I need to vent. First off, this is my own personal opinion.
With that said, let me begin. Back in August, I bid on a sweet 3 story apt. building. I get a call saying I was not the lowest, but the winning bidder. The Apt. Bldg. is run by a management company. They now tell me I have to contact this company called COMPLIANCE DEPOT, and go thru them…oh and there is a fee. This is where I went against my better judgement. They want ME to pay a fee to a company that will investigate my company on THIER behalf?? This sounds absurd…and it is. I mean they never told me about it before the bid…so it wasnt included. I figured if I do it its only $95 so I would eat it to land the gig. I dwelled over it for days, looking into compliance depot to make sure they were legit.
I even talked to Alex about getting a WFP set up(would of been perfect for the job, and paid for itself this day).
I asked compliance depot many questions before I sent them my check…such as what I would need to “pass”. they refused to give me any info I was looking for until I paid the fee.
Well, I paid the fee, for them to give my insurance agent a hard time about ridiculous additional insured to the insurance policy(which my agent gave in and did)…then they told me my auto insurance wasnt “large” enough. I told them my truck has full coverage and showed them…not good enough. I even looked into getting the additional insurance they wanted me to have…but the cost of that added with thier “fee” would of left me about $100 for the job. Compliance Depot wouldnt give me the answers to my questions before I paid because they would of never of gotten my money. I would of known I didnt qualify to thier standards.
Shame on me…
Dont do what I did
I would like to induct Compliance Depot into the Hall of shame…COMPLIANCE DEPOT …YOU SUCK!!!
That’s nuts! It stinks that we have to watch our back on almost everything.
Isn’t there a sucker born every…oh wait, here comes another!
I would never pay a company to check my credentials. And furthermore, why isn’t the client (management co) paying the fees to Compliance Depot? I think I found a great scam to exploit…check it out:
500 Store Retail Mall in Your Town Seeks Window Cleaning Quote!
Just pay us $25 to apply.
I’m tinkin, i’m tinkin…
Man that makes you think doesn’t it! There are companies out there who’s only goal is to rip off small business. Compliance depot, I’ll have to remember that name. Thanks for the heads up Doc!
PS - maybe after a couple of days this post will show up when someone googles Compliance depot and they will get the negative publicity they deserve.
Sorry to hear that Tony,
I also had two condo complexes that also went through Compliance Depot. I visited their web site after that I decided not to do it.
Tony,
you hit the nail! That was one of the reasons why I stated thier name so many times in the post.
If I stuck with my first instinct, I wouldnt be wrining this post!
Live and learn
Allow me a moment to defend our company…first of all, we are not scamming anyone. We are a legitimate brick and mortar company that provides a valuable service to our customers.
To respond to the above critique…I’m sorry if you had a bad experience, but that is rare and may have been due to a hassle that you don’t feel you should have gone through. Our customers are too large to screen every vendor that they use. In order to alleviate this problem, they hire us to screen all of their vendors. This saves them time, money and risk. If a company hires the wrong vendor and that vendor turns out to be a criminal, there could be serious repricusions to the company if the vendor strikes again.
For a legitimate vendor that has all of the proper insurance and licensing, they receive a “clean bill of health” and move through the process quickly and efficiently. CompDepot doesn’t make the requirements, it’s your client that does. If you don’t meet the standards they require, then you won’t be compliant no matter what coverage you think you have.
I agree, if you are too small or don’t do enough work that a $95 compliance fee is too much, then it’s probably not worth the time to go through the process for you or your client.
I’m sorry that you had a bad experience that lead you to post hateful criticism about our company on the internet and hope that some day you will be able to work with some of our clients again. We deal with almost every big player in the industry, so sooner or later you will probably run into us again. Hopefully, you will have a better experience next time.
I think the “hateful” criticism comes from the fact that you and your client didn’t disclose 2 things:
-
There would be a necessary fee to secure the job.
-
What criteria you would be looking into during the screening process and what the limits needed to be.
I think any person, businessman or not, would view that as shady. Wouldn’t you agree?
Comp Depot… How did you find this post here?
oops never mind… if you google the company name this post comes up on the first page of google.
http://windowcleaner.com/vBulletin/marketing-advertising-sales/6649-compliance-depot-scam.htmlNov 11, 2009 … I need to vent. First off, this is my own personal opinion. With that said, let me begin. Back in August, I bid on a sweet 3 story apt. …
windowcleaner.com/.../6649-compliance-depot-scam.html - Cached
GOOGLE SEARCH for compliance depot first page listing 9
Compliance Depot is a mess. Ever heard the expression “the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing” ?- COMPLIANCE DEPOT is a prime example. Getting compliant with them takes maximum effort on us vendors part, like having to send the same information a half a dozen times to them- sounds fun huh? Ask all the insurance companies that we use what they think of Compliance Depot. They’ll use statements like “getting harassed” and “what a joke” Give me the good old days when insurance compliance was free and meant working with one of the companies employees not a a third party. And what’s up with Compliance Depot policing the forums? I guess I’m venting now. Oh yeah check out Compliance Depot’s stellar Better Business Bureau rating - “F”
Man,this thread is on fire! I’ll for sure remember that name.
+1
Ahh…the power of the internet…Right Tony??? I wish I caught this retort sooner. As Curt from 5 Star stated…you could of done a few things to help “the small guy” before you collected my Fee…Like I said in post 1 if you laid the law down before I forked over my money, i would of known i didnt qualify. Oh…and by the way…you being in Dallas…and me being about 30 minutes from the job in question I bid on…I personally could of showed them my proof of insurance, my work vehicle, my truck insurance and my portfolio. Maybe I shouldnt of used the harsh words like scam to relate to compiance depot. Maybe compliance depot didnt play fair with me. This is just my personal opinion about compliance depot. Thank you comliance depot. Oh and also you can PM me for my address to refund my money…or are you just saying “you are sorry” so when people like me google your company they wont be reading this…
Got that right Doc! These guys felt the sting of a highly rated web presence and it obviously hurt. I’d be curious to know if they decide to refund your money.
…and maybe a little extra for pain and suffering:D
Cleaning companies are classified by their system as only of “Moderate” risk. Just how much insurance does one need??? More rules, more rules…
Essentially they seem to be a supervisor of a supervisor. More mid-management, just what we all need. Another someone lookin’ over our collective shoulders.
Sucks to have a unfavorable critique right on the front page of Google, huh?
compliance depot is moving up
GOOGLE SEARCH for compliance depot first page listing 4
Compliance Depot brought me a lot of business. It stinks if you don’t have insurance but if you have all the required insurance other companies that use them will contact you for work.
