In an ABC News story 20/20 reports that the BBB may sell ratings to business owners. This has been a known issue in the small business community for quite some time. The BBB can give a marginal business instant credibility by purchasing a BBB listing. Often times fly by night operators will blow into town and buy a Better Business Bureau listing and rating in order to make them look legitimate.
Often times a consumer will rely on a BBB report only to get rip-offed by an unscrupulous contractors. The report can allow them to drop their guard about the best roofing contractor to select.
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THANK YOU for posting these!
We received a phone call from the Raleigh BBB asking us if we wanted to resolve a complaint made by a consumer. We were informed that in order to guarantee “resolve” in the matter we would need to write a check to the local BBB for $600.00. Essentially attempting to extort money from our business.
They explained that they had mailed two complaint letters, we received one AFTER they called us, that we had limited time to adhere to their complaint schedule; in other words send them money now. I explained to them that I would review the compliant and contact them back, after reviewing what they initially put online we determined that the customer, WHO WOULD NOT REVEAL THEIR REAL NAME, was a person who had in fact ripped our company off.
This customer thought he knew what was wrong with his boat and insisted he was right, even though he could not fix it himself; to the point of claiming we were even trying to rip him off. He had an electrical issue that required swapping out most of the system (battery, plugs, cables, starter, wires) to find the problem. He wrote us a check, while not complaining about anything and picked up his jetski then canceled the check. He has never returned any of the seven phone calls made to him by us about the matter. Which we have informed the police about.
After filing a complaint with the BBB and of course not bothering to contact us, as we apparently don’t know what we are doing, according to him; he them canceled his personal check to us and refuses to clear his complaint with the BBB even though he received free service and parts, which he also refuses to return. The Wake County Sheriff’s office has told us that after we file a civil complaint and win a judgment they would then charge him with felony theft. Unfortunately for us as a small business that customer’s $573.00 bill is simply not worth the day in court and one thousand dollar filing fee charged by Wake County. This is one of the many reasons why dealerships and honest service shops will not bother with mobile service, there is no automatic lien placed on the property enforceable in court without a civil suit process. Our company lost more than $170.00′s in parts cost, which the BBB refuses to acknowledge since we refuse to pay them their extortion fee. I have gone as far as threatening to contact the local police and record their phone calls next time they decide to allow someone with no evidence to libel us online and then extort money from our business. Consequently, the Raleigh BBB gave our company an F rating and wrote three of their own bad reviews about us, because we would not pay them to remove the original complaint.
We have had/handled 15 serious customer complaints in seven years of doing business out of more than three thousand service jobs performed(and we can back that up with documentation in court). Out of the total available market in Wake County we are currently servicing 5% annually and have a referral rate of 20% meaning that 1 in five customers has been referred by an existing customer. Other than a phone book listing Dave’s Marine Services spends no money on advertising.
BBB is a scam!! Once when I contacted them about a transmission shop stealing from me they went back to them to make them a member and when they got them to join they took their side. It didn’t matter that the dealer said they were wrong. The BBB is a thieving ***** trust nothing from them!!!