Today one of the Eco-Energy door to door salesperson came to my door. He was wearing a Grey T-Shirt with green Eco-Energy letters written on it & Khaki pants. I opened the door for him, BIG Mistake !!!.

I own both my water heater & furnace. This guy was trying to sell me a rental water heater & furnace . He was extremely rude, confrontational, argumentative & condescending. I politely & repeatedly told him NO , I am not interested. But he wouldn't budge & wouldn't take NO for an answer. He was going on & on & blah blah about some $ 1,300 Eco-Rebate, I will get.

He started shouting & yelling at me..that's right..he was yelling at me " You have NO clue what I am talking about. You don't even understand, what I am talking about do you ? You have NO idea what I am talking about " " All your neighbours have signed up, Why are you NOT signing up "

I told him I am not interested. He then said " What do you mean you are not interested. This is NOT about your interest. I am not here to tell you, what I had for breakfast ( can't believe he said that ). I am here to check the tags on your furnace & water heater. I am here to save YOU money. This checkup is MANDATORY, this not about your interest. Are you even the home owner or are you just a renter " " I am NOT in this neighbourhood just for fun"

I said, Sir I understand why you are here, but I am not interested. He then said in a rude & condesending tone ( raising his voice at me ) " What do YOUunderstand ? When you say you understand, it implies you know something. What do you know ? You don't understand anything, you have NO idea what I am talking about "

I asked him to leave. He refused to do so. I was trying to close the door, but he wouldn't let me , as he was almost inside by doorway. What he was doing was borderline criminal. He was forcing me to sign something I didn't want or need. He was trespassing on private proverty & refusing to leave, inspite of being told numerous times & was almost barging inside my house. Finally I had to forcefully close the door on his face. Even after that he was hanging on my porch for a couple of minutes. I was even afraid that he might do something to my car or my house, on his way out, that's how full of rage & aggressive, he was.

Close to 20 minutes, he ( Eco-Energy rep ) was on my door step shouting, yelling & arguing with me. I have dealt with lot of door to door energy re-sellers & water heater & Furnace guys, from Just Energy, Direct Energy et al ..all of them have left after a few NO's. But this Eco-Energy sales rep was something else, extremely uncalled for & unprofessional what he was doing. This was nothing but harassment, bullying & intimidation from him, can't believe the Eco-Energy company accepts or condones, such aggressibe tactics . Luckily, I remained calm & collected throughout this ordeal. I was busy deescalating things, & this guy was escalating things over & over again, every time I would ask him to calm down.

So, Beware of Eco-Energy door to door sales rep who come to your door, they are a NIGHTMARE (atleast this guy was), extremely difficult to get rid of them, so DON'T even open your door for them.

People like these are just energy resellers. They will try to force you to change your existing Hydro and/or Heating company to their own.

They will also try to sell you some rental water heater or rental furnace, with ridiculous monthly fees.

They are way more expensive than your current company & will lock you in a 10-15 year contract, which is almost impossible to get out of without paying huge penalty fees.

They will lie to you that they are from the government & its mandatory. They are extremely rude, aggressive & will try to force themselves in your house. They will even wear some official looking ID , Hard hat , Vest etc to make them look like they are from your utility company or the city, gov. etc ..they will even lie about it.

They either want to see your HYDRO bill or your HEATING bill or the tags/label on your FURNACE & WATER HEATER in your basement. Once they have this info, they are ready to go.

1. DO NOT give them any info like your name, phone number etc.
2. DO NOT show them any utility bill like Hydro, Heating.
3. DO NOT let them inside your house so they can get info of your FURNACE & WATER HEATER.
4. Call the cops, if they refuse to leave & have them arrested for Tresspassing.
5. Record them with your smart phone if you can.

Their MO -Modus Operandi is :

1. They will do some Hi- Hello & small talk & talk about the weather to break the ice.
2. They will tell you how ALL your neighbours have signed up etc. This is to create trust..NO one has signed up.
3. They will use words like Eco , Rebate, Environment, Credit & how you will save $$$ through this program. Basically we are here to give you a rebate of $$$ or credit of $$$ . They are here to take $$$ from you, NOT give you $$$.
4. They won't take NO for an answer. They are professionally trained to do that.
5. They will be rude & condescending & will use words like Do you understand etc. They will try to make you look stupid & try to break you down.
6.They will try to shame you , create guilt in you, try to bully you. Act as if they are doing you a favour & you are NOT taking it.
7. They always have a ridiculous, over priced & almost impossible to get out of contract, which is far worse than your existing one.
8. SENIORS and IMMIGRANTS are their favourite target. They prey on them as they are SOFT & EASY targets for them. Their eyes lit up, when they see one of them.

So BEWARE of these reps, you have been warned !

Wow !
I never could guess how these people can be this rude and think that they can escape.
Anyways HW 36 has given tips on how to stop these kind of people.

Once in 2010, when I was laid off, I attended this ADT workshops in which they had advertised that you can make money by selling the ADT alarms.

We were briefed for 2 days. Basically, we need to memorize a paragrph which went like this
" Sir /Madam, How are you. I am from ADT. I was just roaming in you neighbourhood and found that you did not have an alarm system (if you did have an alarm system, then you will change the line asking them to change to ADT). Considering that there have been a number of robberies in your neighbourhood, would you please let me put one of my ADT lawn signage in your lawn. Research has proven that having ADT lawn signage in your lawn can preven possible breakin's by 50%"

If they said Yes, then you should ask them to let you in to talk further about ADT alarm. If they say yes to talk further about ADT, tehn you should call the HQ from their land line asking for a senior rep. to contact them. 10 such phone calls in a month wiull get you $ 1600 min. per month. For every confirmed sale, you get around $ 160 or 200 or so.

99.5% will refuse.

They sent 10 of us in the neighbourhood. We were taken in a van and the van used to roam around, seeing if we were doing the job. We had a printout with the house number name and the reaction. I just put in false data and wanted to chit chat with a Gora male. At that time, the van located me and asked me what I was doing in another street that was not given to me. I told them that I had leg pain and hence got lost. He took me in the van and put me in teh same street. He watched me knock and talk to a person in the house and then only left. I quit once the time was over.

Hope this will give you the other side of the story.

Murali

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I am a Gents and not a Ladies.

Excellent HW36

T K , You are master of all

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Clinton