Branch Chem Dry Carpet Cleaners

I'm putting my home of thirty plus years on the market. I plan on listing it as of early July. The home is a four bedroom four bath and several of the rooms are carpeted. With two small Chihuahuas and chidren and now grand children the carpet was showing signs of a lot of use. One dog is less than reliable as far as house training goes. The kids have had their share of messes and now that the house was going to be sold I needed everything to be clean and inviting. The carpets needed to be cleaned.

I have an excellent real estate agent. She recently sold both my Aunt's house and my Mother's house. My agent and her partner came to my home and gave me a "to do" list in order to have my house really sparkle. One of the things to do was to get the carpets cleaned. She also gave me a list of people who do things like power washing, painting and carpet cleaning. The carpet cleaners she highly recommended was Branch Chem Dry Carpet cleaners. They are a family owned business that operates in RIdgewood a town just 15 minutes away from mine. They also serve Passaic, and Essex counties.

I called and spoke with Eileen. We discussed the prices and the square feet involved in getting a price estimate. She did say the service men would measure and go over the estimate with me. There were several price ranges that seemed to basically go from $139.99 to $189.00 depending on the square footage. The basic package involved a professional grade vacuuming of all carpets involved. The application of exclusive, patented carbonation cleaning solution. The carpets were to be thoroughly cleaned with removal of most spots. The carpets would then be raked and groomed. They mentioned the dry time was 1 to 2 hours for all packages.Experts recomend carpet be cleaned evey 6 to 12 months to maintian warranty.

The next package involved a stain fighter which was highly recommended for homes with children and pets or high traffic. This involved the same steps as the basic package but in addition they would apply Chem Dry Protectant. The third option was the Healthy Home package. Again you got the Basic Package but in addition there would be an application of deoderizer/sanitizer to reduce unhealthy bacteria. An aplication of Chem Dry Solution Protectant would restore stain resistance.

The company also cleans upholstery and offers protectants for the upholstery.

I made an appointment. I was given a time frame and they arrived within 1/2 hour of the appointed time. Two pleasant Chem Dry personnel arrived. They explained what would be done and measured everything. I explained I was getting the basic service since the house was to be put on the market. For about 2 hours they cleaned the carpets. After each room they would call me over to see the results. They moved some of the furniture, not all of it, certainly not couches and beds.They also included an Oriental rug in the cleaning package without charging for that.The results were really quite impressive. The carpeted rooms were free of stains and smelled wonderful. The carpets looked brand new.

The two young men did a walk through with me both before and after the service and were very pleasant and professional.On the negative side it took quite a bit longer than two hours for the carpets to dry with some of the carpets still being damp that night. Another issue I had was the evasive measuring versus pricing. You get an estimate but once the guys come up with measurements unless you have your own measurements it's a problem determining if the measurements they come up with are correct. They gave me a final price, after completing the job, of $219.00 as compared with the $189.00 that was mentioned on the phone. I called Elaine and discussed this and my price was then reduced to $197.97. At that point there was no point in squabbling over a few dollars since the carpets looked quite good. It occurred to me the next day that this measuring of rooms did not take into account that they did not deduct for areas under Queen size beds or several couches.

All in all I would have to give this company a 7 out of 10 since the job they did was reallly quite good.,Mmy carpets were definately a challenge and did clean them up well. The guys who did the work were very pleasant and efficient. Today , I received a call from Elaine at Branch. She is now tellingm e I owe $10.00 more because they can't accept the coupon I had. This coupon is for referrals. I was referred by my real estate agent. Whatever her explanation I told her, this feels like bait and switch. The price was constantly being changed, higher and higher. . She explained, again , how they reached a price and that the phone price was just a guess.I am now at a new price of $207.00 up from the orignal guesstimate of $189.00. I understood her whole explanation but it left a very unpleasant feeling regarding the final price especially when on I'm getting phone calls upping the final price. Were this my company I would eat the extra $10.00 rather than call the customer with yet another raise in price. Becasue of this I would not use this company again.