I had fleas in my backyard last year and was able to exterminate them on my own. It wasn't easy & when they showed up again a month ago, I decided to call a professional exterminator and be done with it.
I like to Go Local, so I called Santa Rosa Exterminators. Nick was friendly, responsive, and fairly priced at $195. He came out on 4/1 & sprayed more than I asked for (which is good). He said the spray will kill fleas for a full year but to "give it a few days to let the product work" and if fleas were still present, he'd come back and spray again for free. On 4/6 I found fleas & let Nick know. He sprayed again on 4/12 when we were out of town. Once we returned on 4/24 I found fleas.
I let Nick know and asked him to come back again and spray one more time. He got back to me on 4/26 and told me I needed to find the source or they'd keep coming back. I found it strange that he told me to find the source (isn't that what I paid him to do?), but to keep things on good terms I accepted the task.
Nick said to check with my neighbor who has a dog. I obliged and awkwardly asked my neighbor if his dog has fleas. He was very nice & let us pet his dog for 10 minutes. The dog showed no signs of fleas (which was easy to see as the dog was losing its hair from a cancerous liver tumor; more on this later). He was also nice enough to show us his backyard which was clean of any kind of debris.
I reported back to Nick and he said if it wasn't the dog, it was likely a flea-infested raccoon or cat visiting our yard and he could come back & spray again, but he'd have to charge again.
It had been 26 days since Nick first came & sprayed. On their website, they have a "100% pest control guarantee" which states: "We offer a 30 day grace period on our services in case the pest returns. We will come to your home and provide our services at no cost to you." It's true he came out a 2nd time to spray, but we were still within the 30 days and he refused to come out a 3rd time to honor the guarantee. At that point, I outlined what I saw to be 3 ways to proceed:
1. Spray again for free
2. Spray again and I pay another $195
3. Refund my money
Nick refused #1 b/c he said he'd be losing money.
I refused #2 b/c of the 30-day guarantee & the fact he said I have a special case & that even if he came out & sprayed again it wouldn't get rid of the fleas. This contradicts his statement mentioned above that the product would control our flea problem for a year.
#3 would be the best for Nick & for me b/c Nick admitted that he could not solve the problem for which I paid him to solve. However, Nick also refused opt #3 without explanation.
My flea problem might be unique and need special remediation, but once Nick and I could not come to terms on how to proceed, he became unprofessional, accusatory, and raised his voice. When we reported to Nick that our neighbor told us his dog's hair-loss was due to cancer, Nick laughed and said he didn't believe it was cancer but was fleas, implying our neighbor was lying. The tennis-ball-sized tumor protruding from that 12-year-old dog's side tells a different story, but I only mention this to show how Nick's demeanor changed during our final conversation. He also asked several times "what do you want me to do?!" He knew I wanted him to come out and spray again at no cost or refund my money, but he either wasn't listening or wasn't asking.
He also said this has never happened. As mentioned above, I may have special circumstances, but special circumstances call for special solutions. He was paid to exterminate my fleas and couldn't, so the right thing for him to do would have been to refund my money. I gave him every chance, and in fact my last words to him before he hung up on me were "is this how we are going to leave things?"
I'm sorry he couldn't get rid on my fleas. I'd prefer to not have fleas and be a satisfied customer. But as it stands, I'm writing this review and will have to call in a big name exterminator who will honor their guarantee. read more
