Need Tree Service - Don't Use This Company

by Wayne Flaherty

Yesterday, about lunch time, I contracted with Show-Me-Tree Service to have 2 trees removed. Much to my chagrin, I learned what kind of people they really are. For a price, they agreed to the following:

•  Remove 2 trees.
•  Cut the stumps low enough that you could "run your lawnmower over them".
•  Clean up the area completely.

These three items were included as part and parcel of the work to be done. Almost immediately, a small army of workers descended on my front yard. They proceeded to attack the smaller of the two trees (25 feet high). After the tree had been denuded, a boom carried a worker up near the top of one side of the tree. Down below, another worker decided to cut that particular half of the tree down. Disregarding any help from the man in the boom, he just cut the half down. I was watching and could see that the tree was going to fall over some overhead  utility lines running to my house. As I expected, the tree did fall on the utility lines. The force was enough to pull the trim board anchoring the utility line completely off the house. During this entire episode at least 4 other workers were watching. None of them made a sound or shouted any kind of warning to the man cutting the tree. I stepped into the yard to assess the damage when one of the workers said "Don't worry. It's happened before. We'll get a hammer and fix it." If anyone was in charge, he never made himself known. Most importantly the entire crew responded as if falling trees on utility lines were an everyday occurrence.

My daughter comes home from work for lunch. On this particular day, she was deathly ill but went to work anyway. I asked someone to move one of their vehicles to clear the driveway so she could pull into my garage. No sooner had they moved the vehicle than another employee drove another vehicle into the driveway. When I called his attention to the fact that my daughter was due home very soon, he said, "I'll be less than 5 minutes." In the mistaken belief that he was telling me the truth, I backed away. (The driver is easily identified because he was clearly the shortest man on the crew.) As I watched, the little man got into a boom and disappeared in the tree. For 30 minutes, he cut limbs off the tree until it was 40 foot high stump. Then he cut the top off in sections until he got it down to a manageable height. In the meantime, my daughter (still sick as a dog) came home and was forced to park a block away and walk to the house. Did this Show-Me-Tree Service employee give a d___? Obviously not. He had not the slightest concern if my daughter was forced to walk or how far she had to walk. He had not the slightest concern about lying to me. In short, he was just another Show-Me-Tree Service employee. In addition to lying to me, my driveway now has pools of oil from where their vehicle was parked.

What they consider cleaning up after they finished consisted of raking the area. If you have ever seen a raked concrete driveway you will know that it is far from clean.  Apparently, a blower is also one of the tools they forgot to inform the customer that they don't have.   

Near the end of their efforts I called to their attention the fact that the tree stumps were high enough that no lawnmower could ever run over them. I was politely informed that they had no equipment for cutting the stumps down any further. What this means is that they lied when they promised to cut the stumps down to grass level because they knew they did not have any equipment to do so. They stood on my doorstep, looked me straight in the eye and lied to me. Later, they said that if I would rent stump removing equipment (for $150) they would take the stumps down for me.

Whatever skills Show-Me-Tree Service may have, they are most proficient at lying. They make their lies seem so believable I guess that's how they stay in business.

When it came time to pay the bill, I was informed that they didn't have a credit card machine. Those who made the promises to me were nowhere in sight. They sent an employee to collect payment. Now I know why this third piece of equipment is also missing. If you did business the way Show-Me-Tree Service does business, you too would accept only cash as payment.

A copy of this letter will be sent to the Better Business Bureau. A second will be prominently displayed on a website that has 300,000 visitors per year. A third copy will be mailed to the Show-Me-Tree Service. Maybe someone will see my letter and avoid a lot of grief by not dealing with Show-Me-Tree Service. This company shows an address of 302 Plumb St., Lexington, MO 64067. It is rated F by the Better Business Bureau of which it is not a member.