The Camper Red Flag: A Bed Bug Nightmare

Podcast Transcript:

Michael Wienecke 0:00
It baffles me that somebody can say they can get rid of bed bugs in one setting with a spray. So just tell me go back over that.

Travis McGowin 0:14
All right, right, so we did a bed bug job yesterday. Super nice family. They bought a house. I think it’s been about eight to nine months ago. They, from what they advised to me, that has not been a full year. So they bought this house, and they kind of told me it probably should have been a bit of a red flag when they bought the house, because the previous owners of the house were not living in the house. They were living in a camper in front of the house.

Michael Wienecke 0:46
You know, if there were any signs, that would have been the sign.

Travis McGowin 0:52
Right, that one definitely, probably would have, would have been like a, you know, a bit of a red flag. It’s like, okay, so you have this house, as opposed to this camper. And maybe, you know, I could get that maybe, if you were doing, like, some serious remodeling or something like that, but, but evidently, they weren’t. So you have this, this house, you know, this three bedroom, one bathroom house, and then you have the people selling it, and they’re not even living in it, but they’re not renovating it, they just don’t want to be in there. So, I mean, that’s at least what I can assume. So anyway, they bought this house, and then come to find out, all of a sudden, they have bed bugs. To their knowledge, they never had them from wherever it was that they were living. So it’s very unlikely that they that they moved and brought something with them. So they move into this house, all of a sudden they have bed bugs. One of the local companies in their area where they live doesn’t touch bed bugs, but they did recommend a gentleman to come and treat them. Claimed that this gentleman is the one that they always recommend when it comes to bed bugs, and so they gave him the card. And so they call the guy. The guy comes out says, Yes, you got bed bugs. I’ll treat it for you. And apparently, from what the customer had advised us, did some sort of liquid treatment. I don’t know what the product was, or how he treated, or what he did, but I think charged them, you know, close to $1,000 and then advise them that they were not going to need a warranty, because this was going to solve the problem, and it didn’t.

Michael Wienecke 2:32
I would always say, you know, talk to somebody about their warranty, their guarantee. I mean, we brought up that in the past. It’s just, it’s a really important thing, you know, it’s kind of what, what that company is going to, you know, back themselves.

Travis McGowin 2:46
Right, and you’re, you’re going to want to do, and this isn’t even just with pest control. I mean, you can use this in pretty much any faucet of your life. I mean, you know, you probably wouldn’t go buy a new refrigerator if you didn’t think that for X amount of years, it was going to be warrantied for defects or, you know, I mean, there any anything you you want to know that a company that you’re hiring to do a service, or a company that makes a product that you’re wanting to buy is going to stand behind that product in the event that something doesn’t go as planned, something doesn’t work out, or something just fails.

Michael Wienecke 3:25
Well, unless question to what the other company did. I mean, did they talk about washing the clothes? Do they talk about, you know, leaving everything inside the house when they were doing the treatment, you know, like with our heat, you know, we give you a full list and of instructions of how to get, you know, the house prepped and ready to go for us to have the best chance to get rid of those bed bugs for you,

Travis McGowin 3:48
Right, you know, you’ll probably laugh when I say this, but, you know, it’s like we always tell our guys during training, like, Help us. Help you. Like, get the customer. You know, it’s a partnership. Yes, we are there to take care of these, these pests. We are there, whether it’s bed bugs, German roaches, general household pests, termites, whatever, whatever it is that’s ailing you, so to speak, but we’re there to take it. But it is a partnership.

Michael Wienecke 4:15
What’s bugging you. Travis? What’s bugging you?

Travis McGowin 4:18
The bugs, all the bugs. So it’s a partnership, though. So you know, case in point, let’s just say you got a really bad German Roach infestation, and we come in to treat but you you know, may not necessarily keep the cleanest kitchen, so instead of the roaches having to contact our product and our bait, well, maybe they’re eating what’s left on the counter or what’s left in the garbage can? Well, it’s going to take a lot longer to get rid of the problem if we can even get rid of it at all, because we’re these are some extenuating circumstances that are not helping us do our job. So in the same token as a bed bug treatment, you know, if the company comes in and says, Hey, you know, we need you to remove. Bed linens, launder them on a high heat. Laundry cycle from washing and dry. And we need you to, you know, remove items off the floor, all these things, these are all things that are going to help you get rid of this infestation. And so help that company, help you.

Michael Wienecke 5:18
Well and it, you know, that’s why we chose heat, because we’re able to give that guarantee one one thing. It’s a 90 day guarantee, and that guarantee that we can get you back in your house relatively fast, I wouldn’t say, the very next day, because it’s still a baked potato by the time we’re done with it.

Travis McGowin 5:37
The customer’s husband did come home as we were packing up, and it was comical, because he did have some choice things to say about how warm it was in the house. He wasn’t, you know, he wasn’t upset or mad. He knew. He knew we had already advised him. But, you know, it’s one thing to mentally play it out in your mind and go, Okay, you know, they’re going to increase the temperature of our house to X number of degrees, and it’s going to be warm and but 160 degrees in your mind, it’s not doesn’t really seem like a thing until you walk into it, and then it hits you in the face, and then it’s like, oh, wow, it really is hot. So he did. He had some entertaining things to say about it. But, you know, like I said, we had advised them of that before the treatment was ever done, that, you know, hey, when we pack our stuff up and pull our stuff out of the structure, you’re you’re going to need to wait to go in there, because it’s going to be hot.

Michael Wienecke 6:39
I did come up with a good idea the other day, we could start selling this to fire departments too, because I felt like I was in a house fire.

Travis McGowin 6:47
Right, I mean, you know, we pipe the heat in there through mylar duct work with our propane heater. I mean, the contents from floor to ceiling and everything in between are heating, you know, heating, and then eventually reach this point where we can finally start our timer. And I mean, it was just amazing, you know, when I, when I did the inspection a couple of days earlier. I mean, of course there were bed bugs, but when you start to put the fire to their feet, that’s when they all start to come out of the woodwork. And, I mean, you just, you would be very surprised as that how many you actually end up seeing when they all start to try to find a cooler place to go, and they can’t, I mean, it was just, you know, it’s, it’s baffling to see just how many are actually in there that you didn’t find because they’re so good at hiding.

Michael Wienecke 7:40
Well, and that’s why during inspection, I mean, one to 50 of bed bugs, of that. I mean, how long does it take before we have just a full blown infestation on our hands? You’re looking at 21 days to 30 days, and you’ve got something that is almost out of control already.

Travis McGowin 7:57
Right, and you know, so looking back, when the customer was purchasing the property, and they, you know, came on site to see that there was the previous owner living in a camper. Well, Michael, as you and I both know, just from being in this profession long enough and dealing with bed bugs long enough, there’s a high likelihood that one, if they were living in that camper to avoid bed bugs. They probably had bed bugs in the camper too, because if they pulled any of their belongings from that house to put them into that camper, they probably brought some bed bugs over there with them. It’s super easy to do.

Michael Wienecke 8:36
Karma is a…

Travis McGowin 8:39
Right, especially if they didn’t, and I’m assuming they did not disclose any of that to the to the buyers when they bought the house, you know. So it’s unfortunate. You know, it does happen. Obviously, if someone’s looking to sell property, then they’re trying to get rid of it. And you know, unfortunately, people don’t necessarily disclose all the problems, whether it’s structural or electrical or plumbing. And of course, that’s why we have, you know, some inspections. You know, you got a home inspection. Of course, you know, a pest inspection, as a lot of people call, is usually limited to termites or wood destroying organisms. But you know, I’d like to say that even, you know, even if we were called to do an inspection, a wood infestation report, or wood destroying organism inspection on that house, we would have probably went, they have bed bugs, even if everything was out of the house. I mean, there was still plenty of signs there were bed bugs around the top corners of the ceiling. Just there was, there was a pretty, pretty decent amount in there.

Michael Wienecke 9:43
Well, and going back to other podcasts we’ve done about just the inspection process and all that. I mean, this is why you pay that little bit of money up front. I mean, you know to varies, but three to $600 is a is a pretty cheap price to pay to make sure that you don’t have all these issues or whatnot. You know?

Travis McGowin 10:03
Well, a person’s home. Usually, I don’t know yet. I don’t know if you priced a new vehicle here lately. So this may not be true. This may not be true anymore.

Michael Wienecke 10:13
$120,000

Travis McGowin 10:15
But typically, most people’s most expensive investment is their home.

Michael Wienecke 10:22
100%

Travis McGowin 10:24
But like I said, vehicles have really shot up. So let’s you know, I don’t want to leave anything off the table there in terms of vehicles could be more expensive than a house sometimes, but that’s your most expensive investment. And so if it’s something that is my most expensive thing, I’m probably not going to cheap out on something that’s going to make sure that I’m buying a quality product, a quality property. I’m just, I’m just not, you know, I’m not going to cheap out on that. I mean, you can cheap out on ketchup, you know, instead of buying the name brand, you could buy the store brand, or mustard or ranch or something like that. But when it comes to a property, I’m probably not going to cheap out and try to find the lowest bidder on an inspection. I’m going to I’m going to try to find the most reputable company to do it, or the most reputable inspector to do it, and even if that costs me a little more money, that reputation of being able to sniff out problems or disclose problems is going to be well worth the extra money paid.

Michael Wienecke 11:26
100%, I mean, a really good guy No. Larry short, he always told me, it’s a stupid tax, right? So if you, if you do something, and you try to cheapen out on doing something, eventually you’re probably going to end up paying something a little bit more

Travis McGowin 11:46
Absolutely

Michael Wienecke 11:47
Shout out to Larry.

Travis McGowin 11:48
You know it’s, it’s the the old saying, buy once, cry once, right?

Michael Wienecke 11:53
Yes!

Travis McGowin 11:54
You know if I’m going to shop for something, and I know that this one thing checks all the boxes, or this other thing over here checks a couple of the boxes, and I can get by with it, but it’s likely down the road I need to buy this one, and eventually I’m going to have to buy this one. So why not buy this one now and go ahead and get everything that it is that I need so that I’m not paying double the price because I was cheap in the in the beginning.

Michael Wienecke 12:21
Well, in this guy that treated the house before for bed bugs, it’s he didn’t give them any kind of information on what he was doing or how he was doing. It seems to be he was nowhere to be seen after whatever he did failed. So again, it just it do some do some research on who you’re hiring.

Travis McGowin 12:44
Yeah, absolutely, you know. And do some research on who you’re hiring. Do a really good interview. Get all those questions, write all those questions down, have everything that you want to know on the table if you had a bad experience previously. These were the things left undone, you know, and what is it that that next company that you’re going to hire, what is it that they’re going to do about it? Do you handle this? Like I said when I when I first inspected this house and spoke to that customer, they had some really great questions. You know, really listened and, I think took notes and jotted down everything that that I said, and then one of the top questions, and I know they asked this because the previous guy did not offer them a warranty, but that was one of the first questions they asked after I got kind of done looking at everything, was “What’s your warranty?” And I like that. I hate that it had to come to a second company coming out to get them to that point. And I wish that they could have had that experience the first go around and been bed bug free after that. But ultimately, you know, that was that was that question that said, Hey, I expect you to have a warranty, I expect you to stand beside your product and your treatment. And I have a very sneaking suspicion that if I would have said, “Oh, we don’t have a warranty”, they probably would not have allowed us to step foot on the property of a tree. And that’s a smart idea on their part.

Michael Wienecke 14:15
It made me think of Tommy Boy and Callahan Auto, and he was like, “If it doesn’t have a warranty on the box, it’s not any good.”

Travis McGowin 14:22
Well, but, yeah. But you know, in that context, in that movie, you know, Tommy Boy basically says, I’m glad your warranty makes your customers feel all warm and fuzzy that they’re buying a junky product with a warranty. So, but in our context, we we genuinely do our best to provide the best service to our customer, and then it’s like our motto. If you’ve seen it on our trucks, you see it on our website, I say it all the time, you’ll be 100% happy, or you won’t pay a penny. And we stand beside that. That’s that, right there is even better than saying, you know, hey, we’re going to warranty this for 90 Days, and that’s great. But hey, if you’re, if we step on the property to handle this problem, and if given an ample opportunity to handle it for some crazy reason, we can’t, what do you got to lose?

Michael Wienecke 15:13
Well, I hate I had a I had a newscaster call me a couple months ago, and he was like, Hey, do y’all really, you know, guarantee your your product 100% and I was like, has it? Was like, Have you ever given anybody of their money back? And I said, we absolutely have.

Travis McGowin 15:27
Yep, exactly. It’s one of those things, you know, stuff happens unfortunately, but I always like to throw that in, yes, you’ll be 100% happy, or you won’t pay a penny. But we’re going to strive to do everything in our power to make sure that you are, in fact, 100% happy. We’re not just going to do the once and done and go, Well, I’m sorry I didn’t make you happy. Here’s your money back. No, we want you to get what it was that you were searching for, if you were searching for the end of your bed bug infestation from a heat treatment, and for some reason, we were unable to deliver that on the first go around. Guess what? We’re going to try it again. That’s right, we’re going to do our best to handle the problem, because that’s what you hired us to do.

Michael Wienecke 16:17
Well, and that’s, you know, some pest issues do require coming back. I mean, there are some, you know, special situations like that. So you really have to know, you know, I would say, as as well as having a warranty, also knowing that that person knows exactly what they’re doing.

Travis McGowin 16:32
Absolutely, and that’s where you know, if you’ve got a company stepping on your property for one reason or another, whether it’s to get your roof repaired to, you know, get a pest control treatment to get a crawl space encapsulated. You know what, whatever it is that you’re needing done on your property, a good thorough interview of that company’s representative, a good check online of of customer reviews, you know, what? What are people in your city saying about that, that company, I mean, and if there is negative, you know, feedback, how did that company respond to it? I mean, negative feedback. You know, unfortunately, we’re all people, and sometimes that’s going to happen. But you know, how does that company respond to it? And you know, when the ball is back in their court, you know, what do they do to make it right with the customer? How do they address it? So, you know, being thorough in your in your check of that company’s background, and then being thorough in your questioning to make sure that they’re going to do everything that you want them to do, and then warranty that product is, is just important.