Complaint Review: Kauff's Towing - Mangonia Park Florida

I noticed you made a comment about talking with other people anf a free for all. This is a rumor and totally unfair. I have owned a towing business for over 35 years and would hate to think that I or my employees would have to stoop to pilferage to make a living. Kauffs is one of the nations largest towing firms. I do not believe they made it that big by stealing dollar CD's out of cars. If the police dept. did not provide an inventory report, (as they are required) then you need to go after them. That is how the chain of liability is established. No report, no liability. And how does one establish that you are not trying to get something for nothing? How does anyone else know except you what was really in that car?????

Kauff's towing at one time used to be a model for the towing and recovery industry. Before I worked there, I know Road one had bought that company and ran it into the ground. I can't really say anything about the Miami office because I was never one time there, but however I spent a lot of time at Magnolia Park and Ft. Pierce. I was a heavy duty driver for them and I was at the Stuart office (which was dispatched by Ft. Pierce) and let me tell you I had a terrible experience with this company. Myself and my friend went to Richard Kauff and almost all towing companies that have big wreckers always need heavy wrecker drivers because we are a bit of a dying breed and hard to come by. He told us that he thought all his drivers were fantastic and were the base of his company. We believed him, so we sought employment there. Uprooted everything from Lakeland and moved to Stuart like Richard said I should (Richard Kauff was and I believe still is a very nice man, so please don't think I saying anything bad about him). He unfortunatley had a real clown running the office in Ft. Pierce by the name of Stanley Moore. This guy was apparently trained by Larry Lemon in which I have heard that Larry really knew what he was doing in towing and recovery before he died. The first big wreck I worked on the turnpike was one I'll NEVER forget. It was a Saturday and I was towing a semi to the dealer in Ft. Pierce and right before I finished my nextel started going crazy. It was Stanley hollaring that we had a rollover and I needed to haul tail to the turnpike. So, I did just that. Upon arrival I was told to stand by and wait, so I did. When I finally checked out the situation it turned out to be a 25' fifth wheel camper trailer that had simply rolled over on its side (A simple recovery). This section of the turnpike had a concrete barricade on each white line, (left side and right) so it made rolling this thing over very tight. Other than that this was a very simple and light rollover. The turnpike authority had already removed the pickup that was towing the trailer so all that was left to recover was the trailer itself. Apparently the turnpike authority has a rule where in the event of a rollover every piece of equipment that the company has must be present at the scene. You won't hear any complaints from towers in that area about that because they can charge peak rates for all of it. Well we had several personell, 3 big wreckers, an airbag trailer and an unknowledgeable manager. What we didn't have was exactly what we needed. Our rotator and a Landoll trailer. So Stanley wants to be the big hero so he tells us to swap out the turnpike authority's 125 red cones for ours (omg). When we finished swapping out all the stupid cones Mr. Moore proceeded to use the longest wrecker we had (which was Kenny's 50 ton traveler) to pick it up. Common sense would tell you that theres not enough room and its a light load, so use the short wrecker to get between the barricades. When I asked where was the Landoll trailer to move it when we uprighted it, he said one wasn't available. When I asked how we would move it he said we were going to load it into the turnpike authority's dump truck (omg). I told him it wouldn't fit, but he insisted it would.They lifted this thing about 25 feet in the air (yikes) about ready to snap in half and then backed the dump truck under it. Naturally it didn't fit and the State Police were getting mad. The trooper actually hollared that he saw it wouldn't fit an hour ago (duhhh). At that point I heard Richard Kauff on Stanley's nextel and I knew this wasn't going well. A gentlemen from the turnpike authority came over yelling "no, no, no you can't do it like that, you have to take the boom and squish it into the dump truck"! Holy crap what is this the dark ages. I asked if I could leave the scene because I wasn't being allowed to help and was humiliated! I'm used to getting standing ovations for my Heavy duty recovery, not being yelled at and made to look like a fool. Some men in this world have serious problems admitting their limitations. Not everybody goes about dealing with these challenges the same way, but as long as they get it done thats all that matters. If I don't know something, whether were talking about towing and recovery, auto repair, or whatever I'll say up front "I don't know how to do this" instead of pretending like I do. Other than dealing with this clown they do have knowledgeable people working there. Mike Scheidt who now manages the Magnolia Park office and although he is arrogant, he is a knowledgeable operator. As far as our pay went thats where I had an even bigger problem. We were paid a percentage of whatever our wreckers made, but there was one problem. They wouldn't tell us how much our wreckers made. We were never allowed to total up our tickets because they said we could quit and goto work for another company and we would know how much we were charging that customer. Okay, point taken, but how do i know how much money I made? Like going to work and not keeping track of your hours more or less. All in all Richard Kauff was a nice man and I didn't mind Mike Scheidt, but that company was a nightmare to work for. I've never worked so hard for so little in all my life. Contrary to whAt they think there, $1,500.00 paychecks for 2 weeks of extreme work (about 8 to 10 heavy calls a day) is nothing and I still to this day don't know how much my truck actually made, but it should have been alot. I will never work for this company again and any serious heavy wrecker drivers out there, if you have a love for the towing and recovery industry like I do I would recomend to stay away from this company. Its clearly not the same one it had a repuation for in the years before Road-One. Richard Kauff maybe the President there, but hes just a poster boy for public relations. Jeff is the decision maker there and he has deep ties to Miller industries.