Extremely rude and unprofessional service. The guy that showed up (Streamwood, Illinois) to remove a trapped baby opossum was a complete idiot. When asked if 1 800 Critter was hired by our homeowners association, his response was "stop harassing me and let me do my job". In addition to this guy's attitude, he threw the trapped opossum into the bed of his truck. This company extensively advertises on how humane they are to wild animals. I'd contact a competitor instead of this company. read more

Maybe I'm being premature in writing this, but I can always change it, right? I think I had these guys in a couple years ago when we had mice. The tech placed baits behind the fridge/range, in various areas in the laundry room, up in the attic and in the garage. My husband found the hole in the garage and sealed it up. I can honestly say I have seen no evidence of mice in the house since that time. Since they did so well, I called them back for my squirrel problem. The tech, Josh, really knows his vermin! He checked out the house, looked for possible areas of entrance, climbed the roof, set two humane traps in front of the attic fan, which is the probable point of entry. As he was walking around from the back yard, I opened up my bedroom window and told him exactly where I was hearing the squirrels, which was in my daughter's room. So, here we are talking squirrel and who should come scampering across my neighbor's roof and up the tree next to our house? Mom squirrel stops at the top of the branch and looks at us, and we both knew damn well where she was heading! After Josh left, I checked the traps and our little friend was caught. I felt badly that she would be stuck in the trap all night long but that's what you get when you chew through my studs and drywall. This morning there were 2 squirrels caught ($40 each) and Josh left the traps for one more night before he places a mesh cap over the attic fan. This service doesn't come cheap...$135 for the visit, $150 to cap off the fan, and $40 per little beast. The cap is nailed? bolted? onto the roof and caulked-it's guaranteed for three years. Now, if we can only get our neighbor to stop feeding the pigeons, squirrels, chipmunks, mice, oppossum and raccoons, we might have a chance. UPDATE...the temporary screen put over the fan on Friday was taken down and the permanent, heavy duty mesh was nailed on. Heard no more munching squirrels from Friday onward. I think we succeeded, until they find another way in. I was a bit upset to find out that the squirrels are euthanized. I naively thought they'd be released at the nearby forest preserve (what was I thinking?) but as the tech explained, they've stored their food here; if you take them out of their area, they're going to starve. Oh well. Guess I'm going to hell. read more

DO NOT USE CRITTER CONTROL CHICAGO. Honestly...please save yourself the inconvenience of the worst and rudest service I have ever experienced in a while. Use any other animal trapping/remediation service but this one. Maybe it's cheap and that's why the townhome association I live in uses them...but like they say, you get what you pay for. The property manager put me in touch with this service and finally got someone to come out on April 20th. After the guy was done with inspection, he said he would give info to his boss and then get back to property manager. I didn't hear any update for a while and neither did the property manager. I actually called and left messages with the guy that came out but no one returned my call or was able to update with me the status until a week later. Anyways, I looked up the the main number online and spoke to a Jan Ghore, who ended up being rude, as I was checking the status and they said they just sent a response to the property manager yesterday April 27th. I wondered and asked what took them so long. I'm sure it shouldn't take that long to give an assessment after they guy already came out one week ago (bat problems have to be dealt with in a timely manner especially before the female starts having babies). She didn't apologize or anything. She said your property manager should have all that info. I told her that my property manager won't have the answer as to why it took you so long to respond back. She tried to shut me up and said it doesn't matter and they can't do the job anyways and still said your property manager should have all the info again and talk to her. That was rude. She quickly tried to hang up on me but I was able to squeeze in one last comment that they will be getting horrible review from me all over the internet. I guess horrible companies don't want to admit fault and tried to shut people up. Sad. I could've had other bat remediation or roofers come out during that time. So that was ridiculous that they didn't respond for a week. Also, I forgot to mention, when I spoke to the guy before he came out, he didn't even know the months when the bats start roosting or when the females start nursing because they could trap the young inside and then I have to deal with a bigger problem like dead carcasses and maggots, etc. He said he would ask his boss and get back to me. So they just send guys out that have no idea about bats and just want to take your money. CAUTION! read more

This place has a cute catchy name but is complete garbage under the hood. These guys act like they are taking drugs. The guys that come barely do anything and never resolve the problems for me. I had them out through my association 3-4 times and was left there for 2 months with no follow-up after setting a trap. I realize animals are unpredictable and act differently at different seasons but I am talking about basic communication. If you try to get a hold of anyone it's a pain...just like I tried many times to get them off their ass after setting the traps. Then you get a phone all from a stone head that murmurs garbage and doesn't help at all. They always leave with the problems still there. When I say leave with problems still there's it means after they close out the ticket! I don't know how many times I get a letter in the mail from my association with these guys still on the job, still a trap in my attic or they just finalize the ticket without telling me first so I have to keep telling my association to reopen them!! Nothing gets resolved in my experience with them. Animals just keep coming back year around and so because of their lack of doing a good job we have animals in the attic year around. That's when I started to tell my association I want nothing to do with this service in the future and to get another company. They never patch the real problem as in fix holes and tell me they can't find holes which I know is BS because another place came and said we clearly have openings that have been there that you can see completely through to the outside! Sum coming into ms attic! Critter control never finds any of that so you are every time left with one visit and poof the guy is nowhere to be seen for months. No follow up calls. And it is not my job to be checking the traps for you after beings set! That is why you are hired..to take care of this and physically come check yourself in at least a bi-weekly period! And one reviewer mentions the set electronic alerts and bust you daily. That is so far from the truth. Try bi-monthly if lucky that they physically come to check on a trap! read more

Horrible customer service. Charged $165 for perimeter service, found nothing. Guy told my wife if we saw any bees or wasps after he left that he would come back no charge, that was a lie. Lady was rude on the phone. Will never recommend them. I bought a $5 can of bee killer and did it my self. Very unprofessional! Do not use this company. read more

STAY AWAY!!! This very unprofessional company only cares about taking your money. First of all it's extremely difficult to get a hold of the technician. You can't call directly, the only thing you can do is leave a message for him to call you. If you miss his call you can't call back. Need to leave a message with the office again asking him to call you. Frustrating, but this isn't the problem. When the guy finally came to investigate scratching we've heard above the ceiling, he inspected the house from the outside, failed to find any entry points made by the critters and was ready to leave, charging us $150 for the visit - FOR NOTHING! Luckily we've noticed him and after some discussion he offered to put poison in the attic for an ADDITIONAL $50. The critters were not in the attic area, but we wanted to at least do something, so we agreed. After he left we've done some research and realized that this was a bad idea. Not only is it undesirable to have poison inside the house, if a critter dies because of it, it would die inside with all the nasty consequences of that. The correct and humane thing would be to install a trap, capture the critter and preferably find where it got inside the house in the first place. The technician should have offered us this option, but he failed to do so. We've contacted the technician again (this took several attempts) and he informed us that he can't remove the poison he already placed in the attic. An additional visit to install a trap would cost another $150 + the cost of the trap. And even if we install the trap, he would need to return and check it - and we would have to pay for each additional visit. THIS IS RIDICULOUS! ! DO NOT do business with this company. There are other companies in the area which install traps, check them and seal the entry points all for a smaller charge than what these guys charge for doing nothing. read more

Poor customer service in my opinion. I had to call the answering service back several times before I ever was allowed to talk to a real Critter Control employee. Then, when trying to set a time for the guy to come out, I got the run-around and a couple "I'll have call you back" lines without ever getting called back. When you have a nuisance animal inside your wall (as I did), you have a sense of urgency to get it out. Critter Control did not share that sense of urgency, so I hired someone else instead. read more

Be wary of the technician, Ryan...Wore his work boots on my brand new, very expensive carpeting and got it muddy, didn't seem too concerned...I had asked him to call me 20 min prior to showing up as the property was vacant (mentioned that as well when I confirmed with him that morning), didn't do that, and when he called me to tell me no one was answering the door, I told him I was 5 blocks away..he was going to leave and come back tomorrow?? This guy is nuts, put up some mesh to keep the birds out and charged us a lot of money to do so. I would recommend the company as they seemed to care when I placed the call but whoa boy, be on your toes with this kid. read more

I've been very pleased with this service. They ask you for your concerns and then actively work to treat your problems. The associates have all been polite and thorough. I have not had any issues. I highly recommend them. read more

I WOULD NOT RECOMMEND CRITTER CONTROL. THEY MAY GET LUCKY, BUT I CANNOT VOUCH FOR THEIR METHODS, BAIT, TRAP PLACEMENT, TRAPS, TECHNICIANS, STRATEGY, CUSTOMER SERVICE OR RESULTS FOR SKUNK REMOVAL. I saw a Critter Control truck and decided on the fly to call them. I should have checked Google comments (https://plus.google.com/101506399900416916876/about?hl=en) for Critter Control / Palatine, which is who serviced my skunk problem in Mt. Prospect this past August, 2012. They came out and for $155 put out two traps for four nights. Then they pulled the traps and ended the service without letting us know - despite there being nothing in the contract about not leaving traps out on weekends or a very short time limitation on trapping period. I was hoping to at least MOVE the traps once to see if we could get a couple of the smelly guys (the skunks, that is) or change the bait to include lettuce or something skunks can sink their teeth into. Sweet stuff (like what they used is apparently good for babies and juveniles) may not catch mama skunks, and the amount they used was less than one gram (I am a chemist - not a drug dealer and know what a gram is - a gram is the weight of a centimeter cubed of water). The "bait:" They used some goo from a couple of jars that had no labels as bait. It smelled like grape jelly. Then technician then spread about a tablespoon worth of jelly (Welches to be exact) around as an incentive for the skunks. He used very little bait and Jelly - and he used small sticks and leaves he found on the lawn as the base on which he spread the pictograms of goo on. The traps were pulled after four nights. They were never moved. They never trapped anything. They were likely never re-baited. I do know we still have skunks. Was their placement of the traps wrong? Was the goo (bait) effective? Were the traps there long enough? Did they even want to catch the skunks or just collect the $110 and go home after four nights? I don't know. THEY REMOVED THE TRAPS AFTER FOUR NIGHTS WITHOUT SO MUCH AS A NOTE OR A PHONE CALL. Perhaps if they had called and discussed what their plans were to trap the skunks were now that they failed using the goo and their trap placement... I know I would have paid for the service. Oh, and I will be joining Angie's List as a result of this experience... Of course their contract does not say anything of them removing traps in as little as four days. When I spoke with Eric at Critter Control, he claims that no other company does more than he. That is not true. He also claims that he is covered by his contract - which clearly DOES NOT STATE THAT WE ONLY LEAVE THE TRAPS OUT FOR FOUR DAYS / NIGHTS. Then he, not I, initiated yelling at me to "read the contract" - which I had - which is why I knew that poor customer service is when you give up like they did without contacting the client. Eric at Crittetrapper Control would NOT make good on his service. I realize that no one can guarantee trapping a wild animal. But four days and gone? When prices go up is it three days them gone? DO NOT USE. There are better and I will report on the next Pest Control company I use. read more

Hey if you want to use a company that traps the animals and kills them instead of releasing them at a place they arent a bother, this is your company. And if you love rude people dealing with you, give em a call. read more

I will never call Critter Control for help again. We have had a skunk problem for two months now. We called Critter Control for help. They put a cage in our front yard and backyard. My husband was getting so frustrated because the skunk was digging up our yard. It looks like a battlefield, so destroyed. My husband ordered his own cage online. The day that it arrived we put cardboard around it to make it dark for inside the cage. We put some peanut butter on bread and caught the skunk in one night. I called Critter control's office to let them know that we were able to catch the skunk. Their cages at this point were not at our property for the past 3 days. They are supposed to bring the cages on Monday-Friday. So we definitely knew we caught the skunk on our own. They charged us $165. It is an additional $60 to remove the animal from the property. I told them that I didn't think it was fair to charge us the additional $60 since we basically did the work ourselves. Dave Envoy, the VP of Critter Control said we have to pay no matter what. That is terrible service so basically we are paying for nothing. We are paying for a job we did ourselves. I said to Dave that maybe they need to wash their cages because the skunk could be smelling other animals in the cage. Then he said that he doesn't need advice from an amateur, that he has 30 years of experience. Blah blah blah. Well, we amateurs caught the skunk in one night. I told him that I would be sure to write a review online. Then he threatened to not come and pick up the skunk. The poor skunk was out in the cage of our property until noontime. I called Critter Control at 8am. I told them to please hurry because where the skunk was in the cage, people pass by walking their dogs. I was worried the skunk would spray someone or a dog. Worst company ever!!!! read more

i am very upset with this service.. i didn't even call them about the squirrels remove. they didn't ask me if they could put two squirrels trips on the balcony. they put the traps couple days and they still didn't come get the squirrels. this is animal abuse. they make a noise at night. my dog is going crazy. i hope you guys don't use this service this will happen to you. read more

Great company and great service. Prices were comparable to other pest control places. They had people available when I needed them and were right on time with the appointment. Got rid of the skunks that were causing problems and before they sprayed my dog. If any pest problem occurs again, I won't hesitate to call. read more

My experience with Critter Control was horrible. The tech that came to my home was rude right off the bat and not very knowledgeable. Their way of capturing squirrels in my attic was the goofiest thing I've ever heard. I should have done more homework in researching companies that deal with pests. When I called the office to ask more questions, she made me feel like I was a big inconvenience. She also was rude and did not answer the one question I had about why would you leave a cage with live bait on my garage roof and expect to catch the one or 2 squirrels in the attic? Especially when they charge per critter caught regardless of the kind. After a week of not hearing from them, we finally did capture one of the squirrels (the wrong one) at 4PM. When I called to make them aware that there was a critter in the trap at 4 Pm, I did not receive a phone call back until 10AM the following morning. They finally showed up to remove the critter at 3PM the following day with an attitude. There was much more drama than I would care to type. The entire experience with Critter Control was very upsetting and they did not care one bit about their customer. Since then, we hired a different service that has been extremely helpful, knowledgeable, caring, and friendly. I would not recommend Critter Control to anyone that I know. read more

Was told one price on the phone and then they said they never quoted that. I wrote it down and agreed to the service. Never received any type of contract, no communication at all until final bill. They were out here for over a month. They did check the trap daily and removed it on weekends. (Didn't know that until I called on the 1st Saturday and talked to their answering service and she explained it to me.) When I called to question the final bill, the lady was rude and they never repaired the damage caused by the skunks. This is from their webpage , "Our services focus on getting rid of animals, preventing them from causing damage and/or repairing the damage they've already caused." read more

I just received the rudest blow off from the office manager at Critter Control. I own a townhome, which is being rented out. The tenants told me that they were hearing noises in the roof, so I called Critter Control. They told me I have squirrels in a soffit in the roof and I need to remove them. They set traps and told me that they would contact me when they trap a squirrel and when the job is done. I told them this is important because I have to call the association and let them know so they can repair the hole. I received no call, so about 3 days later I called them. They told me there was nothing yet and when they trapped something they would call. No call, then today I received an invoice in the mail claiming they trapped 4 squirrels. Upon receiving this invoice I called them and explain to them I never got a call at any point and the call was important so I could alert my association and have them repair the hole so no new animals would get in. She replied, well we've been doing business for over 20 years and this is just how we do it. I understand, however, a little bit of, "Oh, I'm sorry!" goes a long way. In fact, she said rudely, well that's the way it is so now what do you want us to do about it. First of all, get professional employees to represent your company. I really hope the owner calls me, so I could let them know the treatment I received. I would not go back based on the lack of professionalism and common sense. read more