SavATree - Warrenville

Be very skeptical if using them for their lawn care service. We called their Warrenville location in late August last year after two seasons of having issues with our lawn where we got spotty patches of dead grass spreading mainly our backyard but some in our front as well. After coming out and examining it, they informed us we had a fungus and that they could provide fungus treatment. They recommended a treatment be applied, one last season and four additional treatments this year. They also recommended we have them aerate and over seed the lawn last fall. We agreed and had them do all of this. We also spent about three weekends digging up the dead areas of our lawn and reseeding. So what did our $1,200 in fees get us? As with the last two seasons in the spring our lawn began to appear to get back to normal until June came and we started having the exact same issue! Spotty dead grass patches in the same areas which were spreading even more. So we sent them an email explaining our disappointment and frustration. They came out again and after looking at the lawn said we did not have the fungus, but now have Cinch bugs and they are the cause for our dead spotty grass patch. If we want they can send us an estimate of what that service would cost us. After apparently miss diagnosing our issue last year, they want to charge us for another apparent problem. They basically want to keep having us pay them to treat our lawn hoping that one the treatments they recommend will eventually work. Be careful with their suggestions, you may be throwing away your money like we did or better yet find another company that can actually help you with your lawn issues.

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They came in and did a reasonable job at a reasonable price. They were quick about it and cleaned up well. I think keeping some supervision at the job site throughout the whole job could've been a little better.

We have been using their services for the last few years. Originally, this was a locally owned company (by two women?) called Autumn Tree. It was purchased a few years ago by Savatree, which is a large national company out of New York. At first we were pleased with their service, quality and price. Then they began adding services that we did not request. Their prices went up. Last year, our large Magnolia developed scale. They said they treated it for this twice including an application of dormant oil last fall. This year the scale came back with a vengeance. We spoke with their office and I met with the arborist, Alan Doty, who said that they would be out to treat the tree. No one came. There was no follow up. I called and spoke to Alan Doty again. Same thing. This Monday, a Savatree truck pulled up on our street to treat our neighbors three Magnolias -- but not ours. I was furious. We've hired another (locally owned company) and have fired Savatree.

It was excellent, they were very competent, I felt very good about the certified arborist Dave Gaydos, he was extremely knowledgeable.

The experience was good. There was nothing in particular that stood out. They did a fine job. The staff was fine.

It was an Angie's List Big Deal that was like 50% off. I've used them several times. It didn't go very smoothly but I did talk to the company about it. There were two different issues: one the overall quality of the job verses the process of setting it up and the billing. We had some fits and starts. The back office didn't perform well but the front office performed pretty good. We talked about it. I paid what I committed to pay and I had no problems with that but the process was truly draining on the back side with the bookkeeping and accounting. It was a bit of a process making sure we understood it. They admitted that their back end wasn't quite up to snuff yet. I would possibly use them again.

They were okay. I have to call them back as some more trimming had to be done. I would probably use them in the future.

Got estimate in July and asked to have work performed after Sept. 16 they come out on Sept 29. The initial pruning and raising wasn't satisfactory in my opinion because the branches were still to low to walk under, and this was an item that I indicated was important to me. However, our rep. Anthony Erias was very helpful and personally fixed the problem a week later just as he promised. Therefore, I am satisfied with the service and the work and would use this company in the future. I'm unable to comment on the price because Autumn Tree Care Experts was the only company to respond to my phone calls for an estimate out of the three contacted.

Judy was out here to evaluate the trees very quickly after I placed the call. She is very knowledgeable and understood our desire to save the trees that it made sense to save. She did not go too far in that direction though and made intelligent recommendations about some trees that DID need to be removed (for safety, the health of other trees, power lines, etc). She offered a wealth of good advice about how we should care for our trees to keep them growing strong- how to prune them ourselves once we get them better established, how to properly mulch and water, info on root fertilization, etc. We do plan to have Save-A-Tree back out to do the mycorrhizal root treatments to help our remaining trees better recover from the construction stress. I'll update my report after that to let everyone know how that goes.

I WAS REFERRED TO THESE PEOPLE BY ANOTHER TREE SERVICE THAT DID NOT PROVIDE THE KIND OF TREATMENT MY AILING TREES NEEDED. THE SAVE A TREE PEOPLE CAME OUT IN A TIMELY MANNER, PROPOSED A COURSE OF TREATMENT, GAVE ME PREPARATION INSTRUCTIONS AND ONCE I APPROVED THEIR PLAN, PROCEEDED WITHOUT ANY FURTHER DELAY. NOW TIME WILL TELL IF THEIR WORK WAS EFFECTIVE, THEREFORE I HAVE CHECKED N/A IN THE ''QUALITY'' BOX ABOVE.

SOME OF THE WORK WAS WELL DONE, BUT IN TAKING OUT THE LARGE TREE, THEY LEFT HUGE HOLES IN OUR BACKYARD THAT WE DID NOT EXPECT. THEY KILLED A LOT OF GRASS. THEY CALLED TO SAY THEY WERE NOT COMING ON THE DAY WE BOOKED THEM AND THEN THEY SHOWED UP WITHOUT RECONTACTING US. I WAS VERY FRUSTRATED WITH THE PAYMENT PROCEDURE WHEN I REQUESTED TO PAY OVER SIX MONTHS. I GAVE THEM MY CREDIT CARD AND ASKED THEM TO DEDUCT FROM IT MONTHLY. ON THREE SEPARATE OCCASIONS, I WAS CHARGED A PENALTY FOR NOT PAYING ON TIME. I THEN CALLED THE OFFICE, LEFT MESSAGES AND ONLY ABOUT HALF OF THE TIME WOULD THEY CALL BACK. EVENTUALLY, THEY GRACIOUSLY RECOGNIZED THEIR MISTAKE AND WAIVED THE PENALTIES (EACH TIME), BUT THIS TOOK UP MUCH MORE TIME THAN I ANTICIPATED.

THEY WERE VERY PROMPT IN RETURNING MY PHONE CALLS AND GIVING ME AN ESTIMATE. THE STAFF WAS ALWAYS EXTREMELY COURTEOUS WHEN I SPOKE WITH THEM. THEIR QUOTE WAS ABOUT 40% LESS THAN ANOTHER COMPANY I CONTACTED ON ANGIE'S LIST. THE ONE MINOR PROBLEM I HAD WAS A SLIGHT DELAY IN GETTING THE WORK DONE. AT THE TIME I DECIDED TO CONTRACT WITH THEM TO CUT DOWN MY TREE I WAS TOLD THAT THE WORK WOULD BE DONE IN 3-4 WEEKS AND THAT THEY WOULD CONTACT ME A DAY OR TWO AHEAD OF TIME TO LET ME KNOW WHEN THEY WERE COMING. AFTER A LITTLE MORE THAN A MONTH I CONTACTED THEM ABOUT WHEN THEY WERE COMING. THEY SAID THEY CAME OUT THE DAY BEFORE, BUT COULDN'T DO THE WORK BECAUSE THEY WEREN'T SURE IF THEY NEEDED A PERMIT. WHY DIDN'T THEY WORK THAT OUT AT SOME TIME DURING THE PREVIOUS MONTH? ALSO, THEY NEVER CALLED ME TO SAY THEY WERE COMING. THEY DID COMPLETE THE JOB BY THE END OF THE WEEK.

THEY CLEANED UP VERY NICE NICELY. THEY CAME TWO WEEKS EARLIER THAN WHAT THEY SAID THEY WOULD. THEY DID A NICE JOB.

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