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Like Crabgrass, Lawn Care Schemes Abound

Beware of Agent Green's Promises of a Weed-Free Estate

By Joe Benton
ConsumerAffairs.com

April 14, 2005
They look at your lawn and see endless waves of green -- the color of the money you are about to pay them for pouring chemicals onto your lawn. The attack of the lawn-care companies begins each spring with the regularity of the equinox.

We don't need calendars to tell what time of year it is at ConsumerAffairs.com. When the lawn-care complaints about companies like TruGreen Chemlawn start blowing in like pollen, we know it's spring. Here are some of the perennial favorites:

1. He treated my neighbor's lawn but sent me the bill.
2. I tried to cancel the service but they never told me the contract automatically renews.
3. The technician puts down weed control despite a forecast of three days of rain.
4. I told them on five different occasions that my lawn did not need eight treatments a year.
5. They came without calling first.
6. The never return my calls.
7. They said my dog caused the brown spots.
8. My grass is dead.
9. There are more weeds now than when they started treating my lawn.
10. I never signed up for the service and they treated my lawn and sent me a bill anyway.

Lawn Mowers • Physicians Warn Lawn Mowers Pose Danger To Children • Coming Soon: No-Mow Grass • Lawn Mower Injuries Increase Nationwide • The Trouble with Lawn Mowers • Like Crabgrass, Lawn Care Schemes Abound • Six Months Without Gas: We Test a Cordless Mower • The Grass Roots Report • Lawn & Garden Safety Tips --- • Lawn & Garden Section

Just listen to Marcia in Orlando. On five occasions she complained to her lawn-care service that she did not need eight treatments a year.

"I told them to call me before each treatment. They called twice but after that they started treating the lawn monthly. I called them again, several times complaining about a $36.00 bill. My complaints fell on deaf ears. I have received 4 bills this month already. They have been trying to intimidate me with these bills but I will complain and complain until this stops."

The lesson from Marcia's lawn-care nightmare is to make sure that you have your contract in writing -- you must have a document in hand that you clearly understand.

Sorry, but this means you have to read it, even though it may be in 8-point light yellow type. Don't take the salesman's word for what it says. You can rest assured there is a paragraph that specifically and unequivocally states that oral modifications to the contract are not binding.

If you can't get a contract written in regular type using plain English, don't sign up with that company.

You're the Boss

Anyone in business knows that someone has to supervise contractors or the job is likely to go awry. The same is true of anyone you contract with to work around your home, especially lawn-care companies. It's up to you to make sure the job is done to your satisfaction.

You ought to schedule in advance when the lawn-care technician is going to show up at your house. If at all possible, you should be there. If your lawn-care company refuses to notify you before each treatment, cancel the service at the earliest possible opportunity.

Don't allow the company to modify their contract with you by providing more services than you have purchased. In most states, if you accept services over and above what is specified in the contract, you are expected to pay for them. In some cases, your acceptance of the additional service may be treated as a binding modification of the contract.

In other words, if you let the lawn guy come twice a month instead of once a month, you may be committing yourself to twice-monthly service, even though your written contract calls for only monthly service. Laws and contract language vary, but it's best to err on the side of caution: don't let your contractor perform services not specifically provided for in the contract.

Besides that, you probably do not need the additional services anyway.

John in Fort Walton Beach Florida kept a close eye on his lawn-care company. Here's what he found out:

"After using this company's services for several months, I discovered that the technician was not treating my entire yard as he was paid to do. I happened to be at home when he came and noticed that he never entered my back yard.

"When I called the company to complain, the manager got the technician on the line and the tech insisted that he had treated both back and front yards. When I informed him that I was home and watched him, he suddenly recalled that the gate to my back yard was locked and he was unable to gain entry.

"When I informed him that my gate has no lock and that the gate wasn't even latched, the manager informed me that I shouldn't complain because I had been getting a very good price on my lawn care."

John now has a new lawn-care company.

Rain or Shine

Lawn service providers like to stay on schedule regardless of the weather. This works to their benefit, not yours.

Remember, the warnings that appear on lawn-care products apply to professional service providers as well as homeowners. Weed controls are rendered almost useless by rain within 24 hours -- whether your lawn service applies the chemicals or you apply them.

Weed controls ought not to be applied on windy days. The chemicals are likely to find their way to plants, flowers and shrubs you don't want controlled or killed. They may even blow into your house, where they pose a health hazard to anyone with allergies or respiratory problems.

Remember that neither rain, nor wind, nor any other adverse weather condition will keep a lawn service provider from taking your money.

Pamela in Southaven, Mississippi found this out the hard way.

"Trugreen arrived to spray my lawn for spring visit number two. The associate proceeded to spray the lawn even though the wind was blowing 15-20 mph with gusts up to 30 mph. On the invoice, the associate indicated a wind speed of 0-5 mph.

"Where do they get their weather information? When I phoned their number to complain it was a recording stating regular working hours with no option to leave a message."

Linda in Graham, Washington discovered that an old fashioned runaround could be part of business as usual after the lawn service provider made a mistake. Linda then fell into the trap of the automatically renewing contract, one of the biggest rip-offs in the lawn-care game.

"I have really had it with this company. Last spring I paid them over $400 for four or five treatments to my lawn spaced over a six-week period. They said my weeds would die and my lawn would be looking great which is what I wanted for my daughter's baby shower in August.

"I was out of town part of the summer and when I returned, my grass was dead but the weeds were still thriving. I complained to the branch manager who turned me over to the operations manager. He came by and looked at my lawn and agreed that the weeds should have been gone. He assured me he would treat my lawn and make it up to me.

"Nothing happened.

"When I got calls the next fall from the company trying to sell me this and sell me that I said no and don't ever call me again. This January I found that my lawn had been treated by TruGreen. I called them and asked them to explain.

"They told that the contract automatically renews each year! I'm thinking what, I was never told that. I only agreed to pay for what I was supposed to get!"

Amelia in Buena Park, California is victim of a never-ending lawn-care contract. Try as hard as she might, there seemed to be nothing Amelia could do or say to prevent the lawn-care service technician from returning.

"Trugreen called our house in September to see if we would like their lawn service. We decided yes that would be a good idea. They scheduled someone to come out to our house for lawn treatment. The man that came to service the lawn said he could not do anything because our lawn had very bad dry spots. He told us we needed to aerate the lawn and when it looked better he would come back and treat the lawn. We told him that we were not going to be doing anything else to our lawn, so do not come back and treat it.

"Two days later we received another call from Trugreen to come out and we explained to them on the phone what happened when the service guy came out. He apologized and we told him that we did not need their services. Now it is October 30 and we had someone else come out and do our lawn. Then Trugreen shows up and does a treatment on our lawn without asking.

"We called the company to inquire why they had someone come out to do our lawn and they state that we never cancelled their services. We never had a written contract. They are telling us that we owe them $30.00 for their services.

"I am a senior citizen and I feel as though I have been taken advantage of.

A Brisk Walk

Then there's the little matter of mowing your lawn. This used to be something every homeowner did routinely, without thinking much about it. On Friday evening or Saturday morning, Dad or perhaps a resident teen-ager would push the lawn mower around for an hour or so and that was that for another week.

Now families routinely pay $80, $90 or more to have an army of workers descend on their home with industrial-strength mowers, leaf blowers, trimmers and other gadgetry. Besides wasting money that would be better off going into an IRA, this outsourcing of the world's simplest home maintenance chore deprives the homeowner of much-needed exercise.

Commercial lawn mowing services also extract a heavy toll on the neighbors. Their big machines are much louder than consumer models and they frequently operate three or four of them simultaneously to get the job done in a hurry -- making an enormous amount of unnecessary noise. Besides, using commercial lawn-care companies means putting big trucks onto small neighborhood streets, burning lots of extra fuel getting to and from the job. It's a disservice to your neighborhood.

Of course, another way we know it's spring at ConsumerAffairs.com is that the lawn mower complaints start rolling in, but that's another story.

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