JANI-KING Franchise Complaints: Add your own – or defend the company – below.
(UnhappyFranchisee.Com) Entrepreneur magazine lavishes high praise on the Jani-King franchise opportunity via its 2010 franchise rankings. Entrepreneur ranked the 10,000+ unit Jani-King #8 overall in the 2010 Franchise 500, the #2 low-cost franchise, the #1 home-based franchise and #7 in the “America’s Best Global Franchise” category.
In a time when many individuals are struggling to make ends meet, the Jani-King franchise opportunity – with its low start-up cost and guaranteed cleaning contracts – seems especially enticing. But do a bit of digging and you’ll find some troubling – and remarkably consistent – complaints from Jani-King franchise owners.
Lawsuits allege a cleaning-contract shell game.
In an August, 2009 Franchise Times article on lawsuits leveled against commercial cleaning franchise companies, Julie Bennett writes:
…the lawsuits, filed recently in Massachusetts against all three companies and in Pennsylvania, Minnesota and California against Jani-King, contend that the cleaning companies misrepresent their offerings, because they do not have sufficient customers to guarantee each franchisee the amount of monthly cleaning business they purchase. Instead, the lawsuits allege, they breach their contracts by underbidding the amount of time and staffing required for each job, refusing to allow franchisees to inspect cleaning jobs or bid sheets before accepting or rejecting a job, offering geographically inconvenient jobs and unjustly taking jobs from one franchisee to re-sell them to others.
Consumer complaint sites are abundant with specific complaints about the Jani-King franchise, the franchisor and the regional master franchisees who recruit unit-level owners.
On the Complaints Board, 2009-08-22 letshelp wrote
franchise is a scam
I purchased a Jani-King Commercial Cleaning Franchise after reading they were a great franchise opportunity in several franchise magazines. During my initial meeting with the regional director I expressed concern over the 40% they take off the top of what clients are billed. He told me not to worry as they take all their fees into consideration when giving a cleaning quote to a client.
When they started offerring me contracts I would do the math and tell them there was very little profit in some contracts and absolutely none in others. I was told this was a low profit margin industry and I had to learn to work some “break even” contracts for I would get additional business from those same clients ( floor waxing ).
I accepted some of these contracts since they are only required to offer you the amount of cleaning business you purchased (with the franchise cost ). If you don’t accept the accounts they are not required to offer you anymore.
Once I started working accounts, the operations director would go by the account every month to evaluate the franchisee’s performance. He would always find something negative to write about to justify taking the account away from the franchisee and reselling it to a new franchisee. So the franchisee ends up losing the original franchise fee and whatever fee he paid for the accounts he was working at hardly no profit.
I later learned this type of scam preys on people who have never been in business for themselves – so trust the Franchisor. If anyone is looking into purchasing this type of franchise, do yourself a favor and run a Google or Yahoo search on Jani-King. They have had numerous lawsuits and government complaints. I lost all my savings, but hopefully others can learn from my mistake.
85 days ago, Rickety Rabbit responded:
Almost the same thing happend to me in Boston. I bought a Jani King franchise in 2006. I paid $15, 000 for $4000 per month in business. Minus the 22% Jani- King takes off the top. With what is left I pay for labor, chemicals, and equipment.
Jani King has it so they do not have to provide you with the $4000 per month in business, they only need OFFER it to you. If you refuse it, that’s it. They don’t owe it to you any longer. You had your chance. But here is what they do. They underbid the account by hundreds of dollars. They make false promises to the business owner, and do not tell the franchise owner about it. When the business owner cancels because the promises are not met, the franchise owner is left to make a decision. Take care of the promises never mentioned to you ( such as delivering the newspaper ever morning, or a free strip and wax every month) both are actual cases, and both would have put me in the negative for profit.
So I was forced to give it up. No fault of mine. Also the account is not supposed to cancel before one year. If they do Jani King promises to file suit with a killer legal team. Which they must have because they are still in business. However they only use it to defend itself from angry franchise owners.
They purposely offer you accounts that are way underbid, or too far away. When you deny them, they no longer owe you the account. If I could do it all over again I would invest in real estate on Venus before having to deal with this again.
One last thing. I placed over 40 calls per month to the district manager for four months straight. Not one call answered not one call returned. I had to buy an existing franchise that was already working with history in order to pay the bills while waiting for my $4000 in business. Now I am about to lose those accounts to under bidders. Can you believe that? In this economy there are those worse then Jani King that UNDERBID them. Sorry. Very sorry.
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View Comments
loki - Are you retarded or just really really stupid?
How about this... send me your $10,000. I will take it and spend it. You will end up with the same amount of money as you would if you bought a Jani-King franchise, and you won't have to scrub toilets or mop any floors.
Sound like a win-win?
I almost bought into one of these cleaning franchise scams, Think about the insanity of this business, I actually considered handing over $10,000 to an outfit for them to allow me to clean an office buidling that was totally under their control, and not only pay them that huge amount of money so I could do all the cleaning, but pay them 21 percent of what they were promising to pay me, after i gave them $10,000. I always pictured having a conversation with the office manager and saying, "You know, I paid $10,000 to have the opportunity to clean this for you and earn an hourly wage" I just imagined them saying "You fool, the sales person was on the phone with me maybe 10 minutes to set up the walk-through, we agreed on the contract within an hour, I gave him the ok after thinking about it for 24 hours, and you got suckered into handing over $10,000 when I could have let you have it for free and you would not be paying 21 percent off the top. Just food for thought of the insanity of this business.
After interviewing with the scam artist (Master Frachiser) I read over the contract, Totally in their favor, there was actually a clause that said, "We can terminate our contract with you, at anytime, for any reason and for no reason at all" I thought "Are you kidding me?" Who on God's earth would enter into a contract with a clause like that?" I questioned him on this, the answer I got back was, "As long as you are doing your job, there is no reason to terminate you" I said, its sounds as if I am your employee" And regardless of what you are saying to me hear, what is in that contract book is what will count in a court of law, if you terminate me for no reason what so ever, I have no grounds to fight back because I signed your agreement" I told them to amend that clause, they would not. Also, if the office manager of the building you are cleaning wants to cancel their contract for any reason, they allow that, even though they tell you they have a one year or two year contract with them, It was told to me, "We don't want them unhappy and we are not going to hold them against their will " But you will keep my money, I cannot get my money back if they cancel,
But what it came down to for me was the math, I was told $17.00 to $21.00 an hour they get out of the contract, OK, subtract, the 21 percent right of the top for the Master Franshise Owner, now factor in the $10,000 I was going to pay for the account, it would have taken me i figured, 7 months to just earn my money back, If the contract was for two years, I have one year and three months left on this contract where i have to see a profit, I will have basically worked for 7 months for free on a two year contract, so far, not adding up. $17.00 minus the 21 percent, leave me $13.43, now subtract about 20 percent in taxes you pay, uncle sam wants his cut, now i am in the $10.00 an hour range, still need supplies, gas for the car to get to the site, And all of this is hanging in the balance of if the contract stays for a whole two years, if it cancels in one year and they often do, or you are terminated because the Master Franchiser knows where his bread is buttered, on the resale of those accounts bebore they cancel completely. Between the contract being totally in favor of the Master Franchise owner and the wages dropping below $9.00 an hour, I thought, why on earth would i make an investment in a businesss that sits on shakey ground, actually this business adventure sits on water, as soon as you hand over your hard earned savings, you will sink like a rock. I spared myself the headache and tossed the contract book where it belongs, in the trash, I hope for all of you people that got ripped off, you get your money back. The people running these scams should do some jail time for this fraud.
Last comment by Robert was upgraded to a full post here:
Janitorial & Cleaning Franchise Scams
Comments invited.
Can anybody recommend a decent franchise?
Please feel free to email me or FWD any information.
Thanks
I have to add to my comments, I have to say the people who came up with this scam of selling so called cleaning franchises is brillant. The verbal engeering that went into snearing so many people to hand over thousands of dollars and to get them to sign a contract that really states "After we get your money, we can teminate you" What is really snaring people into doing this? I do not believe anyone thinks this is a get rich business, I believe anyone who thought of doing this or has done this, believed they would make some decent money, $17.00 to $20.00 an hour. I also believe the word "Franchise" is snaring many people, it almost snared me, I remember saying to a couple of my friends, I am thinking of buying a Franchise" It has a good ring to it. It sounds like you accomplished somehting really important. So your ego gets in front of the reality of what you are really buying into, your ego clouds your judgement of the sad reality of the truth behind the crafty verbal engeering of these people who throw out the powerful word "Franchise" You think you are sitting among the people who own a Burger King, a real franshise, You do not having someone sitting in the shadows of a Burger King owner, hoping or waiting for them to forget to empty a trash can or to make a mistake so they can go to the office manager and say, "Do you want me to get you another cleaner?" Do you think they are saying, "Do you want me to get you another Franchise owner to invest another $10,000?" As far as you are concerned, you are just a cleaner working for them, you are not the BIG franchise owner, running his own business. These contracts that you are paying huge amounts of money for are fly by night contracts, If the office manager does not like you, they can come up with any reason at all to get rid of you, That contract you are signing is not promising that the office you are cleaning is going to let you stay there for eternity making all kinds of money, it only commits you to the Master Franchiser, One question i had for them, I asked, "If i take the monthly agreement, and you terminate me, and i no longer have the contract to earn the money to pay the $10,000,...... I was interupted and he said, you will still owe me the money, so basically I am just agreeing to pay you $10,000, it really does not have to do with the cleaning contract or that sourse of money, ......... right,.... I asked, "How would I pay you?,..... You would have to go out and get a job somewhere and continue to pay me......NO Thanks. was my answer. if that fly by night contract ends, no way do i want to be on hook for thousands of dollars, there would need to be a contract that locks that office that i am cleaning into something that would go way beyond the inflated price of what I paid to get that office. There would need to be a 5 year agreement that is sueable in court if breached, NO way was i handing over $10,00 and having that money hang in the balance of a pissed off Office manager over a waste basket that was over looked or a something silly like that, People are paying huge amounts of money just so the Master Fransher can say, "Do you want another cleaner as if you paid for the account with Monopoly money or picked the money off the back yard tree. The other thing they say that went round and round with me, "WE DO THE BILLING FOR YOU" No they don't, they do the billing for themselves, that contract is in THEIR name, no one can collect the money, nor will they allow anyone to collect the money, If you have an account and it makes $2000.00 a month, they charge you $200.00 to invoice them, one invoice that is mailed out is costing you $200.00. Most true business owners do their owning billing, but this set up, it sounds like you have your own personal office manager, At $200.00 per invoice, that is one expensive invoice biller. Believe me, these master franshise owners do not want you anywhere near collecting the money, you work for them, you have one job, and that is to clean the office, you will not have anything to do with real business owner responsibilities, Oh yes, you can hire someone if you like, but you will pay them out of the money you get, and you can get accounts, but the accounts stay under the franchise name, if you get canned or leave, they keep those accounts. I think i have said enough for now, Put your ego aside and read the fine print of these contracts, they are a lose lose for the franchisee and a win win for the master franshiser. I wrote this out because I have been scammed before by crafty verbal engeering by the sales person, getting scammed in the passed woke me up to the nonsense of these so called cleaning franchises, and don't let the word "Franchise" play on your ego, the word franchise in these businesses are being used very loosely. When the Master Franshiser can say, "Do you want another cleaner?" that in itself tells you that the word Franchise is only used to stroke your ego to hand over several thousands of your hard earned money to be later replaced by the next person who is having their ego stoked and ready to hand over several thousands of dollars. if i have convinced one person not to buy into this scam, then i feel it was worth writing this, and again for all you people who are fighting to get your money, I hope you get every dime back plus more.. Good luck
Robert
I was going to make an appointment to see jani king, but decided to request the latest jani King FDD from the California Dept. of Corporations website but its not available at all, it seems they file for exemption on renewal every year.
So if anyone has the Jani King FDD disclosure scanned and is willing to email it to me to save the the agony by reviewing before I go see these folks I would appreciate it…
To the people who are asking if they should invest in a cleaning frachise and want some input, please read these posted comments, you will find your answer from people who have done this and who have lost their hard earned money, This is not a business that sits on solid ground, All it takes is a missed garbage can or for the office manager to find finger prints on a glass window, and the franchiser will be asking the office manager, "Do you want me to get you another cleaner?" Remember, they want to re-sell that account, it is big money to re-sell the account. Keep your money and research a business or frachise that is not a fly by night business. I almost got taken in myself from one of these franchises, then i read the fine print of the contract, totally in the favor of the franchiser, the franchiser cannot not lose a penny with the deal, but you can, All money handed over is non refundable, but you can be kicked to the curb in a heart beat if the office manager does not like your work for the tiniest of reasons, This is a business that you will walk on egg shells with, the sligtest inperfection could cost you all your accounts and all your money. If for some reason the office manager gets a bid from a cleaning company that is lower, guess what, your done, good by account. Hope this helps Good luck
THE JANI-KING BUSINESS MODEL IS LEGAL, BUT IMMORAL.
The higher the Jani-King franchisee failure rate, the more money Jani-King corporate makes.
Bottom line
Owner of jani king Jim cavanaugh X wife is the owner of coverall.
Someone in the judicial system should and will sooner or later see there scam for what it is jani king should be put out of business and burned to the ground.
And the goons who try to convince us that jani king is a great investment
I have had a franchise for more than 20 years. However, it only took me a few months to realize I had made a really big mistake.
Jani King cannot exist without churning business between franchises. I have a book of business I sold and my clients will not let Jani King in their buildings! I have had so many clients tell me that during those so called inspections by Jani King they are encouraged to complain and when they don't Jani King field reps begin to point out things they feel should be done better??? i.e. encourage unhappiness in your clients so they can take the building and re-sell it.
I am an experienced business owner but 22% going to Jani King for what. They say accounting…they do a half as job of collection, they rely on you to interact with your clients except when they want your account back… I actually have to not use the Jani King name when selling as they have such a bad rep in the business community. They are know for having the smaller franchises work pretty much for free. To quote on of my clients (who by the way owns a moving and storage franchise) Jani King has you guys working for peanuts and they get all the nuts you're just left with the shells. Business they give you may be OK but they really set there sites on business you have sold and try to take it from you if they can to resell to the new franchisees.
My Franchise in in CA and years ago a group of Franchisees got together and talked to the local office about this situation. At the time the Regional Manager was a really good guy. He acknowledged that there was not enough work to go around and put a moratorium on new franchise sales to focus on account sells to bring existing good franchises up to speed. He was fired, the regional office went back to it usual games.
I have even seen the ops managers take an floor job from a franchise client to make extra money (Client calls and asks for franchisee and regional office takes the work from under the franchisees nose). Does this still happen??? But I can guarantee you the success of failure of most JK franchises have nothing to do with the franchisee not being willing to work hard long hours. The reason for the underbidding is the sales people are on quotas and they will promise free work from the franchisee to make the sale. The franchisee is not told until after they accept the contract.
My company had to clean a building owners house for free to keep a contract based on JK promises. 24 man hours of work to get a contract that I also would have to pay substantial commissions for the same contract. When as in any business you draw a line on how much you can do for free, if the client complains JK takes the account from you and gives it to a new franchisee who is so happy to get work he doesn't understand the daily cost of throwing in free things like floor jobs and window jobs.