Local Locksmiths quoted one price, tried to rip us off for twice that, arrived hour late, unmarked car, shady guy. Internet, Internet

29th of Oct, 2011 by User502450

We called Local Locksmiths to get us back into our car after looking briefly online for a local locksmith that would do the job for $50 or less. They told us it would be 20 minutes and the service charge was $15 and that labor started at $29 and went up in increments of $10 for every 10 minutes of labor.
Since we'd been locked out before, we knew from experience the car could be opened in less than 5 minutes. The dispatch guy was rather rude and said he wasn't going to play that game with us in response to our telling him we had called another company and they told us it would be 15 minutes and we'd waited over an hour to even get a call back. After I explained we had cancelled that call because they sounded suspicious, he was happy to help. He did not take my name or address but said he would have his guy call me right back. About 15 minutes later the "locksmith" called me and asked for the address. When I gave it to him he told me it would be 20 minutes before he could get there and that labor started at $39 but I would need to pay him the service fee of $15 in any case. I told him the website stated $29 and the dispatcher told me $29 and then he said, " Oh, that's right. It's $29." I didn't think too much of it since he agreed. We waited for about 45 minutes before he called again and said he was 20 minutes away- again. I was getting upset because it was cold outside and we had already waited for over an hour. He said he had turned the wrong way. It took him another half hour before he finally arrived, in an unmarked car and pulled up behind us, blocking us in the parking spot. His tools were in his trunk and he didn't have id but I could tell it was the guy I'd spoken to on the phone so we asked him again how much it would be to open the car door. Without even looking at the car and while standing about 4 feet away from the back of the car, he told us it would be $80!
I asked him how it went from $29 to $80and he said, "It starts at $29".
When I said, "But you haven't even started yet so how do you come up with $80?" he just kept saying that labor started at $29 but would not explain how he arrived at $80 without even looking at the car. We told him we only had $50 so if he wanted to do it for that, he could, otherwise we would call someone else. He walked some distance away, pretended to make a phone call and came back and told us he would do it as a favor.
A favor? It took him less than 3 minutes to get the door open! According to the website, and what the dispatcher told me, 10 minutes or less of labor ($29) with the service fee ($15)would have been $44. They are total scam artists. When I got home and looked at the website more closely I realized you can't even click on most of the links including the coupon link and to contact them you have to put your information into a query. They do not list their address or have any other way to contact them except their numbers. One was a local number which came up when I searched Las Vegas locksmiths. The other two numbers are general numbers that come up when you search for them online with no city in the search. Do not call these guys! They (as well as the other guys we'd called before) are all scam artists and will try to charge you several times the original price for minimal effort.

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