JANI-KING Franchise Complaints
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.
Of course, Entrepreneur states that when compiling their rankings they do not “measure subjective elements such as franchisee satisfaction…” since “…these are judgments only you can make.”
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.
ARE YOU FAMILIAR WITH THE JANI-KING FRANCHISE? WHAT DO YOU THINK? SHARE A COMMENT BELOW.
To jerry who said that he is an insidor at jan-pro.
When will you admit that you lied when twice you said that you wouldn’t come back.. Your not a man, you have no word, you don’t keep your promises.
I bet you feel like a fool now. Are you going to trow any more tantrums.
What will you say when more Lawsuits are filled?
What will you say when people start piketing?
What will you say when the Attorney General and Federal Trade Comision take action?
1st amendment: Why are you so bitter? Why are you continuing to lead people down a path that will simply lead them into bankruptcy court? Why don’t you care about the thrity thousand current owner/operators in they system? Who’s paying your attorneys fees? Who’s filing your taxes? Why are you doing racial profiling on the people contacting you via other sites? Why haven’t you spoken to “aiwah”? Why are you insisting that you have been abused in this system?
1st amendment, start answering questions, until you do, you won’t get anyone on your side any more, yes, you’ll still have your original posse, you’ll even get a couple of sympathy calls from time to time, but in the end, you’ll be like “aiwah” all alone, 200K plus judgement in hand, seeing a bankruptcy judge and not even SEIU will want to know “who you are”.
Dear 1st Amendment/Guest …
You had me at “Hola” … can you not see that Jerry the Clown has to have the last word? We get it – it is a scam. Please stop encouraging JTC and he will have no more cause to horrifically butcher the English language.
BTW, 1st … perhaps before your time a well-known TV analyst lost his job by commenting “look at that little monkey run” … so I would advise caution when calling JTC a monkey – have to agree – kind of like the pot calling the kettle negro.
If you insist on giving JTC his voice – I would recommend a less racially sensitive animal … like a jackass for example.
Just my 2 pesos
Real Americans admire people like 1st Amendment & other plaintiffs, because the real heroes in this great country are those who refuse to be victims, who refused to back down, who refused to be intimidated or shamed into silence by thieves and bullies. 1st Amendment & other plaintiffs are taking a stand against corruption, scammers and evil-doers, which is what Americans are taught to do. Maybe they lost their money, but they kept their self-respect and the respect of their families.
I know you were raised with other values, that you were taught to get what you can no matter how. Iknow you’re bitter because you had to drop out of David Duke Elementary to watch the family moonshine still. But know this:
1st Amendment did not sell out his fellow man for the Almighty Dollar like you did, Jerry. He is richer than you will ever be, no matter how many millions in sales you brag about.
And despite your efforts to flood this conversation with 31 posts per day, the truth is being heard and you and the other janitorial franchise scammers are being exposed for the weasels you are, thanks to 1st Amendment and the franchisees brave enough to sue.
1st Amendment:
Teodoro makes a good point when he writes “I would advise caution when calling JTC [Jerry the Clown] a monkey”
He’s right. In the South, where Jerry was “reared,” monkey is sometimes is used as a racial insult.
Plus, monkeys are actually intelligent animals. How about an Ostrich, since he buries his head in the sand? Or a weasel? Or one that eats it’s own young? Or a snake, specifically the belly, since nothing’s lower.
Teodoro:
If I thought I was “giving JTC his voice” I’d never post again. In fact, I might just shoot myself to be sure.
He posted 31 times in the past 24 hours. I don’t think he’d stop if he were the only one here.
Tedoro, SEIU and 1st amendment: Boy it must really be a concern of yours my continual posts, you go from counting the letters, to counting the pages, to counting the posts. Funny, usually when someone goes to that much trouble, it seems they must be a threat.
Tedoro, nice you are truly a “brilliant” indvidual, you speak as poor in spanish as supposidly I do in English. But it was a nice try by SEIU to invent a “friend”.
SEIU: Still cant answer questions very well can you, you obviously don’t care about the industry, you don’t care about the people in the industry, you really dont care about “aiwah” or even 1st amendment. What do your care about?
I think its funny how if I wasn’t a “bother” or a “threat” you would simply encourage me to “shut me up”, but no you must be feeling some “pain”. Is that “pain” related to the new “change of leadership” at SEIU? Has a timetable been sent down the line to either WIN or we are pulling our funding. Funding by the way taken/stolen from the fine union dues that the wonderful but ever dwindling number of the “Justice for Janitors” cause that was done and now failed in several cities including right here in Indianapolis otherwise known as INDY!!!!
SEIU, New Phrase. BRING IT ON!!!!!! Come after me or SHUT THE HELL UP!!!!
Ha ha – at least I spelled your name right JTC. I am just a regular working guy who was almost duped into this scam. My thanks go out to Guest and 1st Amendment but the really convincing reason NOT (look I can use CAPS too) to go comes from little ‘ol you JTS (not a typo – Jerry the Snake is a little more catchy)
Vaya Con Dios y Adios el Serpiente Loco
Tedoro: You are simply a little imaginative friend of SEIU. You are afraid of the criticism that you are facing from you other SEIU “goons”. Now back to the “serious” issues.
SEIU: You come in and attempt to threaten me, come on in and get some!!!! You think Bego and EMS kicked your tail back home, you aint attempted to screw with someone like me. Might want to bring your little friend Tedoro here as well.
Now, here’s the latest rumor coming through the Jan-Pro line of communication:
1. SEIU and their new leader, are going to “clean house’ on some of the money losing ventures that they have been envolved in. You recall of course that you heard it hear first, that SEIU was the one “paying for” the national class action lawsuits against the “big 3”. However, because of SEIU’s recent failure in the Arkansas political debacle, the Federal Government (which is almost funny) is investigating how a UNION could afford to send that much money, that much expense coverage into a statewide campaign without violating its own members charter.
Because of this, the “plug” is being pulled on “Liz and her not so merry, hell, they are depressed, suicidal, drunk and beside themselves band of attorneys”. Because of that, they are now scrambling attempting to find a “new sugar daddy” and really quickly. Because they’ve been spending money quicker than Obama has in this supposed recovery that we are in.
So, after the devestating defeat that “aiwah” and his co-plantiffs suffered, SEIU told “Liz and her mentally challenged band of attorneys” WIN now or we are done. Only question left is when is NOW!!!
1st amendment, get your wife ready and take her out for a very nice dinner, soon the phone will ring one more time and it will be Liz’s assistant informing you that there has been a request by Liz to remove herself from the case as the lead attorney.
Once this “mess” is cleared up, I am hoping that REAL reforms happen in this industry that protects all parties especially and most importantly the owner/operators who despite the best efforts of 1st amendment, SEIU and others continue to perform quality cleaning on a nightly basis all throughout this country.
One last word to SEIU/Tedoro: When you become man enough and want to come visit where I HUNT, come on and don’t be a mouse in the corner!!!!
Teodoro wrote “I am just a regular working guy who was almost duped into this scam. My thanks go out to Guest and 1st Amendment…”
De nada.
“… but the really convincing reason NOT to go comes from little ‘ol you JTS…”
Yep, Clown Boy really shows how people can justify anything to themselves when it’s in their financial interest to do so. You’re their best amigo til the contract’s signed and the check clears. Then you’re immediately the one who didn’t do your homework, didn’t follow the system, or the other justifications they make for stealing your hard-earned cash.
Banditos, pure and simple.
SEIU: As you attempt to make the viewers believe that Tedoro was a real person, I want you to go back to threatening me. You are a coward, you huff and puff and all you get is back wind!!!! What’s the matter SEIU, finding out that what I’m posting about 1st amendments pending legal doom, the possible investigation into SEIU about the misuse of UNION DUES getting a little too hot for you.
Wait for future information, got some “juicy” bits that are swirling around. In the meantime, SEIU and his little hispanic imaginary friend “Todoro” go outside and play “hide n’ seek” together. But SEIU, if you can’t find Todoro by lunch, might want to give up on him for good.
SEIU: As your imaginary friend doesn’t purchase his imaginary unit franchise from Jan-Pro as stated above. Let us get back on to the real topics of the day:
As you continue to tout the FAME WHORE, 1st amendment as a True HERO. Here in Indianapolis TRUE HEROS are coming together to remember those who died 65 years ago in the USS INDIANAPOLIS tragedy. That’s what the next topic is about:
How did we go from the “GREATEST GENERATION” to the “BLAME EVERYONE ELSE GENERATION”. It’s actually quite simple.
We allowed people like SEIU and the Progressives of this country to define all of us. We allowed them to pass amendments to the constitution, we allowed them to have Abortion on Demand, we allowed them to take GOD out of our classrooms, we allowed them to take GOD out of our Government, we allowed them to Bully us and call us names like RACIST and BIGOT, we allowed them to tell US that WE don’t know how to raise our children that they know BETTER, we allowed them to STEAL ELECTIONS and play politics with everything from Sugar Intake to Cigarette Smoking. WE ARE AT FAULT!!! NO ONE ELSE.
SEIU and the people like him are the people classified as the “ENEMY WITHIN”. People make fun of people like Rush Limbaugh, Neal Bortz, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Bill O’Rielly and we allow them to do so. They believe that people like Rachel Maddow, Chris Matthews, Larry King, Whoopi Goldberg are the TRUE leaders of our Country, that they are so much smarter than everyone else.
Time to Take our Country Back, Time to again raise the BANNER and raise the STANDARD of our once PROUD COUNTRY!!!!
With comments like “I’ve chewed pieces of meat tougher than you and still woke up the next morning and took a nice BM!!!!!” you have shown your true self: vulgar. Crude. Boorish. Ignorant. Uncouth. Uneducated. Immature. Disingenuous. And completely devoid of original thought or writing anything worth reading.
Give it up.
I just read the following article.
To read the whole article you can go to the following link.
http://www.prlog.org/10396729-jani-king-janitorial-is-new-slave-labor-franchise.html
Jani King Janitorial Is New Slave Labor Franchise
Jani King franchise owners claim that Jani King will never tell them what their net income is going to be.
North Carolina Consumer News
PRLog (Press Release) – Nov 01, 2009 – Jani King Considered Worse Franchise To Invest In By Previous Investors
Jani-King makes some amazing promises to prospective franchise buyers,
but as many Jani-King Franchise buyers are now finding out the hard way,
“all that glitters is not gold.”
Jani-King has made major profits in the janitorial industry, by deceiving hard working
people, that are looking to invest in a franchise opportunity, or business opportunity that offers them a good return on their investment, and as a result of Jani-King’s deceptive
and unethical business practices, both present and past Jani-King franchise owners are now
making their complaints publicly known, after many past and present Jani-King franchise owners feel that they were deceived by the many false promises of high returns, made to them by Jani-king representatives.
Jani-King is gaining a national reputation for becoming
the new slavery franchise, that takes 20% of each franchise owner’s profit up front before the franchise owner get a penny, and to make matters worse, the franchise owner has to worry about labor cost, taxes, payroll preparation, cleaning product costs, and equipment cost.
Jani King franchise owners claim that Jani King will never tell them what their net income is going to be.
If these claims are true of Jani-King, then Jani-King has become another corporate franchise that is not much better that Pre Paid Legal and its deceptive business practices, that yielded a federal investigation, class action lawsuits, and a decline in its once trusted reputation.
Jani-King now faces lawsuits filed recently in Pennsylvania, Minnesota and California against Jani-King, contending that Jani-King misrepresented 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.
Jani-King has now been put on the North Carolina Consumer News alert watch for its deceptive business practices, and NC Consumer News will be following complaints and lawsuits being filed against Jani-King very closely.
SEIU: You and I can duel with words calling each other names. Meanwhile the items that are truly important are being neglected. So here’s a thought, let’s admit that YOUR an IDIOT! and move on.
As we all know, the SEIU is paying for 1st amendments and others attorneys fees. That is about to change. With a reasonable amount of confirmable information in my “formally nicotine stained hands”, I believe that if there is no WIN in the “to be determined” issues that envolve the “aiwah” case, the money train has ended.
Because of the issues left for “aiwah” are primarily of little consequence in the big scheme of things, I feel that before the end of the year, Liz and her suicidal band of distraught attorneys will be asking to be removed from the remaining “class action” cases.
Once that happens, 1st amendment and others will have to find another lead attorney willing to take little or no money for a case that is already in disorder at best.
So, having said all of that, Jan-Pro is planning on asking the judge in the case to award a “summary judgement” against the plantiffs in the case for attorneys fees, filing fees, harm etc…..
So, they will be asking for more than 1million dollars. 1st amendment and his co-plantiffs don’t have that kind of money, they will be going after personal assets and attempt to “make them pay”.
So, I would like to see how SEIU “spins” this for 1st amendment.
!st amendment: I’m glad you are catching up on your reading. Have you had a chance to read the FDD yet, how about the Policy and Procedures, how about the U.S. tax code? No. Maybe you could become a FAME WHORE and sell t-shirts on the street corner with brokers license renewals.
Bad MOON RISING on your front in regards to money. Phone should be ringing any day now from “Liz and her drunk, disgruntled, poor mouthing, BMW driving band of attorneys” letting you know that she’s about to file paperwork asking for removal from the remaining “class action” cases, which includes yours.
I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes when your wife finds out how many jobs she’ll have to work just so you can keep “pimping your cause”
If you have been ripped-off by any cleaning franchisor you can file complaints with the following agencies.
1. Federal Trade comission http://www.Ftc.Gov
2. Atorney General http://www.justice.gov/ag/
3. Another goverment agency that goes after Fraud http://www.stopfraud.Gov
4. There is also ongoing class actions against these cleaning franchisors. If you would like more information on this you can get my contact information by going to complaintsboard.com you will find my number and e-mail adress there
1st amendment: Your public service announcements should come with the following warning:
I am PIMPING MY ATTORNEYS because that’s how I EARN MY KEEP and how I KEEP SEIU paying for my ATTORNEYS that I’m PIMPING!!!! OBAMA has warned me that he may be hazardous to the American People. (SEIU you can use that term for U.S. Citizens, Candians, Mexicans, Brazilians, Puerto Ricans)
1st amendment: How many more days will you be posting on these sites? I wonder, many things are happening, more are about to come to light. Not only has the SEIU decided that they are not going to pay for your attorneys’ any more, there is an investigation into the misuse of UNION DUES in order to pay for those attorneys.
Obviously, things are going to go from bad to worse for you. Though in a way, I am sorry for you, in others I’m not. You set yourself up for this fall. You Lied by omission, you didn’t disclose that you weren’t paying for your own attorneys, you decided to mislead everyone into thinking that you were some CHAMPION of free speach, some righter of wrongs, something special.
At the end of the day, here’s exactly where things stand for you.
You misrepresented how Jan-Pro dealt with you, you left out key parts including your lack of reading/abiding by the FDD and Policy and Procedures, you left out the fact that you were asked to be removed by the customer, you left out you got angry, violent, almost on a criminal level and were thrown out of the Jan-Pro office, you left out the fact that once you mislead your attorneys, they gave you the opportunity to “make it up” by PIMPING them to anyone and everyone that contacted you.
You mislead the viewers of this site and others, because you are not paying for these attorneys yourself, in fact, other than the basic filing fees, SEIU has paid for your attorneys lock, stock and barrel. Meanwhile, you have become a FAME WHORE and will continue this case for a short period of time if for none other reason than PRIDE and the fact that you want to attempt to retain your standing as the internet FAME WHORE!!!
I am looking for any one in Orange County and Los Angeles California to join me, or give me a phone # to a lawyer to file a law suit against Jani-King for been rip-offs.
I need help in Dallas, Texas against Cleannet USA, for beig ripped off too. Anybody wat to join me.
Yes, I would like to join you Ripped off in Dallas. If you know of others, have them post here. Let’s continue posting until we can get enough people to respond.
For those people who want to take action and stop the cleaning franchisors from ripping you off here is a list of things that you can consider doing.
File complaints with
1. The federal trade commision. http://www.Ftc.org
2. File a complaint with the Attorney General http://www.justice.gov
3. File a complaint with http://www.stopfraud.com
There is curent lawsuits going around the country here is a list of some Law firms.
1. Dady and Garner http://www.dadygarner.com
2. http://www.Talamantes.org
3. http://www.llrlaw.com
4. http://www.Goldlawgroup.com
5. http://www.sturdevantlaw.com
There is many more outthere and more lawsuits being filled.
To 1st Amendment,
thank you for the information you have provided.
Two of the 3 Goverment websites that I posted above are incorect the right websites are the following
1. Federal Trade Comision http://www.Ftc.gov
2. Goverment fraud agency http://www.Stopfraud.gov
3. Attorney General http://www.Justice.gov
ALL PRO CLEANING SYSTEMS: Another Janitorial Franchise Lawsuit
This shi…….. is a rip off get the hell out before you end u in bankruptcy court and a divorce suckers are born every day if you choose to not listen to bad.
I did not know that jani king has a class action law suit on them and i was considering investing 10.000 into the company. so you guys are saying not to invest into janiking. I have never done janitorial and if this true where can i find a good company to invest?
Is Jan pro or Coverall a good company to invest money into?
If i invest $10,000 into jani king or any other janitorial company how much will that give me a month?
First off, most people who decide to go into business for themselves, should not. You cannot have a worker bee mentality and enter into ANY kind of business, either as a new start up or as a franchise owner. People do not take into consideration all of the costs involved. What do you expect when you buy a franchise? That they provide you with all your equipment and chemicals for free? To provide accounts priced so high that you only need 2 or 3 to to live a life of luxury? To NOT have to handle your taxes or manage communication with the clients you are responsible for?
YEAH!!! I used to work for Jani King and moved on due to a better offer. Was everything there a wonderful perfect world? No. But for the most part, I saw a bunch of people who really had no business being in business as a franchise owner. Stop and think, you went through a disclosure, you signed the paperwork. You HAVE to market yourself, you HAVE to be aggressive. I saw a bunch that sucked, and I saw a bunch that did damned well for themselves. To those of you complaining, look at yourselves first and ask, “Why am I not as successful as those others?”
To someone who calls himself “Me”
You start of by attacking everyone and saying that no one in the world should go into business for themselves? If people followed your advice there would be no busineses. No one expects accounts so HIGH that you live the life of a millionaire like you try and insinuate but no one expects to get underbid that pay less than minimum wage! By the way the franchisor that I was working for used to tell people to not talk to the customer.
Have you seen all the lawsuits againts janiking? Maybe you should take a look before you talk.
Then you say that you saw a bunch of people that suked who had no business being in businees. So are you saying that people who payed Thousands of Dollars can’t do a simple job as cleaning? I think we all know that you are just someone from corporate posting here to do damage control. You dont want the truth coming out. You dont want people to know about the 50 lawsuits.
Then you say that we have to market ourselves when people have already payed Thousands of Dollars in franchise fees for that. I find it so strange how someone who says that they don’t work for this company anymore comes in here and defends them.
Finally you try and make it ok for people to get ripped-off if they didn’t understand the very misleading franchise circular. Why do they make the franchise circular so confusing? Is it so that they can rip you off and then they can take your life savings. Even the FTC Federal Trade Commision warns people about cleaning franchisors. This company has been sued many times and will probably keep geting sued many more.
I know your someone from corporate posting here. Let me know how that new lawsuit in Texas goes.
Y’ALL SHUT THE F%CK UP, “JUST SHUT UP”.
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.
The truth about Jani-King, Jan-Pro, etc…
To be honest they all virtually run the same. Going with one over the other is just a matter of how much more fees you will pay because of their “name brand recognition”. The reality is this. They will take almost all of your profits every month (20% of the contract you will be servicing or higher ) and leave you with pennies at the end of the month. Not only that, but they make you purchase a franchise. They actually make you pay thousands of dollars for training & “guaranteed contracts”, the more you pay the more business they will provide (allegedly).
They should be paying you to take on these awful accounts they give you!!! Mostly, they prey upon poor families looking to own a piece of the American Dream and trick you into believing it is a good investment. People invest their entire savings into this dream (more often nightmares). But, the only way these franchises can be profitable is if you have slave labor (you will be the slave in most cases). Working 5-7 days (mostly graveyard shifts) a week, with no vacation. Sound like fun? Not to mention what the work actually requires you to do. It is extremly hard, smelly, grotesque work. Not for the wimps that for sure.
Here are some facts:
1) Regardless of the lies you will be told, they are struggling to get new accounts to give new franchise owners. You will be told stupid taglines like “the dirt doesn’t stop at the door, businesses need to be cleaned”. Although it is true that businesses need to be cleaned, but unfortunately there are more cleaning companies and franchise owners then businesses that need cleaning.
Most of the profits that you would like to make are taken away from you in order for them to get the contract in the first place. The margins are so thin that you will be working for minimum wage just to stay “profitable”. They don’t stop taking in peoples money to buy more franchises just because they don’t have business to give them. The reality is that you will most certainly get an old account that is being transferred from another franchise owner. These accounts more often than not have business owners that are ready to terminate the agreement due to poor service, complaints, irrational business owners that are impossible to please. They are so fed up that it is impossible to save the account. They are simply waiting for the contract to expire in most cases (although you will be told if you work hard, you can save the account, which can happen but is not the norm). A lot of time they come from other franchise owners that turn in the accounts because they are unprofitable. Reminds me of a pyramid scheme to be honest.
2) They purposefully offer you accounts that you will not be able to service because it is too far away (by offering you an account which you don’t except regardless of your reason, it meets their contractual agreement to offer you an account within their set time frame, once they have offered you an account, they are no longer obligated to get you more business within any set period of time. Meaning they still owe you more accounts, but there is no time frame in which they have to get you the business once they have offered you enough contracts to cover the amount you purchased (if you are promised $3k a month and are offered a $1500 which you can’t service for what ever reason, now they only have to get you $1500 within the time frame that was promised. So if you accept another account they offer for $1500, they now have as much time as they like/need to get you the remaining $1500 they still owe you. Which you may never see!
So knowing this, they will purposefully offer you accounts hundreds of miles away that they know you will decline just to fulfill their “end of the bargain”. Doesn’t sound like too good of bargain for the franchise owner though. Not only that, they will offer the same account to as many franchise owners as possible before it finally gets assigned after they receive as many no’s as possible. You will be lied to and told that this doesn’t happen. This is a fact though, it happens every day.
3) Labor Costs account for 50-70% of the accounts that you will be servicing. Equipment rental/payments account for roughly another 15%. If you have any financing when you purchase your business that will account for another 10-15%. You will always have 20-22% of your contract value going to the company every month (for example, Jani-King is 22%) You will most likely have to pay off your equipment/supplies that you recently purchased that will account for pretty much the rest of the contract leaving you with nothing. It will take you about 20 hours a week (4 hours a day, 5 days a week) to service every $1000 in contracts that they offer you. Meaning that 1 person can do a maximum of $4000 a month. This is assuming you can work a 16 hr grave yard shift everyday. Which usually isn’t possible since most businesses are usually open 7am-5pm. They want to show up to a clean facility and don’t want cleaning people there during normal business hours. Which means you normally have from about 6pm – 6 am to clean (only 12 hours).
There are some exceptions (restaurants, bars, etc..), but this is generally speaking… So the reality is you can probably service about $3k by yourself, then you will need to hire people to help you (costs go up tremendously at this point). You need to buy more equipment, more expenses, more management… Thinner margins. At the end of the day, you will probably see about 10-15% profits if you are an excellent franchise owner. That means if you want to make about $4k a month, you need to be billing about $30k a month. You will need multiple crews with lots of equipment and supplies for each crew. Not to mention, what are they going to be driving? Who pays for fuel, insurance, etc.?
4) New large accounts will not go to a new franchise owner. They do not want to take a chance on losing new accounts, so they will assign them to existing franchise owner with a good work history (or the one that greases the wheel the best). So if you fork out the money to buy a franchise that guarantees you over ten thousands dollars in monthly contracts you will most likely have a bunch of small accounts. They will offer you accounts all over “your territory”.
Imagine starting a new crew just to service $1000 a month! Or a $500 contract for that matter! In fact, they will give themselves over a year to fulfill their contractual agreement to get you that business. They can offer you contracts that only bill $195 a month. Imagine the logistics in trying to manage 20 of those! They say this will never happen and most the time it wont, but it could. In fact, they might just keep offering you small accounts because they know you will decline them. They will add up and eventually their “contractual agreement” will be fulfilled.
5) The Director of Franchise Sales job is to make this investment sound as great as apple pie. If you work hard you can succeed like all these other franchise owners (most franchise owners are not happy nor have they succeeded. Although there are some!). They will show you Entrepenuer magazine or what ever their highest ranking is and say “look here, see we ranked #7 out of all franchises to own”… We are the best low investment franchise, these people think we are so great.. Blablabla.
They will tell you that you will be offered new accounts that are close to your home. “We always try to find the nearest franchise owner to the business. If they don’t want it, we offer it to the next closest, etc… Now technically we can offer you business anywhere in our territory.” They most likley fail to mention that some territories are hundreds of miles from one end to the other, covering multiple counties (It’s in their FDD so that’s how they get around it) . If you take traffic into account, you could be several hours from your home. Refer back to my point #2. They do this on purpose because they are lacking new accounts!
You will be told that there is plenty of business and you can always bring in new accounts or you can buy more contracts if you want to expand your business (which of course you will be paying 22% to the corporation every month, regardless of if you bring in the business or if they provide you the accounts).
6) You must purchase and operate under an LLC or Corporation. Sounds great right? Well, this is just one more expense. You will pay about $800 a year on top of the money it takes to file the paperwork with your state. Figure another $500. You will have to file separate business taxes which is also an additional expense every year if you use a CPA.
The bottom line is that they feed on people coming in with the dream of being business owners. They make it sound great because you can invest as little as $3000 and own your own business (not true by the way). You have to buy equipment, start an LLC, etc… What eventually happens is that people will be offered small accounts. They will start to service them and be offered more accounts (most of which are impossible for them to service since they are so far away).
So here they are sitting on a $1000 a month contract that they service every month. Almost $700 a month of which is being taken to pay your fees to the corporation leaving you with about $300 a month. It cost you more in fuel to get to most of the business than you make in cleaning them!
You will continue to ask for more accounts which they will never give to you (unless you are very lucky, it does happen from time to time). You will be told to go out and get your own accounts if you are sick of waiting. “We already offered you this account and you turned it down. We met our contractual agreement. Go get your own business!!!” So you continue struggling to service the small account you are given, most of the time working for less than minimum wage in hopes that one day you will get the additional business that you were promised. Eventually, you tire of waiting for the account and turn in the account you were servicing. Which then gets transfered on to the new sucker and the viscous cycle continues.
The fact is, the people that are making money in this business are the ones that take 22% of your blood and sweat every month. They sit in their mansions, yachts and fly around on their Gulfstreams laughing at all the money they are rolling in, as people pour everything they own into this industry to try and put food on their tables. It’s really sad if you think about it.
If you still want to invest in this industry knowing the facts, I wish you the best of luck. Not too many people have what it takes to make it. It can be done, but you will need a lot of luck on your side. When all else fails, you may need to bribe someone to get you the extra business you need! :)
I am a commercial cleaning company owner and have sat here for 2 hours reading this whole blog. I want to thank whoever is responsible for this consistent truth into the evil business practices of Janiking, Jani Pro and Coverall but especially JANI KING. I myself and my employees run a small commercial cleaning company that is honest in service and fair in price. I know what it is like to bid on an account or fight to keep my account against JANI KING or what I like to call them JANI- SHIT ! I plan on using the information I have found in informing current customers and future customers to the horror that comes from choosing companies like JANI – Shit or COVERALL.
Cheers to the truth and the illumination of the evil practices of these companies that prey on honest working people so they can afford there Lamborghini’s.
I owned and operated a very successful Jani-King franchise for 12 years. I bought an existing, smaller franchise and built it up to a very large one with the help of Jani-King’s sales office and also from learning to bid my own accounts and actually doing some of the work myself. This is not an easy business or a get rich quick scheme, but it is also not all bad. Sorry to hear about some of the problems some of you have had. Some just seem to need a kick in the pants to get off your butt and run your business and others are down right ridiculous! I have never had some of the problems listed on this site in my 12 years of being a Jani-King franchise owner. I relocated to another state, sold my existing franchise to a friend who still runs it, (successfully, I might add) and tried my hand at operating a cleaning business on my own. What I found is that without the backing of a large corporation, it’s a whole lot harder to land the nice, big accounts. I’ve had my own business for 6 years now and believe me, the “mom and pop” businesses and accounts cannot compete with the one’s I’ve had through Jani-King. After all has been said and done, I’m considering buying another franchise with Jani-king and getting back into the business with them. There is definitely money to be made, but it does take time and work! So for anyone having any questions about a Jani-King franchise, I would be glad to help you if I can…..
jani king your company are scam you should have in trial
Molly Wotring continues to repost the same thing in diffrent blogs/ Jani King should be listed as a criminal enterprise that’s my opinion!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Before you speak out of school Mrs. Worting i to was a franchise owner.
Hey John,
Not sure what blogs you’re speaking of when you say I re-posted the same things on different blogs as this was the first time I posted anywhere! As to your other comment about speaking out of school?, not sure what that was supposed to mean but we all have different opinions and I just happened to have had a good experience with Jani-King and was simply stating the facts of my franchise to show others that it is very possible! Sorry you had such a bad experience!
Well, I cannot speak about the experience of owning a Jani-King franchise as I am not a franchisee, however I can give you insight on the experience of the quality of service they provide. One word: HORRENDOUS!
The hotel I work for has recently come under new managment, within a month or so of their new quasi-tyrannical reign, they fired all of the original housekeeping staff here at my hotel and replaced them with a contract with this joke-of-a-company: Jani-King. Needless to say, the old housekeepers were primarily Latin American and actually did their job. We never had any complaints regarding the quality of housekeeping they provided us with.
Now, post-JaniKing contract, we get complaints back and forth. The quality of the staff they bring in is horrendous. First, they dress like a bunch of thugs and are covered in tattoos, and lack any sense of work-ethic. They are more suited to standing in line to be checked into the nearest penitentiary than they are to actually have employment.
Jani-King obviously cares about the quality of service it provides as much as it does the benefits that it gives its unfortunate franchisees….
Class action lawsuits is now going to happen in Australia as well.
I can and will tell a story about them so shocking you will find it hard to believe.
But since J-K here is being looked at by a few government dept for sham contracts not a lot has changed as of yet and we are still to go to court and I don’t want to give it all away yet.
When I as a franchisee could not afford to pay legal wages to my employees I urged them to go to the ombudsmans office or Fair Work Australia. The Ombudsman took the view that Jani king was responsible and not me since I did not negotiate the contracts, needless to say J-K was forced to pay but I was still never compensated by J-K as they were hell bent on putting me out of business. Now i’m hell bent on getting even by telling the truth every where I go.
Ben Stoltz is the owner of Jani-King australasia and he is about to find out what it’s like when you pick on the wrong guy. Corporate bullying seems to be their way but i’m not scared. so come on.
Come and sit down face to face with me in court and I’ll tear you to shreds legally unlike the the way you tore me to shreds when you stole my family home and everything that meant security for my wife and 5 children you made yourself an enemy that will never rest.
I’ve spent three years getting to a position where I can strike back. If there are more aussies out there reading this and have been burnt by this company contact me on [redacted] or the Fair Work Australia as well as the ACCC so that you to can be part of this class action too.
A place called “Former jani king franchisees” have been set up on facebook get behind it where ever you are and welcome jani king to social networking.
My name is Roger Bush FZEE1016 and i’m not scared because i’m telling the truth and I can prove it.