INDIANAPOLIS — A woman tells WRTV she hired a company to clean up tree damage after a storm, paid the company, but the work was never finished.
Glenda Chambers lives on the west side of Indianapolis. Several trees were damaged in her yard after a storm in July. Chambers’ mother gave her a business card from a company that went door to door passing them out looking for business last year. Chambers assumed her mother had used them and that they were reliable, she later learned her mom never used the company’s services, just passed the card to her daughter because it was on hand.
Chambers says she contacted Twisted Timber Tree and Landscape back in July. A crew of three men came out and gave her a quote to remove two large trees from the backyard, clean up brush and debris from her fence, power lines and to remove dying branches from two other trees on her property. The agreement was written by hand with a contact number, the name of the business, the business owner and the breakdown of what was agreed to and the price.
Chambers signed the paper expecting to pay $2,000 for the completed work. She gave the crew a $700 down payment and they started right away.
"They came and they quoted me and I thought that sounds like a good price and they were ready to start right now and said if you agree right now we'll start right now,” said Chambers.
The tactic is one that Tim Maniscalo of the Better Business Bureau is familiar with.
"We call them storm chasers and they'll say hey I'll pick up your trees or take care of the damage, ask for money up front and never come back and execute the job so that's probably the one that we see the most out there,” said Maniscalo.
Chambers never paid the full $2,000. After the $700 down payment the crew came back two more times. One of those times they asked her for another $500 specifically to help pay for tires for their trailer. Chambers complied. After the 3rd time they came by, she never heard from them again.
"I've called and texted and stuff and I'm not getting any response from them,” said Chambers.
We also tried to call the company for two days. WRTV has yet to receive a call back or response to messages that were left.
Chambers says she doesn’t expect to recoup her money, or to see the workers come back and complete the work. She just wants to make sure they don’t do this to anyone else.
Chambers did file a report with the Attorney General’s office and the Better Business Bureau.
After doing some research she found other poor reviews of the company online.
Maniscalo says its always good to check reviews of companies before you hire them, “We always recommend that you hire an accredited business with the better business bureau. Also ask for things like are they insured are they bonded those types of things are very important.”
