Complaint Review: Vivint

 I promised the people at VIVINT I would share our experience, so here is it. Vivint is door to door sales for home security.
 We were very happy with the security system we had been using, but this salesperson got me interested when he mentioned they offer the video door monitoring included with their regular monthly fee. This was no different in cost than we currently were paying, so why not make the switch and get some added extras? It was "free" to set up. (That should have been my first clue). After about an hour of pitch the salesperson told us the normal fee is $199 but because he could use our equipment he was willing to slash the service fee to $99. (He was slick and we didn't even realize until later that he initially said this would be Free!) 

They could come set it up same day..because they had a guy around the corner. What was promised to be a 2hour install, became more than 4 hours, on a Sat evening. The install guy was here until 1am. It took him a long time to get the doorbell working correctly. Apparently he did some wiring (which he never mentioned to us) that ended up being charged to our account in the amount of $70.  According to what our salesperson said, our first bill should have been $164 and then $65.99 each month after. The $164 included the $99 set up + 1st month of service.  

The next morning, I decided to go to my online account to see what the online experience was like and I was shocked to see the 2 statements they had posted.  One statement showed the amount of $164.99, that showed paid and appeared as thought they had used my voided check to pay those charges.  The 2nd statement was dated with the same service dates and was for $236.20! I called right away to find out what these charges were and why I wasn't told about them. They claim it was an error on their end, but I knew better. This is when I found out about the $70 wiring fee.

 If you plan on contacting customer service via phone, get a few snacks handy because the hold time to get to an agent is LONG. I spent almost 2 hours on hold and being transferred to an "agent who can better assist me". By this time I was so frustrated, I decided to cancel everything. (thankfully we had 3 days to cancel without penalties).  The sales rep never told us that we would be set up with auto-pay. This makes it very difficult to block/stop payments from coming out of your account. At this point, I had not seen any charges on my bank account and even after calling my bank confirmed they had not yet pulled out any funds. I was assured by the vivint customer account rep that I wouldn't be charged anything since I decided to cancel. 

In the course of the phone calls, I also found out that they charge to send a tech for any issues (free with most other security companies). 

Day 4 and I found both charges on my acccount! Over $400 and now I'm back on the phone again waiting to speak to another account rep. My sales person at this point has pretty much washed his hands of us bc well, he's not making any money off us anymore. I have an appt scheduled for the uninstall next monday but if I don't get my money back before then, they will not be allowed in my home. 

Buyer beware! Don't even entertain this company by letting them pitch their sale. It's not worth the time and frustration. I wish I had read about them earlier. Check their fb page and other customer review blogs, you will see how horrible this company is to deal with.