Complaint Review: Waste Management - Internet

If you are considering working with Waste Management for your trash hauling, I strongly encourage you to use ANY OTHER COMPANY if you can help it. Where we live, the options are between Waste Management and a small local company, whereas when we first moved here we had the option of many trash companies.  WM thinks it has a monopoly out here and has responded by having worse customer service, higher bills, charging a fee for the privilege of being their customer, and shoddy service. I had been a customer of theirs for almost 20 years, until recently.

In 2009 they instituted a $3 per bill 'administrative fee'. If you did not let them have access to your checking account to automatically bill you, you had to pay this fee. Historically Waste Management is famous for changing their fee structure by leaps and bounds, and the only way to combat it is to call them and threaten to leave, at which time they'd give you a reduced rate (temporarily). No one with brains in their head would EVER let WM have unfettered access to their checking account, because you never know when they will raise their rates. You only know that they will, and to let them have at your checking account means they got their money and you can't do anything about complaining.   When my family's business was hit with this $3 fee, my father told WM that he would drop not only the business trash service but his home trash service if they did not drop this fee; they immediately removed the fee.   When I first saw the fee on my bill, I called WM and was told they 'cannot remove this fee under any circumstances'. I told them that they had done it for my family's business and my father's home service, and the rep hotly denied it.  Well, folks, the reason they were so quick to kiss my dad's behind is because both his home and business trash service are in areas where there is open competition for trash service. They know he could go anywhere else and accomodated him. They think that we would have a hard time getting new service in the country, so they did not feel they had to remove the fee because we couldn't go anywhere else.  They were wrong.

So, the last quarter of 2009 comes (Sept/Oct/Nov/Dec). I have always paid WM in all the decades I have had their service. Sometimes I pay it late but I always pay it. They have never just stopped giving me service before, but for some reason they did not pick up my trash on 12/8, 12/15, 12/22, and 12/29. However I did pay my last quarter bill (for Sept/Oct/Nov/Dec 2009) on 12/31/09. When it was clear they had abandoned my service by 12/15, I retained a small local trash company and left my 12/8 trash out at the street in the WM cart. I left the WM cart out at the street until it was picked up in May 2010. No trash was put in the cart after 12/8.  I assumed they abandoned my service and found another company; I think that's what they are the most pissed about. They prefer you to be powerless and beholden to them.

So they finally picked up the cart in May 2010, and now say I owe them close to $150. They did not pick up for four weeks (for which they were paid). I never called them to cancel my service, nor did I ever call them to reinstate the service, yet they are charging me a $25 restart service fee. (When did they notify me they were stopping service? When did I call them to stop service?)  I sent them a letter in June 2010 about the fact that they stopped providing service and I did not receive four weeks of service that I did pay for, and that I would take this issue to public forums and the Better Business Bureau if they did not cease collection activity.  Today I got a collection letter.  Today I am letting everyone know how dishonest this company is.

They have 250 complaints for billing and collection with the Better Business Bureau. Why am I not surprised? Today I become another number!