Swingle Lawn, Tree & Landscape Care

Last fall, I called Swingle; I needed someone to prune my out-​of-​control pear tree and some branches from a neighbor’s tree that were growing over my side of the fence. Someone came to the house and gave me an estimate within a few days. I called the business office to schedule the work — they offered a nice discount if I prepaid, and allowed them to schedule the work sometime in the next few months during their not-​so-​busy season, which was fine for me. Their crew arrived (they checked with me beforehand) and the work was completed today. The trees look good and the area was left clean. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend their work and will use them again in the future.

Bob, you nailed it! This is their business model and it stinks! I had them come out to fertilize — one time! Then, I get a message a few months later that they were coming out the next day. I had no clue what they were talking about and called their customer service. She said I signed up for a’plan’. I told her I had not and told her to cancel whatever services they had locked me into with their ‘plan’.
So, I get home tonight and what do I find — a pesticide flag in my yard. The nerve of these people. I had just fertilized my lawn a few days earlier and I sure hope their unauthorized ‘service’ does not burn my lawn. BEWARE!

Swingle came out last May — 2013 to aerate my lawn on a «Special» for $ 35.00 — from a postcard. That went fine and I had no complaints.
Well, apparently use of any service with Swingle becomes a «Continuing Services Agreement» and they will automatically come out to service your property again without specific authorization. I did NOTHING else with Swingle after Mayt of last year. However, they came out no Friday the 14^th of March 2014 and aerated the front lawn only and attempted to charge my $ 53.25 for approximately 400sq ft. Who services just part of the lawn — and $ 53.25 for 400sqft. They claim they only did the front last year, but I beg to differ.
I did call and complain. I was told that a proposal had been mailed to me in January. She stated that I probably thought it was junk mail and threw it away. She said I also received a voice mail on February 26^th. I checked my voice mail and deleted messages. I’ve got messages from 2012, but NO message from Swingle saying they were going to come out and charge me an arm and a leg for my front yard. They did waive the charge, but I was given the reason that «all services you use have the continuing services clause in fine print», like your cell phone, and cable, so I should be more careful when signing up for service and that my «person» should have explained the continuing services agreement with me. Uh… I never spoke with a person beyond the aeration scheduled last May and continuing services were NEVER mentioned. I know me… no way I would have agreed to them coming out again for $ 53.25 — for the front lawn. I do feel somewhat bad for the customer service person. She’s probably had to deal with irate people all day long because of this. However, their willingness to waive the charges so easily make me think that these guys know they’re just trying to rip people off.
This also gives me an opportunity to complain about the tree trimming fiasco I had with Swingle two years ago. It took a week for someone to give me quote on trimming a tree away from growing into another and also thinning out a second tree. It took 3 weeks for the service, then another 3– 4 weeks and two phone calls for them to come out and finish the half-​assed job they did. They still never completely fixed the issue of the two trees growing together. They still left one single long branch growing into the other tree. Any reasonable observer can tell that branch should also have been cut back. At that point I got sick of trying to call them again.
I will NEVER use Swingle again!!! Their crappy service and «sleight of hand» with the services agreement are almost criminal!!!