Complaint Review: LifeSafer - Tigard Oregon

I think it’s important for me to state here that I don’t actually like to leave negative info and reviews about people and businesses. I actually prefer to take the time to let people know when I have a better-than-average experience with a company, including the company themselves. I don’t even like to downvote on Reddit. But when I’m subjected to the sort of experience I’ve encountered in the last two years with LifeSafer, and feel powerless to do anything about it, despite my repeated attempts to let them know privately, I have to say something and I will take this as far as it needs to. If one person is saved the exorbitant fees and deplorable service this company provides, I will count that as a success. If LifeSafer examines and reinvents their policies and procedures, that would be even better. If they end up out of business, it would be a bad thing for the people required by the state of Oregon to use their services, but it would sure feel good.

From the outset, when I saw the installation and was explained the operation of their device, I was upset. I appreciated how quickly they’d gotten me in so I could follow the letter of the law following my DUII conviction, but when I saw the large, coiled wire hanging down in the way of where my legs go while driving, then was demonstrated how to operate the contraption, with all its loud and invasive beeps, I was upset and had some choice words for the installer. I’m not proud of how I acted initially, or what I said, and don’t intend to make excused for it, but that was my introduction to this company. If there’s anything positive to be said of this company at this point, that particular employee actually expressed some understanding at the situation and handled himself expertly. He’s been the only one through all of this.

I regretted my actions, later apologized and, for the better part of two years, I showed up early for my appointments, paid my roughly $60 per month for “calibration,” and waited out the time until I could have it removed and my car returned to its normal state. After all, this was a condition as a result of something wrong I’d done, which completely altered my life (for the better) going forward, so I made my peace with it and moved on.

Somewhere around March or April of 2015, the one person I’d been dealing with and had been having little to no trouble with, had put in his 2 week notice and left the company. I found this out when someone covering his site called me before my appointment to ask if I could come in a little early. No problem; I accommodated and moved on. The next month, they apparently still hadn’t found someone to cover the site permanently, and the same guy covering the month before called me again—this time as I was on my way for my appointment—and literally whined about wanting to get done and leave for the day. I was still pretty neutral with them, showed up, got it taken care of and moved on with my day.

The following month they still didn’t have a permanent replacement. I found this out when I showed up at the agreed-upon appointment time and found no one there. No phone call, no request to change anything; just a locked door and no recourse. I called their 800 number (you can’t call the shops directly, and when they call you, the number is blocked. How’s that for professionalism?), pretty upset, and was given the impression they were doing me a favor by getting me in at another location. I drove the 20+ miles to get to the other shop as soon as I could, was offered no apology or acknowledgement for the time they’d waisted of mine, paid the full, regular monthly amount and left.

The next month, I went to this new location (Clackamas). I was pretty disillusioned with LIfeSafer at this point, and somewhat rudely sat through the usual routine, took the contraption and left.

The next month, a little less than two hours before my appointment time, they again called me asking if I could come in a little early. They told me they were getting their offices cleaned and couldn’t be inside the building while that occurred. I told him I would leave right then and was about 45 minutes away.

I showed up in 46 minutes, unclipped the contraption, walked across the parking lot and started to walk inside when one of the guys cleaning stopped me and told me I couldn’t go in. I learned from him the two guys with LifeSafer were gone, and would be back “within an hour” to make my 4 o’clock appointment. That was abut 40 minutes away at that point. Given my experience with this company the last couple of months, I was immediately upset. They had called me and asked me to come in early, then they weren’t there and no word on where they were or when they’d be back other than “by four.”

I marched back to my car, and sat in over 90° heat, to call their 800 number. I immediately asked to speak with a supervisor after navigating their phone tree. I was short with her (though respectful) and vented my frustration. She put me on hold while she tried the shop and, come to find out, in the time I’d been sitting in the car trying to get ahold of them (about 15 minutes to that point), the employees had returned and were sitting in a gazebo a few yards away. I asked the supervisor on the phone what she was going to offer me in compensation for wasting my time. Her answer basically amassed to the fact that she was the call center and could do nothing. I now had to deal with the two guys to get on with my day, so I hung up on her.

I directed my attention to the guys now, where we made the swap and he assured me I could just take care of the bill “next time.” Incredulously, I asked him if he was serious and if we was going to cover the cost for this month for wasting my time. He seemed confused and refused, completely oblivious to how angry I was at this situation. I had some swear words through all this, but could see I wasn’t going to get anywhere, and pretty much gave up. I was shaking my head as I walked back across the parking lot to hook the device back up and move on with my day. No acknowledgement from them of the frustration they’d caused. No empathy (fake or otherwise). Nothing even resembling a connection to reality.

A few days later, I had some extra time, so I drove back down and apologized to the gentleman that I’d made the swap with. I felt compelled to let him know that I wasn’t trying to attack him personally and that I understood exactly what anguish I’d caused him, because I’ve been there. I’ve had people upset with policies for one reason or another, and felt threatened they were going to come across the counter at me. We talked (well, I talked mostly) for several minutes. I tried to get my point across—calmly—that what they were doing was wrong and how badly I felt at how they were treating me (and, by extension, the rest of their clientele). His response? For some reason, he tried to defend the company and their outlook. No point he tried to make made sense. He didn’t have anything to say that made any sense in any capacity that could justify how they’d been treating me and the prices they charged, etc. I asked him to communicate what I had to say to his boss or supervisor, and left.

The device I was now using, come to find out, was running updated firmware and also (I believe) had something defective with it. To let you know when you can hum/breathe into these devices, they alert you with a very loud beep, and continue to beep while you’re blowing, then provide another series of beeps to let you know you’ve passed, aborted (and will have to try again in a couple of moments), or failed. The noises they emit are loud, distracting and embarrassing. This replacement was much quieter. I actually appreciated that, but the problem was, while driving at highway speeds, with the windows down and the radio on, I found out you can’t always hear it when it alerts you to blow. I found this out by noticing two flashing red lights on it the next day. That means the device will go into some form of lockout in the coming days and I wouldn’t be able to start my car, having to get it towed to LifeSafer—at my expense—in order to rectify the situation.

I called them, again (still?) upset, they again acted like they were doing me a favor by getting me in somewhere, offered no acknowledgement or apology, and directed me to the nearest shop with an open slot. This turned out to be the original location I’d been dealing with in Tigard, now staffed by someone permanently. He mentioned in order to reset the device, there would be a $50 fee, or he could replace the device. I explained the fee would not be an option given I couldn’t see how this was my fault, and he let on that he was doing me a favor by swapping the device again. This new device beeped much more loudly, leading me to believe the previous one had been defective, and I called the 800 number, asked to be connected with the gentleman at the Tigard shop to let him know so that they didn’t pass it off to another unsuspecting person. He told me “some devices are louder than others,” and that he’d “put a note on it” and I left it at that.

The next day, I had a coffee flavored energy-type drink and a chocolatey CLIF bar for breakfast. I got in my car, was able to start it normally, drove to a nearby grocery store, blew into the device after I left the store, all without a problem. A few minutes after starting the car upon leaving the store, the device howled for me to do the “rolling test.” It failed and continued to fail 4-5 times. Then it “took,” and didn’t give me any trouble thereafter. But the two red lights were flashing again.

I was furious. LifeSafer again didn’t care, and again acted like they were doing me a favor by getting me in somewhere. Back to Tigard that afternoon where, come to find out, the guy had gotten in trouble the day before for swapping the device out. He declared I would have to pay $50 to be able to go about my life, and I refused. We went back and forth for nearly an hour and a half. His stance was their policy; mine was that I hadn’t done anything wrong. In my eyes, if I were trying to drive drunk, that’s an issue and a $50 is the least of my problem. In this instance, their device couldn’t differentiate between alcohol and a breakfast bar, and it was costing me $50 to rectify the situation.

He got upset and frustrated, trying to juggle multiple customers coming in and me at the same time. There was no one else at the site to assist, and as I was insistent I was not going to take his answer as a solution, I demanded to speak with someone else. He said there was no one else, but did try to get hold of one of his two managers (neither of which were available to answer for quite some time). In the meantime, I called the 800 number and asked to speak with a supervisor—and actually got the same supervisor I’d gotten a couple of weeks earlier before when they hadn’t shown up for their appointment in Clackamas. She still was no help, proclaiming they’re “just the call center” and we basically got nowhere, so I gave up on that path.

While that was happening, the guy finally got hold of one of his supervisors, explained all of what had gone down, and let me know she was supposed to be calling me. At that point, it’d been almost an hour and a half and I was running out of time. I had finally decided I was going to pay their $50, just so I could move on with my life and take the argument up some other way. The supervisor finally called me at that point, and I made what I see as my only error in judgement. She was trying to justify their position and used the words “you failed” in talking about what had occurred with the device. My exact words were “I didn’t f****** fail you f****** b***h,” to which she responded “F***. You.” And I hung up. I paid, waited the 5-10 minutes while they “re-calibrated” the device, and was on my way.

Two days later, while driving, I got alerted to blow as normal, but this time, it aborted while doing so. Not a fail, but an amber “Abort,” followed by a wait while it prepared for me to start again. It did this 3-4 times before it would “take.” Understandably worried, I called them again, and was basically told by this phone rep that it was essentially a known firmware issue in Oregon, and that it would under no circumstances result in a fail or a fee for me. But she didn’t have a fix. I expressed how much I didn’t trust them to hold their word, and she assured me of all the ways they supposedly have of documenting customer interactions. But she stated she had no way to provide to me in writing any way to verify I wouldn’t be charged for the defective device.

This morning, I couldn’t even start my car at first. For twenty minutes I sat, in front of my house, blowing like normal every few minutes, while it consistently aborted. I called again to find out what I should do and, while this rep did use the words “I understand you’re frustrated,” however insincerely, was combative and mostly unhelpful. While I was talking to her and she attempted to provide suggestions to get the device to work, I was able to finally start the car and the call was shifted to my phone when the Bluetooth connection dropped out. This was a bug between my phone and car stereo, but she had kept talking, even though I’d said “wait” while I figured out how to get to where I could hear her again. I wasn’t yelling or screaming, but I was definitely letting her know with my tone how upset I was with them. I don’t know if she knew my voice (maybe I’d been connected with her at some point through all this), or saw my notes, or is just genuinely a rude person that is burned out and bad at their job, but she literally hung up on me mid sentence.

Enough is enough. Despite my multiple thousand word diatribe here, I haven’t even covered everything pertaining to how this company has consistently treated me and—by extension—the rest of the public forced to deal with them the their type of service. On August 5th, I have an appointment where I get to pay $75 for them to spend 15-20 minutes uninstalling their device and setting my car back to start normally. I have little to no faith that the electrical system isn’t or will not be compromised as a result of their sub-standard device. But I fear I will have no recourse if something does come up. I could focus on myself only, divorce myself from this company and move on with my life. As I stated earlier, though, if even one person can be saved the insanity of having to deal with this company, I think that’s a good thing for all of us. Better yet, we should use this company as an example of what should not be allowed by a public business in the US and hopefully we can all benefit in all industries (Telco industry, I’m looking at you). It really shouldn’t be that hard; all it takes is a little effort.