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To start off with, I was an employee of TruGreen for roughly 5 years. I have extensive knowledge of how the company does business.

Now, before any of you decided to hire TruGreen to do your lawn care for you, consider this... from the beginning.

-The sales rep that you are contacting, works for $10 an hour with a rotten commission structure. Of all the years I worked there, they are pushed to work 9AM- 9PM and 9AM-5PM on Saturday, no overtime. They are reamed out by a rotten sales manager that makes his bonus off of their sales, so... he makes sure to have one sales "rep" stay in charge on saturdays or late night so he can skip out, but will MAKE the reps stay there, just so he hits his bonus. They are treated rotten, and do not have the tools to do their job. Not to say they aren't Slimy (some are of course) but think of that when your talking to them.

-The specific location I worked at (in Western MI) needs some serious restructuring. The so called "Office Manager" Hires all of her friends to work in the front office, and allows them to go smoke marijuana and *** for an hour or two, while the lower paying, harder working office people are left to fend for themselves (taking calls for billing, retention, and complaints). She yells at her employees, has absolutely no sense of judgement and will literally tell her employees (who YOU'RE talking to when you "try" and cancel) that they can tell you whatever they want to, we'll make it happen, which by NO MEANS actually does. Just for an example of her incompetency... the people that used the specific TruGreen I am talking about, had issues with their payments not getting posted in three or more weeks.

*** ***This was because your CREDIT CARD and CHECKING information were sitting in a pile of 300+ on a file cabinet in her office, door wide open to 50+ employees for weeks, because she couldn't "FIND" time to post them....."********

- The "easy pay or pre-pay ONLY" option they say you MUST sign up for when they call you back to "verify" your service... yea, dont let that fool you, you DO NOT, repeat, DO NOT NEED to sign up and they will let you send a check if you tell them you will not sign up unless they allow you to mail it. That's just because the auditor your talking to on the phone gets a bonus of $1.00 per payment to collect that, therefore, He'll be SURE to tell you that's the ONLY way to pay.

AND THE BEST PART... ** AUTO RENEW ** they will ALWAYS come to your house the next season if you do not specifically CALL and cancel. BUT, they do NOT report to a credit agency, and they will NOT make you pay for it. If you refuse, they tell the employees to try and get you to pay half, and they will "Work with you". WRONG! If you refuse, the company policy is they credit you.

The technicians are forced to work 50-60 hours a week, and they get paid chinese overtime, they have one day to do 20 lawns that are way underpriced, and they dont allow them the time to do a great job, because if they do, they literally average about $7.50 an hour without bonus, and bonus only comes when they do more lawns. The techs feel bad about it, but they have to make a living to feed their families.

Sorry this was a novel, there is plenty more, but I figured I would give the small amount of people that read this a chance to know how the inside workings of this company are.

I recommend AAA Lawncare 100%, and used them for 4 out of 5 years that I worked at TruGreen.

Hope this helped!

Location: Detroit, Michigan

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Guest

This is such a biased opinion of a obviously poorly run Trugreen and chinese overtime is for salaried employees only.... The article horsecrap and he obviously was fired from his position and is strictly biased against the company and is lying about using another company to do his lawn while employed by Trugreen.

I ifnd that the funniest.

4 weeks vacation after 5 years, overtime i 1 1/2x. I work for a top notch Trugreen, don't beleieve this happens at all Trugreens cause it just doesn't....

Guest

i'm actually making a sale as i'm typing this. hourly pay plus commission sitting in a comfy facility with mostly friendly coworkers is the actually realistic experience at trugreen sales job.

if you're a mediocre sales person in other words you're not that good at your job I don't think anyone should take your opinion seriously. lol

Guest

wow man you should've worked in sales. we make a lot of money & work is fun.

on the other hand why didn't you just quit after the first week? that sounds horrible. you should've made friends with those smoking outside so you can chill out.

anyway, trugreen is great if you can sell! :-)

Guest
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-1216838

i live in tampa not olathe.... lit

Guest

When the 'great recession' hit, Corporate couldn't see the beckoning heights. The ship was taking on more water than it could bail, and they refused to retrench.

Many of TruGreen's ventures were ill-conceived, born out of naivete, and had too little input by career lawn people. Instead, Corporate hired retail "taste-makers" that squandered money that should have gone into fundamental improvement of the service.

There is no business problem solving, but an overriding group-think process of forgetting reality, and going on theory and rhetoric. The rest is history, and hindsight is cheap -- and far too easily indulged!

Guest

I have been told the same basic issues about Tru-Green here in Illinois from a Tech. over loaded for the time they have been allotted to do a good job. Not the tech's fault, lousy company.

Guest

Scotts is no different. It makes sense that they merged...

Guest

I worked for them also They are monsters.The management now gives you about 28 to 36 lawns to do a day.No way you can do them correctly.They give you old broken down equipment to work with so your always fixing it losing more time.They had me putting chemicals down on top of snow last year.Stay far away from their trucks on the road as the lack brakes and steering and are often leaking chemicals .Here that nj depe.

Guest

My husband works for TruGreen and has for 5 years now. This is NOT the way it is run at TruGreen.

It is no wonder that you no longer work for the company.

The question is "Why did you work there for 10 years?" if your description of your work environment is correct. Good luck finding a company that will provide you with the training and compensation that TruGreen provides it's employees.

Guest
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-1061646

You ma'am are delirious if you think trugreen is not the most corrupt dishonest disgusting sales company on the planet that disguises itself as a lawn care company they are terrible to the customers they are Terribles their employees and just because your husband works there I guess he's probably a manager doesn't make it right it is a disgusting place to work

Guest

I have worked at TruGreen for one year and I can tell you that this review - and many of the other comments here - is/are very outdated. The company has broken free from ServiceMaster and is one of the best companies I have ever worked for.

Can there be a bad branch here or there?

Sure. But the way the company asks for and uses employee feedback, I have already seen it work very effectively to improve the branch I work in...

and this branch was well run to begin with.

I highly recommend working at TruGreen.

I highly recommend hiring TruGreen to treat your yard.

Guest

You didnt use different lawn care while u worked at TruGreen because it was FREE. So if youre just a poor sap working for pennies, why in the *** would you pay for someone to do what YOUR company would do for free. And since ur an employee, Im sure they would actually do your lawn the way they should.

Guest

My husband works at a different TruGreen and it is way different. He works 6am to 5pm each day gets $10 an hour, but only works Monday through Thursday.

He also got promoted. They sometimes get overtime and if they do, they work on a Friday and get paid $13-15 an hour. I think it depends where you work, management and also the State you live in. TruGreen has great health insurance, great hours, gives you a three day weekend where he works and easy to get promoted if you are a hard worker.

Also, when it comes to land care, it depends on who the company hires and if they fire the people they should fire or if they do not. If someone is lazy, late, etc they should be fired.

They should be giving 100% when working. Only then will you get great land care from the employees no matter the company.

Guest

TruGreen as a whole may not be that bad. But its the company's individual Branches that are doing unethical activities, giving them a bad name and reputation.

As a former outdoor Sales Rep for TruGreen, I was required to give customers my personal cell phone number, so that they would not call the Branch because: 1) The new customers are my responsibility, (even though I will never see them again.) Yet the Service Techs do. And 2) The branch says that they're "too busy" to take calls. Even though on average there are 3 people sitting in the office daily. I would then tell my Sales Manager and the Service Managers about the complaints and Service Calls.

And 9 times out of 10 they would "blow it off". So customers would continue to call my PERSONAL cell phone at all hours of the day and night essentially asking me "wtf" is going on with your company?! Then most would cancel their Service Agreement because of poor customer communication and relations. Some of the customers have called the 1-800 number and just get a recording and no response.

Some have been able to talk to someone, which is very rare. In less that 4 months, of the 4 Sales Reps that we had, we collectively signed up over 500 new customers in the spring season. (This does not include the over 3000 current customers that the Branch has.) But the Service Techs could not keep up. Yet the Branch, (due to pressure from the Regional Manager), wants even more new customers.

More focus is put on adding on new customers, than servicing existing customers. So yes, if people cannot get a hold of someone at their local Branch, or the 1-800 number to assist them in fixing their situation. Then due to the lack of response and accountability, they have every right to be frustrated and to "vent" out on Gripe Sites like this one! This way TruGreen hopefully sees that they have a critical "situation" on their hands.

And they need to fix it ASAP! A lot of customers have placed their trust, and invested their money into a company that says that they will take care of their lawns, and give them the best looking lawn in the neighborhood. So TruGreen has a responsibility to all their customers to say "We got this!" No matter how big or small the matter may be!! P.S.

I originally posted this treatise on TruGreen's Facebook wall, and to not much surprise they deleted it.

As statements like this are a violation of TruGreen's "Social Media Protocol" regarding employee's negative posts on FB. Yet TruGreen's customers are allowed to post all the complaints they want on FB!

Guest

Katie is a dumb ***

Guest

For all the trugreen haters please realize this is a for profit company and for the ex-employees that have a problem with the way this company is ran you also need to realize this is a for profit company--I no longer work for trugreen but with that being said it was my own choice and it wasnt becuase they were a shady company. AAA lawn care or anybody else knows that you have to have upsell campaigns to be succesful in this industry--without them you cant keep customers happy--also know that for every 1 pissed consumer they have 100 satisfied customers and its not because of the marketing they do its because more often than not they provide the results customers look for.--All employees know exactly how much they are going to get paid when they are hired and if you dont then shame on you.

Trugreen offers some of the best benefits and pay programs to their employees--but they do make you work for it. Furthermore if you go above and beyond their expectations the give some really great bonuses and certainly know how to reward people. On the opposite side of things if you are not good at your job instead of firing you they will coach you until one of two things happen-1. you actually listen to your mentor and get better at your job or 2.

you think your way is better and eventually quit or get fired.

and for the person that posted this--is there a reason as to why you wouldnt just take care of your own lawn? If you dont know how you shouldnt be working with a lawn care co anyway.

Guest
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-724955

I'm not an "ex employee". I would never hire them again. The trust is broken.

Guest

You said a mouthful here "Rainydays1986". I quit working for that shady scam company after 3 years of working in a Branch office.

I just couldn't take it anymore. The way we were conditioned to lie and rip-off our customers just broke my spirit! Because of this company's fraudulent ways, I had to get out to keep my self-respect intact! The big TruGreen scam in the front office was what we did to our "Cred Bal" customers towards the end of the season.

You see, some customers would have a "Credit Balance" status on their account because they over-paid. Over-payments by customers usually occurred by accident. And as such, most customers were not aware that they had extra money on account because of their unintended overpayment. Customers could also accrue a Credit Balance status if they pre-paid, and then later on skipped or cancelled some applications(s).

In this situation, the proper company procedure was to notify customers of the overpayment/excess money on account and issue a refund for the same. Instead, an act of fraud would actually be committed when, (usually in late summer or fall), TruGreen would pad the customer's account by adding on extra services, that would be covered by the extra money that was on their account. And the customer would not be the wiser most of the time. Worse yet, if TruGreen was overloaded with work, behind budget, or short staffed, management would add "ghost" (nothing) applications to Credit Balance accounts.

This ghost app would innocuously show up on customer's Account History under the GM's employee number with the code "PNP", (Posted-Not Produced), as there wouldn't be anything actually done. One year the Ops Mgr pulled some Techs into his office, (a few at a time), and told them to just fill out the invoices of "Cred Bal" customers as if they actually did them. But then just ghost (skip) those properties. Since those customers didn't owe TruGreen any money, (as we already had their money), they would never know what we did.

After awhile, (maybe the next season), customers would eventually realize that they were getting more applications, than what they were getting originally. Let's face it. TruGreen can only pull the wool over their customer's eyes for so long before they figure out what is happening. And customers will never have TruGreen back out on their lawn, no matter how many Post Cards they send or phone calls they make!

All is not well in TruGreen Land! It amazes me that the Attorney General has not shut TruGreen down for all its sketchy business practices. HEY TRUGREEN!

Just go rape a beehive why don't ya!!! :x

Guest
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-614243

you are a retard. This does not happen at this company.

If a customer over pays then the overpayment rolls over year to year.

All trugreen employees are ways to busy to even care about overpayments. There are way too many other important things to worry about.

Guest
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-614243

dumbest thing i have ever heard. Customers who prepay still get invoices mailed showing services were completed and the app price taken away from the balance they still have.

No manager encourages ghosting, especially the kind where ur filling out invoices and just turning them in and not going to the property. Its a sure fire method for being fired the very first time.

Plus if a customer gets an invoice showing services were completed dont ya think they would be confused since there was no lawn flag or invoice left on the door? Get a brain or stop blatantly lying to people reading this ***

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