Terminix? Good or Bad?

[Paul Greathouse]

I signed up for a free home inspection with Terminix while at a local home show last month. The salesman came today and seemed on the "up & up". He gave me a price for treating my home and shop. The agreement includes what amounts to insurance to take care of repair costs should termite infestation occurr after your under contract with them.

Well, I just got through doing some googling and the results were not very favorable for Terminix. I checked "consumeraffairs.com", ripoffreport.com and another I don't recall the name of. There wasn't much good said about Terminix.

Have any of you had any dealings, good or bad, with Terminix. The bad press really surprised me considering the fact that they are a nationwide company.

I haven't signed a contract yet. I told the salesman that I would give him an answer Monday afternoon.

[Tom Veatch]

We've had a Terminix contract on our houses, 2 of them for the past 30+ years, and have no complaints. We've had no termite damage over that time, so I can't comment on their response to a termite repair claim. Would we have had termite damage had we not had the contracts? There's no way of knowing. The contracts are renewable annually, so whatever you decide doesn't lock you in (or out) forever.

I haven't read the reports on the two websites you referenced, but I doubt that any sites like those give a balanced review any more than "testimonials" on a company web site. Customers who are dissatisfied for whatever reason are far, far more likely to speak up than those who don't have complaints, and companies are far, far more likely to publish positive testimonials than negative on their sites. So I take both with a grain of salt.

[Joe Pelonio]

I have not used them either but know a family that had carpenter ant issues and was very happy with their service.

BTW when you sign up for anything free, including a contest to win something at a fair or home show, you have waived your "do not call list"
protection for that company, so be careful and only do so (as in your case) when you are really interested in what they provide. In other words, when you don't win that hot tub, you will be getting calls trying to sell you one.

[David G Baker]

I had a neighbor in California that had a Terminix contract. For some reason Terminix couldn't get rid of their termite infestation. Over a period of 5 years Terminix spent thousands of dollars repairing damage caused by termites that kept coming back. They paid a monthly service fee of around $30 but it was well worth it to them.
No one told Terminix that the housing tract was built on a buried almond orchard. Terminix did honor their contract with the neighbor so I will give them credit for that. When the homes were built in the very early 50s the contractor dug pits and buried all of the trees. I was lucky because my home was the first home in the tract making it a model home and it was beyond the orchard. I had Orkin for a while but I would watch the Orkin guy do his job, if he thought no one was home he would pull up in his truck, sit there for a while, fill out some paper work and then leave with out doing the monthly contracted spraying for water roaches. I called the company and complained but got an argument from the sales rep so I cancelled my contract and told the sales rep that if they gave me any problem I had video of the lack of service and would take them to court.
I have read negative things on the Internet about all of the national services. I have found that if you can find a local exterminator that has a good reputation and not affiliated with the national services you may come out ahead.

[Danny Thompson]

The only complaint is that they have a "negative confirmation" system of scheduling appointments, at least in my area. The deal is, they call you and leave a message telling you your next scheduled appointment is this Friday. If you don't call back, they show up as "scheduled." If you aren't at home when they arrive, they only spray the outside of the house. Then you get a bill for a full service, even if they didn't treat the interior. I don't know if that is a nationwide policy, or just local (SW Tenn).

[David G Baker]

I was charged a flat rate monthly fee when I used Orkin whether they did the inside and outside or not. It was not an extra fee if I had them do something on the inside of the house. This was around 10 years ago so things may have changed.

[Ted Calver]

Danny..I had the same experience with National Exterminating...they were inflexible on their policy ..so I told them to take a hike and am looking for a local firm.

[Neal Clayton]

The only complaint is that they have a "negative confirmation" system of scheduling appointments, at least in my area. The deal is, they call you and leave a message telling you your next scheduled appointment is this Friday. If you don't call back, they show up as "scheduled." If you aren't at home when they arrive, they only spray the outside of the house. Then you get a bill for a full service, even if they didn't treat the interior. I don't know if that is a nationwide policy, or just local (SW Tenn).

that's the same deal here in little rock.

not a big deal to me since my house is on a crawlspace and i only ever have them spray around the outside and under the house via the vents on the outside wall, not inside. however they did tell me if i wanted them to do more i could call them during the week of the appointment and schedule them to do more.

i have no complaints about their service.

[Rich Engelhardt]

Hello,
I worked for the major competitor of Terminex for two weeks back in 1983.
You think the recession now is bad?
1983 was a lot worse.
There were literally no jobs to be had back then.

Anyhow, a lot of ex-Terminex people work there & I'm sure a lot of ex-major competitor employees worked at Terminex.

I quit when they gunned ~ 25 gallons of Chlordane into a family room by mistake. The schematic of the termite job showed the house on a full slab. What wasn't shown was the half sunken family room.

Instead of drilling 1/2" weep holes in the slab to inject the Chlordane into the gound, they drilled into the wall in the family room and started gunning.

Ok - mistakes can happen.
Even one where the family of the house is out everything they own -which they were.
The family had to evacutate immediatly & even the clothes they were wearing had to be disposed of as hazmat.
This was a "jackpot" foul up. We're talking major millions to clean it up.

All company X was concerned with was how much of it they could pin on the home owner.

I personally wouldn't let anyone from any of the national chains set foot in my place.
Find a good local pest control place that's more concerend with ridding you of pests & not selling you a monthly service contract.

[Paul Greathouse]

Thanks for all the advice from everyone. I think I will tell the Terminix sales guy that I want to shop around some. Maybe it will give him some incentive to lower his price ($2200 to treat my 2100sqft home and my 1500sqft shop for both pests and termites which comes with the "we'll repair it if they eat it" guarantee).

I'm going to check around at some of the local pest control businesses. The Terminix saleman claimed that they were the only ones that guarantee their work. I don't necessarily need the guarantee it would be nice to have though, if it is legitimate.

Trouble collecting on damage claims was what alot of the complaints were about that I read on the other websites. The other big complaint was that they were charged for services that they did not recieve and when they tried to argue that the services were not recieved they were turned over to collection agencies. Who knows the real truth, but there were enough of these complaints to make me stop and think. I hate dealing with large out of state businesses, they tend to have you over a barrell before you even start.

[David G Baker]

Paul,
I had no idea that their guarantee was so high. At $2200 for the guarantee the only way a person could possibly break even is if they knew that there was serious termite problems that would cost more than the contract price.

[Paul Greathouse]

David,

Sorry about that, I should have explained myself better. It's $2200 for the first year and then a $200 renewall every year after that.

[Ted Calver]

..."we'll repair it if they eat it"...

There are so many if, and or but clauses in these guarantees that I have my doubts about them helping very much if you did have trouble.

[David G Baker]

Paul,
I have a feeling that that company won't be doing a lot if business with the economy the way it is. If you had a real serious infestation and they lived up to the contract the cost really isn't bad but as Ted wrote there are probably too many "IFs" in the contracts.