VEOLIA TWIN CITIES/ONYX WASTE SERVICES INC

Veolia failed to pick up trash and recycling several times during scheduled pick up dates. We were told to make sure containers were out the night before, which they were and were still being missed. Finally, I asked how this is happening and I was told that our house is in an unassigned route so drivers have to finish their assigned route and come and pick up our trash and sometimes there is not enough time. Really!!!! After I was told that we began searching for a new company.

They do a horrible job, there is a new owner and ever since then we have been unsatisified. Before the new ownership, they would come up to my house, go inside the gate and dump my trash for me and I had no issues with it. Now, they will just take the large bag if there is one in there and if there isn't they don't dump the trash at all. I called and complained about this and the next time, the guy did a good job and I called and complimented him on that. Ever since then it goes back to the way it was, my trash doesn't get picked up properly. I'm not sure what to give them for price because I have nothing to compare them too yet.

Now doing business as Advanced Disposal, I cancelled my service with Veolia last February after the waste hauler once again failed to pick up on the assigned day. When I called to complain, the so-called customer service person told me it's hard for drivers to remember their routes. Advanced Disposal/Veolia also failed to pick up their container on the day they said they would. They also failed to send me a refund for the balance of service that I hadn't used. When I called months later on May 2, I was told the check was in the mail. Three weeks later, it still hasn't arrived.

We decided to hire another trash collector company to pick up our trash and recycle. They offered a low rate guaranteed and every week recycle pick up. I called Veolia to see if they could match the price of my new hauler and they said they would loose money if they offered the same rate. They told us that when they pick up the cans it will cost us $35.00 plus fees and taxes. With the fees and taxes, it will cost us $60.00 to $61.00. If we return the cans to them there would be no charge, I have checked with other haulers and they do not charge a pick up fee when you stop service.

My bills keep increasing in price and arrive not long before they are due. My last bill arrived one day before the due date. They also keep leaving the trash bin right in front of my gate, blocking my exit from my yard.

They collect garbage on a weekly basis and their service has been fine. They do what they are supposed to do.

Service was good, customer service rates below zero.con

When I set up service with Veolia they never disclosed the fact they will charge me $35.00 to pick up the can if I switch providers. This is an extremely important piece if information and it seems to me rather deceptive to fail to disclose this charge when quoting prices or setting up the service. The excuse I was given was that the charge is disclosed on the back of my bill. Too little, too late in my opinion. Veolia provides garbage service for my home and several rental properties and I am cancelling service at all locations because of this deceptive practice. Furthermore, I can understand recovering some costs for those people that switch often (but this must be disclosed before service starts), but over they years I have paid them hundreds, perhaps even thousands of dollars for garbage service fees - I have been a profitable customer for them. Had they waived the pickup charge I would have been pleased, now I am just disappointed and angry about being lied to (by omission) when I set up service at all of my locations.

This company (Veolia) succeeded the previous Onyx waste collection (I assume they acquired Onyx) with whom I was very pleased. The folks collecting the garbage do a fine job, missing a pickup only once or twice in a few years. However, I found their office/phone response skills to be very poor most of the time. I had such a difficult time getting a call answered in May of 2008 that I resorted to sending them a fax, which was never answered. I also found it frustrating that Veolia charged a group of neighbors, who had approached this hauler collectively, a much lower rate than I was paying. I know this because I had a copy of the neighbors bill, and it was about 40% cheaper for the same service. They would not offer me the same rate without disclosing the name of the neighbor who shared this information with me. It's probably a good idea to solicit your neighbors and ask garbage companies to bid on the service for all. I have changed to Waste Management, which has good customer service skills.

Ever since Veolia acquired the garbage collection service that I have used for eleven years in Saint Paul, Minnesota, the prices have steadily gone up while the service has gone down. Veolia, a global corporation that provides water, waste, energy and transportation services to European and North American countries, "re-branded" my longstanding garbage service provider roughly 2 years ago. My trusty garbage service used to be a small, responsive company based in Newport, Minnesota. Now, however, they appear to be run from corporate offices in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Despite the steadily increasing prices, my service was fairly reliable until recently, when a regular Friday garbage pickup was missed and I received a telephone call from the collections department of the Wisconsin office. For roughly two years, I have participated in Vela's "auto pay" billing system, where they provide an electronic invoice every three months and then automatically withdraw the payment from my bank account. My bank account always contains more than enough money to pay the Veolia bill. Imagine my surprise when a Veolia collections agent called me recently from their Wisconsin corporate office to report that my October 2008 invoice remained "unpaid" in January 2009. However, my October invoice was clearly marked "auto pay." I asked the Veolia agent why the funds had not been withdrawn from my bank account. She did not know, but she nevertheless told me that my account had been suspended for nonpayment. Immediately I submitted a "manual" electronic payment. The Veolia agent confirmed receipt of this payment. However, she still could not explain why, for the first time in 2 years, my "auto pay" invoice had not, in fact, been "auto paid." Alas, my scheduled garbage pickup did **not** occur, even though my account was paid in full. When I finally spoke to Vela's Saint Paul office 4 days later, they still did not have any record of my payment. Amazingly, a global corporate giant was able to take my money in mere minutes, but they couldn't relay my payment information from Milwaukee to Saint Paul in 4 days! Worse, the Saint Paul office told me that if I wanted the missed garbage pickup to occur before the **following** week's scheduled delivery, I would be assessed an additional $30 charge for an out-of-cycle pickup. I gasped! My scheduled garbage pickup had been missed "through no fault of my own" yet I would have to pay $30 to remedy a mistake made somewhere within the huge Veolia corporate structure! Somebody in corporate Veolia had failed to "auto pay" heaven-knows-how-many invoices (the local Saint Paul office was swamped with calls when I finally got through on the telephone, after waiting on hold for more than 30 minutes). The Veolia collections agent in Wisconsin failed to return my telephone calls, even though she had promised to call me on Tuesday to explain why my "auto pay" invoice had not, in fact, been auto paid.

Very responsive and good prices initially. Found that over time they really ramped up the price and found ways to charge extra for everything, gas surcharges, Christmas tree hauling, etc. Got tired of the price hikes so switched. Good service but didn't like the sneaky price hikes.

They do a fine job collecting our garbage.

We have really never had any problems with them. At least once we missed a bill and they did not cut off service right away like many companies might do. Sometimes they are collecting pretty early in the day (I mean, before 6:30 AM) and they use trucks where loose papers might fly out of the truck when the garbage is dumped in, causing some litter.

I'VE BEEN USING THIS COMPANY SINCE I MOVED IN 9 YEARS AGO. THEY HAVE GONE THROUGH SOME NAME CHANGES (ORIGINALLY EAGLE). THEY ALSO CHANGED FROM MONTHLY TO QUARTERLY BILLINGS. THIS WASN'T SO BAD IF THE COST WAS STILL THE $14/MONTH AS WHEN I STARTED. BUT OVER TIME, THE COST HAS CREPT UP UNTIL IT REACHED OVER $23/MONTH JUST FOR THE BASIC SERVICE. WHEN YOU ADD IN STATE WASTE MANAGEMENT TAXES, ENVIRONMENTAL CHARGES, AND FUEL SURCHARGES, IT WAS MORE THAN $100 PER QUARTER, WHICH IS A LITTLE TOUGHER TO FIT INTO THE BUDGET THAN SMALLER MONTHLY INSTALLMENTS. I FINALLY WENT OVER THE EDGE WHEN THEY CHARGED AN ADDITIONAL $5 TO PICK UP MY CHRISTMAS TREE. NOT MUCH, BUT IT HADN'T BEEN EXTRA IN THE PAST, AND I DIDN'T RECALL SEEING ANY NOTIFICATION THAT THE POLICY HAD CHANGED. THAT, COMBINED WITH THE ALMOST DOUBLING OF THE SERVICE FEE FINALLY LED ME TO INCLUDE A NOTE ON MY BILL JUST TO LET OUT A LITTLE FRUSTRATION. TO THEIR CREDIT, THEY CALLED & OFFERED TO LOWER THE MONTHLY FEE TO $17.25.

THEY MISSED A COLLECTION. I CALLED TO FIND OUT WHY AND THEY SAID BILL WAS NOT PAYED. I PAYED BILL AND THEN RESEARCHED PRICES AND SERVICES AT OTHER TRASH HAULERS. I FOUND THEY THEY WERE ABOUT TWICE THE GOING RATE. I CANCELLED SERVICE ON THE NEXT BILL AND BY LEAVING A MESSAGE ON THEIR ANSWERING MACHINE (THEY WERE NOT AVAILABLE). THEY CONTINUE TO BILL ME FOR TWO MONTHS OF SERVICE AFTER CANCELLATION.

FREQUENT MISSED PICKUPS. DIFFICULT PHONE SERVICE.