Be careful of the "Fertilizer Scam"

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TwoFlowersLuggage
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Be careful of the "Fertilizer Scam"

Post by TwoFlowersLuggage »

I tell this story in the hopes that you will not be as gullible as my wife...

This morning, while I was out, a crew of guys in a pick-up truck knock on the door. They tell my wife they have a truckload of fertilizer/mulch that they will spread on our front lawn for only $8/bag, and it will probably take 5-10 bags, so $40-$80. She tells them OK, go ahead for 5 bags. (Mistake #1) 15 minutes later they knock on the door and show her that 5 bags have been put down and it is only a tiny part of the total lawn. They tell her they will keep going for $8/bag. She says stop, and tells them what she really wants is to have our front planter cleaned out and filled with the mulch. They say OK, they will do that for $8/bag and it will take 40 bags. ($320) She says OK, do it. (Mistake #2). An hour later, they knock on the door again and show her that the 40 bags have only done half the planter. This is the point where I got home and heard the story. I told them to clean their cr@p up and leave, now. They started saying "why? what's your problem? "we do a good job" - I just kept saying we're done and they need to clean-up and leave. I told them I was OK with $320 for the entire planter, but not half the planter, so we're done. I turned and walked back into the house. They knocked on the door again and told my wife they would finish the other half of the planter for a grand total of $400. My wife said OK, but then they must leave. (Mistake #3, but at least that was the end of it)

I have absolutely no doubt that if I had not stepped in and shut this all down they would have continued to bleed my wife by increments for well over $1000. They were at our place for a total of 2.5 hours. I love my wife dearly, but I can't count the number of times she has allowed some random guy that comes to the door to talk her out of money. She is an educated, intelligent woman, but she simply has a huge blind spot for door-to-door scam artists. I have stopped all the really big ones, like the solar guy, the roof guy, the whole-house air filter guy and the kitchen remodel guy, but there are other smaller scams that she has happily paid for. When I ask her why she always falls for these things, her answers make little sense. For example, in this case she said that she had asked our normal lawn care guy (who has been mowing our lawns for several years) to give her a quote for doing the planter, the guy has been blowing her off and has not provided the quote. I said, OK - but - that doesn't mean you have to engage with the first random guy that rings the doorbell! We could call another reputable local landscape guy and have them do it! She looks at me like I'm crazy and completely unreasonable... ::facepalm::
"The Luggage had a straightforward way of dealing with things between it and its intended destination: it ignored them." -Terry Pratchett
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Mumbleypeg
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Re: Be careful of the "Fertilizer Scam"

Post by Mumbleypeg »

People like that have been scamming gullible folks for centuries. They prey upon people's good and trusting nature. There are all sorts of different cons they run, from the one your wife encountered, to asphalt driveways (we have a partial load left over from a job and we will spread it on your driveway for $XX, only to then come tell you it only covered part of your drive so they'll do the rest for $XXX more), to painters, to roofers to tree and shrub planters and so on and on. All either sub-par inferior materials, poor workmanship, partially done work, and so on.

We recently has a severe hail and wind storm here, within a day or two there were guys in pickup trucks going door to door offering to repair roofs. The area was also flooded with people calling on the phone with offers to "come and give you an estimate". One lady, a widower, was told they would repair her roof, gave a quote, put a tarp on the damaged part of her roof. Then said they needed money to buy materials (shingles). She gave them a check for several thousand dollars, which they cashed that afternoon. She never heard from them again. The tarp blew away the next day. The police told her she wasn't the only one they had scammed.

Never never ever hire some stranger that knocks on your door with a story. Always ask for and check references. And hire contractors having an established business in a building, not some "buck in a truck" regardless what kind of story they have to tell. And unless it's a contractor you know, get at least two or three independent estimates.

Ken
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philco
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Re: Be careful of the "Fertilizer Scam"

Post by philco »

I haven't heard of them working our area for a while now, but there used to be guys who would drive through the country side knocking on doors and offering to paint barns. They would give a quote that sounded very reasonable and then proceed to spray paint the barn including the metal roof. They, of course, provided all the paint. The barn would look great when they were done so they'd collect their money and be on their way. After a few rains fell the paint would be fading away. By then they were somewhere else scamming others.
In my work as a property insurance adjuster I've encountered numerous siding and roofing contractors who chased hail damage from state to state. Some did a good job. Some were looking to hook someone and skip away having never done the work they were paid to do. I always advise folks to deal with someone local who has an established reputation. I also advise anyone to NEVER pay for work that has not been completed or for materials that have not been delivered AND installed. If a contractor doesn't have good enough credit to stock the materials he's likely someone you're better off not doing business with.
Phil
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jlw257
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Re: Be careful of the "Fertilizer Scam"

Post by jlw257 »

We have all been suckers of some type of these scams at one time or another . ::dang:: ::dang::
Larry W

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rea1eye
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Re: Be careful of the "Fertilizer Scam"

Post by rea1eye »

Ken you are absolutely correct. When we lived in Illinois, there was always a
group (several) wanting to "repair your damaged roof" with no cost to you whenever
there was a storm They said your house insurance would cover it 100 %. Yea right.
They always had out of state plates and had official looking estimate sheets.
When asked where their office is they never gave you a straight answer. Looked them
up in the yellow pages (this was the time before internet became popular) and could not find them.

One time when we lived in Illinois, there was significant hail damage to all our roofs and
siding in our subdivision. Our door bell rang for at least a week from companies we never heard of.

Bob
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zzyzzogeton
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Re: Be careful of the "Fertilizer Scam"

Post by zzyzzogeton »

And then there is also the old "we're doing a paving job down the road and have some asphalt left over, just enough to do your driveway" scam.

We get those fly-by-nights about 3x per year.
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Eustace
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Re: Be careful of the "Fertilizer Scam"

Post by Eustace »

As a person living in a country where different types of scams are very common, I would like to share with you my rules to prevent:
1. Never communicate with unknown people who offer you something or want something from you on the street or on the phone.
Example:
Excuse me sir, I have a problem (rob me, I lost my wallet, my mother was in the hospital ...) I need urgent money, would you take this huge gold ring for $ 100...
2. Always be careful when calling from unknown numbers. There are so many types of phone scams.
Dad, crashed the car and killed a kid. I'm in the police, my lawyer will come to give him money.
Оr 10 minutes convincing a stranger that there is a mistake, and then it turns out that you have talked to South Sudan for $ 50 per minute.
3. If something is too good and cheap to be true, it is not.
Original dagger of Hitlerjugend for $ 100...
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Re: Be careful of the "Fertilizer Scam"

Post by RobesonsRme.com »

Before my Mom passed away, she lived in the house in which I grew up and owned the house next door as rental property.

There was a huge white oak in the rental yard that died and needed to come down. Its trunk was between three and four feet in diameter. Leaves were still on it, but they were brown in the middle of Summer.

Two guys knocked on the door asking to do the job. She said OK, but they wanted half in advance, $250.00. She paid it. They fumbled around the tree for a while, but never went up it or cut anything. Then they came to her and said they needed to go buy more rope and asked for another hundred dollars and she gave them that, too. They left and never came back.

I don't remember why or when, but I was there briefly and saw them, their truck and the stump grinder they had hooked to it. They did not see me.

Prior to all that, I had had two big pine trees removed from the front yard.

About a week after they cheated my Mom out of $350.00, they pulled up in front of my house, which is about four miles from where she lived. They were asking to grind the two big stumps in my yard down to below ground level.

They asked for half the money in advance, $200.00. I said "No, never mind". They relented and ground both my stumps, did a good job, actually.

While they were working, I managed to get their license plate number and make and model of their truck.

When they were done, I told them I wasn't going to pay them anything, because they had cheated my Mom out of $350.00, that I had their tag number and they needed to leave and they should never again show up at my house or my Mom's.

They left.

I reported them to the Birmingham PD and because I knew somebody there, I was given the address and phone number of the truck's owner. They were from Blount County. I reported them to the county sheriff there, as well.

Then, I called the guy's home and talked to his wife. I asked her if she was aware that her husband and another guy were scamming people out of money for work not done. She told me she was not and that the other guy was his brother and she provided his name. She seemed genuinely angry. Maybe it was a con. I don't know.

Luckily, the power company came along at Mom's house about a month later and told her the tree needed to come down. She told them exactly what had happened and they took it down for her, no charge. I got all the firewood out of that and it lasted a long time. ::tu::

Charlie Noyes
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