Arbor Investigations

I tried to let this sit for as long as I could, as I am worn out from trying to fight various sources for nonexistent customer service. I lasted five weeks before I went postal, and now it's been two more.

I hired Linda from Arbor Investigations (otherwise known as Vancouver Private Investigator) at the end of January to begin the search for my father (see previous post here). She talked a good game in the beginning, trying to make a connection with me by saying she was from Toronto originally, and she sounded perfectly reasonable. My credit card was charged $500 the moment I agreed to retain them, which was the only sign that they had received my e-mailed contract. My unease at the lack of contact grew as each day and then week passed with no messages from them. I obsessively checked my email inbox, wondering if at any moment the mystery of my father's whereabouts would finally be solved.

I sent an email tentatively asking what I should expect in terms of communication and follow-up, as they had only explained what they would do, not when I would receive progress reports. There was no response, which was my first clue how this would go. I waited five days and followed up with a phone call, and was told by the woman they only get in touch when there is news, but she would ask Linda to give me a call. I received a generic email later that day from a company address but with no signature, so I had no idea who it was from. It said it could take up to 30 days for there to be any news. And so I waited.

After 30 days had passed with no further communication, I sent another email expressing my disappointment and asking where things were at. Is this really rocket science? All it takes is a two-minute call or email to say what steps have been taken and what is coming next. It's common sense to try to make your clients feel as though you are actually working for them. This time my email was responded to by a woman named Julie who said they were still working on it, and she would ask Linda to get in touch. No surprise - no call from Linda.

Another week went by and I phoned again, finally reaching Linda in person. She said they had confirmed my father had not died in the province of BC, nor did he own property there (which I'd already checked through a realtor friend, and told them so), nor did he have a telephone in his name. They were now waiting to hear back from another contact about the existence of a cable t.v. account. This all struck me as incredibly lame for 5 weeks of work. I asked what would follow the cable inquiry, and she said they would likely want to move on to another province, and she would be in touch as soon as there was news.

After replaying this conversation repeatedly that night, my gut told me not to trust these people at all. It made no sense that it had taken 5 weeks to confirm just a few pieces of the most basic information, nor that the next step would be to check each other province one by one. I sent another email asking for a financial accounting of what had been spent of my $500 retainer thus far, and saying that I would want to terminate the agreement and obtain a refund of the remainder of the fee. I guess I should not have been surprised that again I received no response or acknowledgement of my email.

Two more weeks passed, and I finally called but was sent straight to voice mail. I left a very emotional message asking for the owner of the agency to contact me, and followed up with an email.

I received a brief email from Julie saying that "quite a bit of work" had been done on my file, and she would review the case with Linda.

What I received in the end was a Word document in an email titled "Closed Notice", saying that much time had been invested in searching on their end, they had been unsuccessful finding any trace of my father, and the file was now closed. No accounting of how my $500 was allocated. 

It's shocking to me how many unprofessional people there are in the world who seem able to work completely independently, with no recourse for clientele to escalate issues. It's galling, considering my years spent in customer service and management where the customers were always responded to and appeased. 

I don't have the energy or the money to start this process all over again. Maybe he is better left unfound.