Tree Wars

Finally, the cracked tree branch – a nagging reminder of the storm – has been sawed off and removed from the roof. After what seemed like a million calls to tree services and arborists, one company (Tree Company A) quoted us a fair (“pre-insurance jackup”) quote and indicated they would be out on Monday to do the job. When Monday came and went and the albatross of a tree branch was still with us, I began another round of calls. When I spoke to another service (Tree Company B), they were also fair in their quote and promised a crew out the same day. I told them great. Turns out when Tree Company B got to the house, Tree Company A was already there sawing off the branch. When we got home and saw that the branch was gone, we assumed that Tree Company B had done the job as quoted earlier in the day. It looked great, although we wondered why they hadn’t trimmed a second branch as promised during our conversation. I was in the midst of drafting a report for Angie’s List on how fair and considerate I thought their quote was and how pleased I was with the work when I checked cell phone messages and discovered what had actually happened. I initiated a call to Tree Company B and started going on about how sorry I was that things had gotten messed up and how fair and fabulous I thought they had been with their quote when they asked whether I would be willing to call up Tree Company A and ask them to cut off $100 so that I could compensate Tree Company B for the trouble of bringing their crew out. What??? So this is how all this works?? I managed to broker a deal that would not require me to ask people to cut their quote and I think all is well.