Trusted Pros is a website that hides behind a one sided terms of use and offers ZERO warranty for their services. There are no refunds or early cancellation for any reason, including not providing the services they claim you get. The category for our company is only selectable for interiors and does not exist for exteriors and commercial. The leads generation is dismal at best and there was NO increase in traffic from their "Premium" membership through our website tracking url. We track everything that comes to us as any business should be doing. I have not gotten a reply to their customer support email address to address the issues so the credit card was cancelled. 8 months later, they are still holding us to the 6 month contract and only send threats of collection and we are back to the basic listing. The fact that this seems to be an automated threat speaks volumns to how many companies are cancelling their credit cards once they realise there is no return on investment. At this point, we dont want the listing as the contact we only got is unsolicited from salesmen and wannabe contractors wanting to know our rates and how we quote.
From the leads generation, our account claimed we had 80 leads before we paid for premium, but under the leads page we have only confirmed three and none of them were within 50km of our city and the budget was ridiculously low. $500- $1000 budget to frame a 1000 square foot basement, would barely cover materials, but this is the garbage leads we found. A major issue with the website leads only having an interior category was we had to do a manual search to compensate. This was how we found out that in a city of 1 million plus, only the three above mentioned were found within a two month period. 80 leads is an outright lie. You would find more work and waste less time searching for jobs on kijiji.
An additional problem with TrustedPros is you cannot delete the listing, so other than setting the phone extention to play an automated message and hang up, you can expect an increase in spam calls. Trusted pros claim its to provide quality content, but really its to make the website appear to be bigger than it actually is and to get you to go Premium. Here is our average stats for a 30 day period in june: ( quotes are a direct request from the potential client ) Homestars $200 a month, 30 quote requests a month Google Adwords $100 a month, 23 quote requests a month Bing Ads $40 a month, 7 quote requests a month Houzz free, 4 quote requests a month BBB Accreditation $55 a month, 4 quote requests a month TrustedPros $80 a month, 0 quote requests, 1 poor quality lead As a contractor, I have zero trust in TrustedPros and if we cannot delete the listing, or they dont stop with the collection threats you will see us in the news. Its time these websites that hide behind their terms of use to collect for a shoddy service be regulated in Canada. In the 10 years we have been in business TrustedPros has been the worse experience with an advertiser.
Each review we receive at trustedpros is run through a very rigorous screening process Automated and manual). Over 30% off all reviews posted to trustedpros are determined to be fraudulent and rejected.
Our policies regarding reviews are:
A consumer that has hired a contractor is entitled to post a review Positive or negative) regarding their experience. Once a review is submitted the business owner is notified immediately of the review and it is placed in queue with our validation team where it usually takes 3-5 business days to properly screen and validate. If the review is approved, it is posted live to the corresponding company profile page.
The only ways to remove a negative review are:
The contractor resolves any outstanding issues with their client and their client requests removal.
If the contractor feels the comments posted by their client are untrue and provide us with documents to support that those comments are factually false, the review will be removed.
If the contractor feels the comments posted are untrue and pursues legal action against their client or, if there is an active legal matter related to the work performed i.E. Their client didn’t fulfill the terms of the contract, withheld payment etc., the review will be placed into pending status until a decision is made by the courts. If the courts rule in favour of the contractor, the review will not be reposted however, if the courts rule in favour of their client, the review will be reposted live.
Unlike this website ‘yscam’ and many others, we do not allow anonymous reviews. We feel that complete transparency is needed for all parties involved, especially when false negative comments are posted and by allowing anonymous reviews the business owner or individual is unable to properly defend themselves. Additionally, we feel that reviews posted anonymously are usually done this way because the statements made are untrue – wouldn’t you agree ‘integrity first’?
Because of our policies we have helped many homeowners rectify problems with the contractors they’ve hired, and others avoid the potential headaches of hiring certain contractors. We’ve also helped thousands of reputable contractors across canada effectively market and build their business.
As explained above and likely explained to you before, if you’re able to provide us with proof that the client you speak did actually post false comments about you and/or your business, we would definitely remove the review. However, until such proof is provided there is nothing we can do.
Other sites owned by myself are handyamerican.com Soon to be trustedpros.com ). Last year we were able to obtain the domain names trustedpros.Ca and trustedpros.com. Since most of our members are not just ‘handymen’ we decided that trustedpros better reflected our business and the services offered by our members so we switched our name from handycanadian inc. To trustedpros inc.
If you or anyone else has questions about trustedpros, i would be happy to discuss them with you directly. I can be reached at [email protected]
Regards,
Max
Here is my experience with their garbage.
This company does not care about checking the validity of bad reviews they will print whatever the clients says. I had a negative review and had all the proof and was sent to trusted pros that the client was not telling the truth i sent them all the details. They did nothing i had to get the client to remove his negative comment. They are very quick to print negative comments but it takes forever to get your positive reviews posted. This would be a great site if the the company screened the reviews of clients and asked for proof not just allowing people to review and say whatever they want. I lost 2 jobs because of this over 17k and they do not care!
Do not join this website. The owner has been known to extort money from users by refusing to remove live/hosted reviews that are either entirely fake or can not be substantiated. Countless otherwise reputable contractors have lost millions upon millions of dollars in potential work due to this website and the owner should be charged with fraud at the least. He also had another network called "Handy Canadian" before which he had to shut down due to negative national media attention on CBC.
DO NOT DO BUSINESS WITH TrustedPros. Max Sheppard is a scammer.
Trustedpros.ca is a joke. They take info from other sites and never verify reviews, good or bad
Stay away from this mickey mouse operation.... Use a reliable company like (((competitor's name redacted))).
I used a company off their site and found out all the reviews were fake...speaking to my lawyer on how they can allow fake reviews and if I can sue them for it...I most likely will anyways.
TrustedPros Inc. Reviews
Trusted Pros is a website that hides behind a one sided terms of use and offers ZERO warranty for their services. There are no refunds or early cancellation for any reason, including not providing the services they claim you get. The category for our company is only selectable for interiors and does not exist for exteriors and commercial. The leads generation is dismal at best and there was NO increase in traffic from their "Premium" membership through our website tracking url. We track everything that comes to us as any business should be doing. I have not gotten a reply to their customer support email address to address the issues so the credit card was cancelled. 8 months later, they are still holding us to the 6 month contract and only send threats of collection and we are back to the basic listing. The fact that this seems to be an automated threat speaks volumns to how many companies are cancelling their credit cards once they realise there is no return on investment. At this point, we dont want the listing as the contact we only got is unsolicited from salesmen and wannabe contractors wanting to know our rates and how we quote.
From the leads generation, our account claimed we had 80 leads before we paid for premium, but under the leads page we have only confirmed three and none of them were within 50km of our city and the budget was ridiculously low. $500- $1000 budget to frame a 1000 square foot basement, would barely cover materials, but this is the garbage leads we found. A major issue with the website leads only having an interior category was we had to do a manual search to compensate. This was how we found out that in a city of 1 million plus, only the three above mentioned were found within a two month period. 80 leads is an outright lie. You would find more work and waste less time searching for jobs on kijiji.
An additional problem with TrustedPros is you cannot delete the listing, so other than setting the phone extention to play an automated message and hang up, you can expect an increase in spam calls. Trusted pros claim its to provide quality content, but really its to make the website appear to be bigger than it actually is and to get you to go Premium. Here is our average stats for a 30 day period in june: ( quotes are a direct request from the potential client ) Homestars $200 a month, 30 quote requests a month Google Adwords $100 a month, 23 quote requests a month Bing Ads $40 a month, 7 quote requests a month Houzz free, 4 quote requests a month BBB Accreditation $55 a month, 4 quote requests a month TrustedPros $80 a month, 0 quote requests, 1 poor quality lead As a contractor, I have zero trust in TrustedPros and if we cannot delete the listing, or they dont stop with the collection threats you will see us in the news. Its time these websites that hide behind their terms of use to collect for a shoddy service be regulated in Canada. In the 10 years we have been in business TrustedPros has been the worse experience with an advertiser.
Here is their code of ethics,
Hello integrity first,
Each review we receive at trustedpros is run through a very rigorous screening process Automated and manual). Over 30% off all reviews posted to trustedpros are determined to be fraudulent and rejected.
Our policies regarding reviews are:
A consumer that has hired a contractor is entitled to post a review Positive or negative) regarding their experience. Once a review is submitted the business owner is notified immediately of the review and it is placed in queue with our validation team where it usually takes 3-5 business days to properly screen and validate. If the review is approved, it is posted live to the corresponding company profile page.
The only ways to remove a negative review are:
The contractor resolves any outstanding issues with their client and their client requests removal.
If the contractor feels the comments posted by their client are untrue and provide us with documents to support that those comments are factually false, the review will be removed.
If the contractor feels the comments posted are untrue and pursues legal action against their client or, if there is an active legal matter related to the work performed i.E. Their client didn’t fulfill the terms of the contract, withheld payment etc., the review will be placed into pending status until a decision is made by the courts. If the courts rule in favour of the contractor, the review will not be reposted however, if the courts rule in favour of their client, the review will be reposted live.
Unlike this website ‘yscam’ and many others, we do not allow anonymous reviews. We feel that complete transparency is needed for all parties involved, especially when false negative comments are posted and by allowing anonymous reviews the business owner or individual is unable to properly defend themselves. Additionally, we feel that reviews posted anonymously are usually done this way because the statements made are untrue – wouldn’t you agree ‘integrity first’?
Because of our policies we have helped many homeowners rectify problems with the contractors they’ve hired, and others avoid the potential headaches of hiring certain contractors. We’ve also helped thousands of reputable contractors across canada effectively market and build their business.
As explained above and likely explained to you before, if you’re able to provide us with proof that the client you speak did actually post false comments about you and/or your business, we would definitely remove the review. However, until such proof is provided there is nothing we can do.
Other sites owned by myself are handyamerican.com Soon to be trustedpros.com ). Last year we were able to obtain the domain names trustedpros.Ca and trustedpros.com. Since most of our members are not just ‘handymen’ we decided that trustedpros better reflected our business and the services offered by our members so we switched our name from handycanadian inc. To trustedpros inc.
If you or anyone else has questions about trustedpros, i would be happy to discuss them with you directly. I can be reached at [email protected]
Regards,
Max
Here is my experience with their garbage.
This company does not care about checking the validity of bad reviews they will print whatever the clients says. I had a negative review and had all the proof and was sent to trusted pros that the client was not telling the truth i sent them all the details. They did nothing i had to get the client to remove his negative comment. They are very quick to print negative comments but it takes forever to get your positive reviews posted. This would be a great site if the the company screened the reviews of clients and asked for proof not just allowing people to review and say whatever they want. I lost 2 jobs because of this over 17k and they do not care!
OTTAWA BEWARE OF TRUSTEDPROS inc
Do not join this website. The owner has been known to extort money from users by refusing to remove live/hosted reviews that are either entirely fake or can not be substantiated. Countless otherwise reputable contractors have lost millions upon millions of dollars in potential work due to this website and the owner should be charged with fraud at the least. He also had another network called "Handy Canadian" before which he had to shut down due to negative national media attention on CBC.
DO NOT DO BUSINESS WITH TrustedPros. Max Sheppard is a scammer.
Trustedpros.ca is a joke. They take info from other sites and never verify reviews, good or bad
Stay away from this mickey mouse operation.... Use a reliable company like (((competitor's name redacted))).
I used a company off their site and found out all the reviews were fake...speaking to my lawyer on how they can allow fake reviews and if I can sue them for it...I most likely will anyways.