Poor leadership with unrealistic demands and expectations
When I first started with the company, I was very enthusiastic and enjoyed being part of a great team. Unfulfilled promises and a feeling of unappreciation caused my outlook to wane until my departure from the company. When I announced my decision to leave, I did not hear anything from my regional manager, my director of HR, or region admin on how the exit process works. The region sales manager was the only person from leadership to reach out and ask questions, and wish me the best. I was promised an in-depth training program, hands-on learning that would take months to a year to complete, and many other things that never came to fruition. My training was condensed as I was thrown into every position before I was ready. This company has a notorious tendency to fill positions prematurely because they see you as a body, a solution to a problem. Once you are in that position, you are out-of-sight, out-of-mind while you desperately struggle to balance everything and still complete your goals and tasks. The recent change in leadership brought on a numbers-driven mentality, with no regard to appreciating the employees who work extremely hard, attempting to meet the unrealistic expectations set forth. Asking questions, or needing clarification from leadership always came off as bothersome. I was put into the position at the time thinking it was temporary, an area to train in order to transition me back to the location I was previously at. This was definitely not the case. This bra
ProsCompany Vehicle, good 401(k) program
ConsDemanding, no support, geographically challenging area
You will not succeed here unless you follow every direction the Branch Manager gives you. This company promotes safe working environment but once you get hurt on the job you are frowned upon. There is no family culture here. No company gatherings or Christmas parties. It's only you, your truck and your work. On-Call starts Friday after your shift at 5pm to Sunday at will of the company and not paid unless you're called out to service an account. This account maybe as far as from Sacramento to the Bay Area to address an ant problem. There is one branch but two different uniformed technicians which is Orkin and Crane. Crane was purchased by Orkin so they get to wear their original uniforms and they get paid $30+ an hour with no commission even though they do the same exact thing as all Orkin Technicians. I was told that would earn $40 to $55k per year first starting. As an Orkin Technician you will be paid $14.50 hr + $0.50 raise when you pass your Branch II Exam. There are no annual raises no matter how hard you work. You will receive a commission/production monthly based on the amount of buildings you service and how much the account is worth. Your monthly salary will solely depend on how big your route is and how many additional odd jobs you complete each month. The Manager decides how big of a route you will have, this is not allocated equally to technicians.
Technicians are told they will receive a route to work that is near where they live but this is not the case. You w
ProsCompany vehicle, Company phone
ConsVery little trust, micromanagement, long hours, not enough hours, no real HR in building.
Great managers, great co-workers, great job. Terrible pay and benefits.
Depending on the account you're servicing that day will determine what time you will start work. Some days you might at 4am and some days 8am depending on who you are scheduled to service that day. I learned how to manage my own route, problem solve on my own and work independently. Also went above and beyond to solve customer problems and leave them satisfied. My co-workers and managers are a great team, they're all cool and fun to work with. Hardest part of the job is waking up at different times everyday and not having a set sleeping schedule. When you're behind on your route you will be working a lot of over time and sometimes weekends to catch up on your route. You're required to be an on call technician every couples weeks, all technicians do it. The bad part of this job everyone gets paid differently depending on how much your route is worth. You will work as hard or even harder than the next guy and get paid less. Which is wrong. Example: Your route is worth $16,000 and have 170 accounts to do in one month (not including start ups and extra services.) But the next guy has 120 accounts in one month and his route is worth $22,000, so you will be more stressed out do to more accounts while the next guy is loving life getting paid more and having to do less. You get paid hourly and commission. Also benefits are not good. Been here 3 years, no raise. In order for me to get more money I have to get more accounts which means more stress. Also bonuses are out of your hands, b
The only good thing about this job is the customers
I was recently fired after slaving for this company for about a year & a half. Clocking the start of my day from the time I left my driveway to the time I got back home.(was told when I got hired) they’re excuse was that after a 1.5 years they just caught it and it was a new rule that you don’t get paid for drive time. Was never able to take lunch breaks due to customers always being added to my hectic schedule. I got moved to a new territory that was anywhere between an hour & a hour and a half away from my house because they said I had poor performance on my previous route (poor excuse), because I had customers that canceled and residential and commercial accounts begging me to come back. The management in this branch is horrible! The closest thing you will get to getting help or a question answered is a answered phone call if your lucky. The branch manager is always on vacation and when he is there he strictly stays in the office at his desk and doesn’t make any effort on helping any techs when it’s needed most. Especially during hectic summer months. Everything about this corporate America company is shady. They once took $150 out of my paycheck because a customer didn’t want to continue their service because I had solved the issue within 2 months. (Bad roach issue). All that matters to these people are numbers, they could care less about the actually employees or customers, just where the numbers are for the months to keep higher management off their backs. After having
ProsGood customers
ConsHorrible management
3.0
Pest Control Technician | Davenport, IA | Jul 27, 2018
Fun place to work with lots of opportunities to make money.
Selling additional products while on the route is easy and is very profitable. You can literally just tell someone that Orkin does insulation and they will ask if you can get them a quote. You pass the info on to a salesman and if they close if (40% of the time they do) you can also sell some things on your own. Neighbors will knock on your window when you get done with a stop. If you have time you can get them signed up and get your 10% commision of the sale. The brand sells itself with little effort. If you do well here they will make you a lot of money with route. But you will also end up working 12+ hours a day 6 days a week. I’ve taken home over $4,000 net in a month. The hours slow down dramatically in the winter. I only took home $1,400 one month last winter. Family insurance is absurdly expensive. $641 a month. You can take home the truck but you’ll pay $128 a month for that too.
Responsibilities that suck include dealing with customers being upset that they don’t have their old tech. Making bad debt calls. Having to do free stops where you don’t get paid for customers with returning pest issues and getting oil changes or getting chem from the shop. Quite literally being 100% commision based you only make money for completing a service and collecting payment or for selling. A lot of running around for free. Management depends on location. Some suck some are great. Calling in when legit having family issue or simply ill is followed with harassment from managers. Th
ProsCompany truck, company phone, good pay in summer, 2 weeks are of vacation and 3 PTO within 6 months
ConsHealthcare expensive, lots of hours. Bad pay in winter.
Company Wants & Expect A LOT from you (Very Stressful )
Company Tracks EVERYTHING from Brakes to speed.
Truck & Phone Has a Tracking GPS, monitoring all you do.
We get poorly bonus(amazon $10 gift card) while the company takes 90% of our sales & 95% production. Managers get big Bonuses Quarterly and we get (parties & Candies) SMH.
If your on production _ you have a start $1,400
customer paid $700 during the past months and she calls to cancel .the total left is $700 in the contract which she didn't paid is coming off your check bud. true story.
it hard to take Lunch brake every time your at work because if you do you'll fall behind and trust me u don't wanna fall be hide when you get them starts specially without NO managers telling you because then you'll be STRESS OUT (than they are going to say "just do your Job" or take 2 day off No paid tho)
Here in this job Customer calls shot which mean (you scheduled them 1pm-3pm and informed them , Customer call the Office and the people in the offices make sure customer get the time they want , no consideration that this is going to throw you off .
no days offs but when you do have it you still have to use the phone to set appointment for the next day which company does not pay you for this and sometime they Blow up your phone when another tech calls out for STRESS .
1 hour meeting about Nothing just MONEY talk(instead help us to deal with STRESS)
Oh one more thing FACE-TIME CHECK OUT they want to see your face before you drive
ProsTraining program
ConsCompany Tracks EVERYTHING you do, poorly bonus, ALOT of work, LONG hours, Lack of communication, High expectation, Facetime checkout, no consideration of you as an employee, Stress Zone
If you want to work hard, this is a pretty good gig. It's pretty easy and straightforward once you get the hang of it. Fairly repetitive on the daily, but sometimes the job will require some creativity. Making relationships with the customers is fun, and I've made some friends during the time I spent there. I left because I had a better job opportunity working in my field of interest (not pest control).
Don't kid yourself though, this job is hard work. You drive a truck every work day and every other saturday, you generally go to somewhere between 7 and 15 addresses a day (I've had days where I needed to only do a couple of addresses and another day I had to service 20, but these are outside of the norm). You have to climb up into attics, into crawlspaces, and check for pest activity. You also have to handle pesticides and chemicals - so if you're not good at that, probably look elsewhere as pesticide exposure isn't a joke.
The sales scheme is a gimmick and isn't really honest, so I didn't really sell, however, the pay is good enough that you can make a living without selling anything, if you're bad at it or not interested in that aspect.
Definitely have some gripes with this job, there's a higher than normal level of disorganization and frustration, however, it's really good work experience, and at the end of the day you go home being proud that you did actual work for people that actually needed your help. Pest control is a very valuable and necessary service in our so
If you like to be stressed all the time this is the job for you.
I have worked for Orkin for the past couple of years. Working as a termite home inspector, the days can be long working on average of 12 hours a day including drive time. Being paid a based salery of $1000 per month before taxes plus commission, which is paid out only if your jobs sold and completed the same month.
Average pay check ranges from $2200-$6000 depending on how much sales sold per month before taxes.
New hires aren’t tranied properly. Consist of doing an average of 3-5 ride alongs with tenure employees, than doing mock proposals with management and then thrown out in the field without having ample time to learn criteria and what to look for.
Management consists of having 5 conferences calls a week, more time is spent on the phone with higher ups and less time out training new sales and termite techs out in the field.
Management also requires sales techs to schedule our own appointments, which they require 6-8 people to be seen every day, their motto is “ it’s not what you have done for me in the past, it’s what have you done for me lately?” Thus, feeling overwhelmed and rushing scheduled stops to be on time for the next appointment.
Breaks are hardly ever taken, you have to block out on your calander lunch break, otherwise management or call center may fill in the spot thus making you not be able to take a lunch that day.
My advise to anyone that is reading this, yes you can make a lot $.
I have made over $100k a year, yes it is possible, bu
ProsCompany car, company sponsored trips
ConsLong hours, micro management, no work/life balance
Poor management. Low compensation. Stressful working environment. Unethical practices by the company
The company has gone in a new direction as of late. The company Does not value technicians. New pay plan only benefits the company. Managers are very one sided and retaliate if you don’t do what is in there best interest. Management also will try and cut corners on products. Plenty of times techs do not have the proper material and product to do their jobs. Yes, which means a bigger bonus for the management staying within budget. Management not caring about the customer receiving the best service they should be due to not having proper products. As far and the pay, It’s very unmotivating knowing month after month your pay will be the same. Incentives are none existent in the Orkin technician world. The company increases customer rates yearly, at least a $10 rate increase but still cuts the pay. It makes no sense, all it proves is how much they value the techs. As far as the process if you decide to work for the company you will be an hourly employee for about a year or two. 13-15$ hourly to start. And they will milk that until you ask enough and when they finally give in you will receive a 5% production pay. Whereas before it was 15-20%. So there you have it Orkin “worlds best” pay plan. And In order to receive a raise you have to work for the company for 10-15 years with the new plan. Welcome to the inside of this crooked company. I talk confidently in what i am stating here i am a top 3 performer in the region. Too in sales customer service route gain etc. With that being
ProsPlenty of work and business
ConsPoor management. Low compensation. Stressful working environment. Unethical practices by the company
High stress, low rewards, no support from region management
Worked for the company for a little over two years-over this time, my pay was severely reduced. Technicians are encouraged to cut corners while performing services this way more services can be performed to bring in more revenue for the business daily.
Management allows sales staff to basically cut other sales staff throats by stealing customers. Poor quality of work/family balance. Region management is abusive with morning meetings in which the sales staff is blamed for poor sales. Overall morale is extremely low amongst sales, management, and service staff. Office staff is extremely overworked, I’m able to keep up with her daily tasks as more are piled on them each and every day. Branch and region management micromanage exactly where the vehicles are at all moments, and you were questioned as to why you went 2 miles over the speed limit.
Sales People are encouraged to oversell to the customer, with excessive floorplans for each and every branch that are bloated so that the region and division management obtains bonuses on a quarterly basis.
Local branch employees are not rewarded for good work, and often are overworked. Little to no support by region management or even by branch management as the turnover rate is so high most do not even know their own jobs.
As a sales person, you have the ability to basically write your own paycheck, however branch management often neglects to schedule your sales which then makes the customer cancel, and you do not get paid your co
Pésima empresa para laborar, te tratan como un simple numero mas, no existe el respeto de los superiores para con los técnicos, ni para el tiempo de vida privada y de descanso de los mismos, la gerencia tiene favoritismos con los parientes ineptos e inútiles que ademas toman dinero de la empresa misma para sus fines de semana de diversión, nunca hay dinero para reposición del dinero que se ocupa para transportarte a los servicios, de igual manera nunca hay dinero para cubrir totalidad de viáticos, eso hace que el salario que te ofrecen se divida entre gastos de pasaje, gastos de paseje a servicios y el sobrante, equipos y material de trabajo incompletos o en mal estado, por no mencionar la pésima calidad de algunas cosas del equipo de protección propio, uniformes ni se diga te mandan con una juego de uniforme para toda la semana y quieren que te dure limpio para los 6 días, te mueven los servicios a realizar aun cuando y hayas terminado, para que cubras a otros integrantes del personal que ya no quieran realizarlo en el día o fecha, por los favoritismos que ciertos supervisores tienen con sus literal lamebotas, pésima estructuración de rutas de servicio y horarios, se ofertan como empresa con años de experiencia pero una ves que entras ves que es de mala experiencia, la gente que entra con estudios entra solo a ser un técnico mas, que solo se convierten en numero, y en el caso de las mujeres con estudios entra a hacerla de oficinistas.
No existe ningún crecimiento en esta
ProsSeguro medico, pan y café el primer día de semana
ConsNo existe horarios ni rutas establecidas de buena manera, la mala administración, favoritismo hacia los parientes, suelo pésimo para andar por toda la ciudad, no hay tiempo para descansar a lo largo del día de servicio, no respetan tu día de descanso
2.0
Sales and Service Technician | Ontario | Dec 11, 2018
No work/life/balance. High expectations/Low pay
Extermination is unfortunately, a mostly unrewarding career. Very physical, technical, and professional job that few people respect the difficulty of. Also a very dangerous and uncomfortable job considering the chemicals you use and their legal implications. Do not forget you are dealing with mice, wasps, ants, rats, cockroaches and more. Infestations and grumpy customers as well. You are a jack of all trades; Sales meetings, applying pesticides, light construction work, you do it all. While you are offered significant independence, it often feels like you are running the entire company remotely. You are frequently expected to work long or split days on short notice to accommodate customers' schedules. The random nature of this work can take a serious toll on personal life. Management are great people, but most are just waiting to retire and pass on problems. Additionally you are charged $120/month for the truck and there is no yard to park it. Total waste of money because no one wants/needs a 2 seat light truck with pest control decals all over it. Mine didn't even have power mirrors or winter tires.
Pay is also not competitive. Base pay is $600/week + commission to start. Raises were below rate of inflation, which meant I would virtually never reach max wage. As for commission, this is highly dependent on the types of customers you are assigned and how far away they are. Commission can change drastically with route reorganization like mine did. I saw annual income drop b
ProsManagement and office staff are genuinely good people
ConsToo many to list
Questions And Answers about Orkin
What is the best part of working at Orkin?
Asked Nov 22, 2019
Not in office all day..
Answered Nov 8, 2020
The satisfied customer whose pest problem is no more.
Answered Oct 22, 2020
How flexible are your working hours at Orkin?
Asked Mar 16, 2020
Average hours per week 60 hours. Management allow some flexibility but not much.
Answered Nov 10, 2020
8 to 5 but you can work from home if making calls also you may have to help technicians out when doing a roach clean out late at nite.
Answered Nov 8, 2020
What is a typical day like for you at Orkin?
Asked Mar 16, 2020
Teams meeting at 8, call homeowner to confirm,1st appointment by 9, meeting homeowners, perform inspection, use iPad to draw diagram, take pictures, ready proposal, discuss inspection findings, discuss Orkin solutions and pricing for services, close sale, fill out agreements, credit check, obtain signatures, schedule service, follow up, ask for reference to other homeowners.
Continue on to 5 more appointments, days average 10 hours plus 1/2 day Saturdays.
Answered Nov 10, 2020
Check sch if no aptts driving making cold calls if possible and on phone cold calling. Its not an easy job
Answered Nov 8, 2020
What tips or advice would you give to someone interviewing at Orkin?
Asked Jul 30, 2016
It is a long process to be considered for a position at Orkin from application thru on boarding it can take upto 12 weeks so don't give your notice until you know when your actual 1st day will be.
Answered Aug 25, 2020
Avoid used to be a great company now its profit at all costs even over ethics employees are nothing more then numbers
Answered May 17, 2019
What is the interview process like at Orkin?
Asked Jul 30, 2016
You will meet with Manger and office management.
Answered Oct 1, 2020
The interview process took three months for me and it seems that process has not changed
