Junk removal company accused of overcharging customers

The other day I was searching for a junk removal company in Vancouver. The usual results for local providers show up, but at the bottom of the first page I saw this article by ctv regarding a company that was overcharging clients for the service. Here is the link to the original article http://bc.ctvnews.ca/junk-removal-company-accused-of-overcharging-customers-1.2047776 .

I have to admit that what I found in this story did not surprise me. There was a time when my disposal company was young and I knew very little about this industry. The different pieces were connected fairly quickly but there was one question that I could not answer. How were these companies charging so little for junk removal, and making a profit. I was forced to follow these disposal fees in order to be competitive but after few years I could see that the profit was very little. After some research I found the answer. Basically those companies were doing what the owner of the company mentioned in the article was doing. The trick is very simple. They post a low fee for rubbish removal and once they show up to your door, the price goes up astronomically for reasons most clients can’t understand since they are not familiar with the garbage industry.

There are many reason why I refuse to run my business this way. The first one is selfish. If my clients get such treatment, I will never get a call from them again. Returning business is important. Sure, money can be made from one time clients but this leads to the 2nd reason why my business does not operate this way. We deal with garbage in most cases. It is dirty and hard work. There are few pleasures in this business and one of them is the fact that we meet new people. Pleasant interactions make my day go easy. I also meet some really interesting individuals with whom I become friends. I refuse to spend my days engaged in conflicts with people just so I can make more money the easy way.

The last reason is based on principles that are bigger than my junk removal business that I operate in Vancouver. My industry is not the only industry that suffers from businessmen running things based on greed instead of principles. I have been a victim of this little trickery that is going on everywhere, and I don’t want to be part of it when dealing with my clients. Therefore, I tell clients not what they want to hear but what the reality is. For this reason there are some very important questions my clients need to answer before any pricing is quoted. This way when my team arrives, there are very few surprises. If price has to go up it won’t be more than $50 unless the client has doubled the amount of garbage in the pile or there are lots of mattresses that were not mentioned in the conversation. It is important to have a clear dialog with your clients. Honesty does not leave any gray areas for misunderstanding. Since I’ve seen the good these principles run my business, I have started to implement them in my personal relationships with other people and the results have been the same.