Delaware - 12/06.  I recently used Merry Maids over the holidays in order to have my home cleaned. I spoke with a representative regarding what I would like to order and an available coupon that was available on [their] site. The person explained that it was okay to use the coupon even I was going to sign up for the 4-weekly coupon.  I ordered 2 people at $80 per hour for two hours. That plus the coupon should have been $120. I was told that a crew leader would be coming out to price out future jobs and give me my invoice.

I had to tell them when their two hours were up, because someone wrote clean until done on the contract (that I NEVER got a copy of). I am extremely dissatisfied with the services received.  I was NOT given an invoice and was overcharged.  The next day there was a charge for $240 on my credit card.  I spoke with the office manager who was extremely nasty and never said that she was the person I originally spoke with.  The owner told me this when he called back later in the day.  When I asked why I was not told this by her he said that she was not aware of it until she read all the notes.  He then accused me of lying to receive a refund because I could not afford the service.  His words were that people will call after the holiday in order to receive a refund for services they could not afford.  He then went on to say that I had to be lying because he knew his office manager and that she would never lie.  He then went on to state that they had refunded $80 and not the full $120 that was due back.  Why the partial refund, because he KNEW she was lying but would rather lose a customer then refund the additional $40.  To date however the $80 has not been refunded either.  Good customer service would be an apology for the overcharge and the refund due.

? - 7/06. We had Merry Maids (a Service Master company as is Terminix) cleaning our  place back in 2001. You know, give 'em a key and they clean? About the same time, my mother-in-law is fighting breast cancer. So we decide to have her over for dinner, and we wanted to giver her a steak to keep up her strength. But, we wanted no hormones in it.  So, the wife buys organic steaks.  Four fillets at $40 a pound. Expensive, but mom-in-law is worth it.

The wife is a fine cook and has an organized kitchen and knows what she has on hand. She's careful to even rotate her stocks in the freezer.  So, she knows she has the organic steaks in her freezer. She opens the freezer, and it appears to have been rifled through. Only her and I and Merry Maids were in the house that day, and you can bet I didn't rifle through the freezer. Needless to say, someone at Merry Maids had a fine steak dinner that night.

I called Merry Maids and asked for a supervisor. I told them of the steaks being stolen.  They flat out denied that their people would do such a thing and questioned my wife's organization and memory.  I fired them right then and there and demanded my key back. I also changed my locks that weekend.

In this same house, I was launching a fledgling business from our dinner table.  On the table were canceled checks, banking information, and business papers all bound in folders or being kept in file boxes.

Six months later, we buy our first house and leave the rental. My business is  finally taking off and I barely have enough operating capital in the bank.  I get a phone call and I am informed that I was the victim of identity theft. That someone had started out in San Bernardino at a branch of my bank and transferred funds from one account to another. Then on to San Dimas, where another account  has its funds transferred to the third account and finally to a San Diego branch of my bank where $11,000.00 is taken from my bank.  But....the creep cleaning out my accounts forgets his I.D.  (The police said typically, they jump the border back into Mexico with quite a bit of money in their pockets to live the high-life.)  It's a forged California Driver's license with my driver's license number on it, but the address of where we used to live, which was never used on our business account.  Our business account used a P.O. Box imprinted on the checks. Some joker had pilfered through my papers in my former rented home, swiped a check with the license number on it, and used the address of my home to forge checks and a driver's license.  To make matters worse, I was running my business as a Sole Proprietor and was using my Social Security Number as my Federal Tax I.D. number. So my SSN was compromised too.

The bank eventually restored my money after I almost lost my new business because of having no operating capital.  What really irks me is.... My credit information keeps being recycled and used to this day, and I cannot get a new SSN. That's another story.  Anyway, I found out that I own a Suzuki Sidekick that was repoed although I never bought one. Furniture, electronic components, computers, and cell phones with calling plans were bought in my name.  And I found out that I owe Social Services in Spokane, Washington, $30,000.00 in back child support for a kid I never fathered!

My credit is totally trashed, and I believe the same people who were dishonest enough to rifle through my freezer were the same ones who rifled through my private papers to rip off my banking information to turn around and sell for profit to fraudsters.  Other than my wife and accountant, only Merry Maids had access to that information. We shred the rest of our papers even from that time.  Thanks Merry Maids!