reviews of them and rely on word-of-mouth business. They also tend to charge less money for their services.

[Buug959]

It seems that any of the big guys can be pretty shady. This was a CBC MarketPlace show a few years ago.

[TiMSport]

When I see "Weed Man" I don't think of lawncare services. Lol.

[Our03z4]

Licensed applicator of almost 20 years here. Not really sure how they could damage a lawn so fast and to that extant. You'll be fighting an up hill battle. Lots of blame can be placed on the customer, not saying it should be but they can use many legitimate excuses.

Nothing they carry should kill a lawn, burn it, perhaps. As far as you saying they need to sod and damages are 10k, you are in dream land. Simple seed job with maybe some light grading and you're back in business. Was the lawn originally sod or seeded? If it was seed then you won't get sod.

Personally seed is the only way to go. I see many lawns that are sod die out from lack of customer care, ie mowing short, not watering causing massive shrinkage and general burn out etc. 99% of the time a lawn dies out it's the customers fault. Again not saying it is in this case but most of the time it is. Only thing that could cause the issue you have is a mixing error at the facility.

Go with a owner operator company next time, it's worth the extra cost.

Oh btw TruGreen is a multi billion dollar company, good luck, you're going to be in for a ride if you try to sue.

[Our03z4]

Meant to ask, how old is the lawn?

What's the max amount that small claims court allows you to sue for in your state?

Depending on the above, I'd give that a go. No lawyer fees and just simple paperwork on your end. Just the actual threat of litigation itself will likely be enough to garner a worthy response from them, before even having to appear for court.

[spazzyfry123]

To be clear, I am not trying to make a buck on any of this, I just want my yard back and wash my hands of these fools. I do not want to sue - I simply do not have the time. The SOLE reason I went with TruGreen was because I needed some time back - this has really added to my frustration as I have spent more time chasing a phone call than I would have just continuing my own service as I have for years.

I've had multiple people tell me my yard was over-fertilized. I'm an engineer, not a botanist. I don't know enough about it, but every third party that has given an opinion on it has told me it has been over-fertilized. A friend of mine used TruGreen in Georgia with a similar outcome as mine, albeit not nearly as widespread, but he got people to return his phone calls and they caught it early.

My yard was full sod in 2016, and with the $/pallet and its given coverage over the area I need redone, I'm ~$7k-$8k in sod alone with local prices I've gotten. Doesn't factor in an labor, debris haul off, increase to water bill... So I don't think I'm far off on my estimate, but by all means, if it costs $500 or $50,000 to get this done I don't care - I just want my yard back. If that can be achieved quickly, safely, and completely with seed, I’m on board. I just can’t be looking at a half ass yard six months from now.

Not sure why I should expect to pay for a service, get destroyed, and then get plugs and/or seed to wait even longer to get this back to a baseline instead of sod to make whole. To add to it, I've got HOA up my ass and I'm working on a new job that has me relocating to a different state. I couldn't remotely list my home in its current state, and I've been chasing resolution for months without any traction.

[dscabra]

I canceled service with TruGreen years ago after they burnt a section of my lawn by filling their spreader and over flowing it in the middle of my front yard. I had a perfect outline of a spreader in my lawn and they denied any fault, so service terminated.

They will fight you and drag it out if you file suit. They will simply deny responsibility for the damage and will see how much you're willing to spend in time and money to fight a loosing battle.

Have you done any soil samples? May be too late now, but could show what the cause of the issue is.

[DETRoadster]

Originally Posted by dscabra

Have you done any soil samples? May be too late now, but could show what the cause of the issue is.

That's actually a really brilliant idea.

Get some science and data on your side. As you're an engineer too, you probably know where I'm about to head with this next idea: Buy 2 kits. Sample your "lawn" and sample the neighbors lawn 10 to 15 feet away. If you can show a significant difference in topsoil nutrient make-up, it'll be pretty hard to deny where it came from.

Also like the idea from zx10guy of going after their license and insurance. This is why they carry a bond. There has to be a way in your state to easily file a claim against a contractor and get some consumer protection on your side.

[shimmy23]

Ugh what an annoyance! It's hard to find good help these days from even the bigger companies. Best of luck OP! You had a beautiful lawn

[DETRoadster]

Originally Posted by zx10guy

Don't understand people's blind faith in the BBB. The BBB can't do squat. If the company is hell bent on screwing you, they won't give a crap what BBB says or posts on their website. The BBB has no regulatory power and gets it's funding from businesses that want to be a part of their program or from donations.

I just looked up info on if Trugreen is registered in my state as a licensed and bonded contractor. They in fact are. That's where I would go to get any real action.

I had trouble with Trugreen in the past but not to your level. It took me threatening to cancel service before a manager came out to inspect my lawn. He even did the treatment and gave me some application intervals for free.

Agreed. BBB was relevant in the pre-internet days. I've always looked at them as being essentially a Google reviews, Yelp, etc. Just a place to go complain and for others to see that there's complaints. I'd 100% be posting these photos on Google Reviews, Yelp, Instagram #TrueGreenKilledMyLawn, etc.