Amazon Home Service

>>1205652
Probably not? Just use Angie's List. Also, don't cheap out and hire someone just because the price is good. Research, research, research.

>>1205652
Not likely. Source: got contractor from Amazon Home Service, contractor fucked up the job (connected softener opposite), in the process of getting money back from them now. (not easy)

>>1205708
I thought you pay Amazon?

>>1205652
No, because the good contractors usually don't take those jobs.
They pay shit compared to what they'd normally charge a lot of the time, with a lot more red tape and paperwork.
Why do you think that you'll get more for less just cause Amazon's name is on it?

>>1205702
Angie's List is also a fucking scam, on both ends. Really all of those things are. Most in fact I'd wager.


You know how you get a good contractor?
Never trust any reviews that you or someone else is paying for.
Google reviews? Probably fine, least last I checked you didn't have to pay to put those there or to be listed there as a business. But be prepared to wade through shit of course, same as with any other Internet comments.
Talk to your neighbors and find out who did their stuff.
Talk to your family if they're local.
Talk to your co-workers.
Talk to that guy at the store.
Literally whoever is a 'normal person' in the area.
And don't hire a contractor through a service that is going to take part of their profit. That's less incentive for the person to do a good job.

Sorry, butt-hurt contractor here. Tired of getting taken advantage of by large companies that want to market our services to people for below market price, take a cut of the profit, and put all the liability on us.

>>1205843
Google has the highest percent of paid/biased reviews that I've seen. Anyone can post, and you can pay companies to have reviews removed. I'm guessing they give notice of lible.

>>1205844
And Yelp, Angie's List, and others just let companies pay for favorable reviews and preferential treatment directly, no questions asked.

At least Google just allows all the shit, good and bad.
Last time I checked, it worked closest to 'the old way' of Internet reviews.
Sure, you can pay people to "SEO" reviews and everything for you, but that's a lot more effort and slower than just 'Hey, yo Angie's List... Go ahead and just hide all those bad reviews... yea... thanks babe... here's a tip$$$.'


Just my opinion. Again, I really advocate the 'talking to others' thing. It's quite honestly still the best.

>>1205845
I've heard that Angie's List also prioritizes people with particular political leanings. Not sure how the hell they find that shit out, but it's certainly another dollar in the hat for grass roots research.

>>1205843
>Angie's List is also a fucking scam

This, a highly rated one I hired was pure scam.... At least with Amazon I'll be protected.

>>1205652
The best way to avoid shitty contractors is with knowledge. Take the time to learn a bit about the job you are asking someone to do, then just talk to them. Its easy to tell if someone doesnt know what the fuck they are talking about when you do.

And you don't need to know how to do everything, just the steps involved in doing it.

if this is too much work, you might as well just pick a contractor at random. maybe one with a bit shiny ad

>>1205710
Yes. And like I said, getting it back is not easy.

>>1206025
I can see it being terrible. Amazon has a decent process but they aren't my advocates like my credit card is.

Furthermore, my credit card would side with Amazon not me. If it was just a local vendors or even a decent side chain, they would be fair, but it's not like Amex is going to shit on amazon for $500

>>1206068
To be fair, "terrible" is too strong word. On a pain scale of 1-10 I would say it is 3.

>>1206068
>my credit card would side with Amazon not me

That's not how credit card works.

>>1206068
amazon has always been more than accommodating whenever i had a problem and returned something.

>>1206200
They're getting shittier, and they're not as good as my credit card. 100% of the time I've made a warranty claim with my amex, they don't even care if I ship the product back to them. They're just like 'yeah whatever, here's your money'

>>1206180
Okay, I didn't mean that definitively, but I think they would be more likely to do so.

Like I had a near thing with a tire store that were being pieces of shit and didn't want to honor their warranty. credit card had no problem. If that was vs amazon I don't think it would have gone so smoothly.

Has anyone had any experience with Porch.com? It's what we're supposed to shill at Lowe's, and the few people who I've talked to that have used it liked it, but I don't know if that's just that it's good in our area or not.

I'm starting to notice a pattern, whites are almost universal shitty contractors, since they are either middleman (that subcontract to the mexicans), or druggies.

Hiring Juan directly off craigslist seems to be the way to go.

>>1205843
>Why do you think that you'll get more for less just cause Amazon's name is on it?
Because they have a reputation for swallowing losses?

>>1207471
So the contractor wanted more money so I canceled the amazon order. They did give me $25 in credits to make me happy though.

>>1205652
These guys & LinkedIn have been trying to recruit my company (small professional services biz) for months now. I looked into it, even took a trial membership.

Lead quality was exceptionally bad and uninformed, endless requests for "information" and demands for detailed quotes based on next-to-zero info, lots of "in kind" pay offered in worthless services, and about half had bizarrely unrealistic cost expectations.

Maybe viable for very short term, complete commodity services, but worthless for anything more complicated.

>>1206003
>>1207336

This pretty much sums it up. Do a similar job yourself the first time so you know what you're paying someone else to do. Then talk to contractors & make an informed judgement call.

Amazon/Porch/Angie can give you some options to talk to, and maybe some structure to the deal, but don't think they're providing any sort of expertise.