# New Safeguard Zones for GC Season and Conference Call



## tak

Yesterday, I was on a conference call with SFG. They have condensed the Grass zones in Florida to make the smaller. I covered a huge zone for them, which got turned into 5 zones. They ended up giving me 2 zones and after looking at 1 of them, quickly called them and said no way I'm driving 2 1/2 for $30 dollar cuts. She then placed us in the zone that covers where I live and my shop is. One of the nicest people over at sfg. 
On this conference call they stated, we must take pictures of the bushes everytime at every house ! and that we can trim them also every trim.....I get more $$ trimming bushes then cutting the property !! Biggest issue I now have is that SFG wants debris removed by us depending on loan type if debris is present ( I do REO lawn cuts ) How the hell you expect me or my crew to remove debris larger than .5 cy when we are trying to get done 20 cuts a day with a 6x12 trailer with it full of lawn equipment????? Never got a reply back when I asked if we must take debris are we able to come back within 48 hrs with an empty trailer. WTF


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## hammerhead

Kinda what i told them when the said to call in from site to get approvals. I asked the lady how big of a truck do you think I have? I dont carry my whole shop around with me every day.


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## BRADSConst

tak said:


> Yesterday, I was on a conference call with SFG. They have condensed the Grass zones in Florida to make the smaller. I covered a huge zone for them, which got turned into 5 zones. They ended up giving me 2 zones and after looking at 1 of them, quickly called them and said no way I'm driving 2 1/2 for $30 dollar cuts. She then placed us in the zone that covers where I live and my shop is. One of the nicest people over at sfg.
> On this conference call they stated, we must take pictures of the bushes everytime at every house ! and that we can trim them also every trim.....I get more $$ trimming bushes then cutting the property !! Biggest issue I now have is that SFG wants debris removed by us depending on loan type if debris is present ( I do REO lawn cuts ) How the hell you expect me or my crew to remove debris larger than .5 cy when we are trying to get done 20 cuts a day with a 6x12 trailer with it full of lawn equipment????? Never got a reply back when I asked if we must take debris are we able to come back within 48 hrs with an empty trailer. WTF


Did they also tell you that all birds nest must be removed from the front porch area and any bee/wasps nests need to be removed from the windows and soffit areas as well? What about cleaning any glass on front doors or storm doors? EVERY CUT. Don't worry, It'll be on the "next" conference call. All for the low, low price of $30. No Thanks.....


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## JDRM

BRADSConst said:


> Did they also tell you that all birds nest must be removed from the front porch area and any bee/wasps nests need to be removed from the windows and soffit areas as well? What about cleaning any glass on front doors or storm doors? EVERY CUT. Don't worry, It'll be on the "next" conference call. All for the low, low price of $30. No Thanks.....


REALLY????????????? :whistling2::whistling2:


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## PropPresPro

All this PLUS I get to fight with their upload site?

Where do I sign up?


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## tak

I do 300 cuts per month for them. Just Me, my wife and a helper. My wife uploads to thier site during the day as I send her work directly from the field using Pruvan. Takes her 2-3 minutes an upload as they are just grass orders. Most people on here are regionals type owners who are getting the work from a national and passing it down as well, thats why they say $30 is low, but how much do they pass down to thier crews for ??
Residential lawns in my area are $20-40 and includes bushes and bullcrap from picky owners. I make alot more than my residential buddy who cuts 70 properties a week.


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## Wannabe

tak said:


> I do 300 cuts per month for them. Just Me, my wife and a helper. My wife uploads to thier site during the day as I send her work directly from the field using Pruvan. Takes her 2-3 minutes an upload as they are just grass orders. Most people on here are regionals type owners who are getting the work from a national and passing it down as well, thats why they say $30 is low, but how much do they pass down to thier crews for ??
> Residential lawns in my area are $20-40 and includes bushes and bullcrap from picky owners. I make alot more than my residential buddy who cuts 70 properties a week.


 
Your buddy will end up the "winner" in the end :whistling2:


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## Cleanupman

tak said:


> I do 300 cuts per month for them. Just Me, my wife and a helper. My wife uploads to thier site during the day as I send her work directly from the field using Pruvan. Takes her 2-3 minutes an upload as they are just grass orders. Most people on here are regionals type owners who are getting the work from a national and passing it down as well, thats why they say $30 is low, but how much do they pass down to thier crews for ??
> Residential lawns in my area are $20-40 and includes bushes and bullcrap from picky owners. I make alot more than my residential buddy who cuts 70 properties a week.


You are the first person in over 5 years that has stated 2-3 minutes an upload for this company...That's great when I keep jearing that you have to also do a PCR for any visit to a property that is SG's....with you only doing grass cuts this may not be a manditory thing for you but everyone else states it is....
That is great though.....perhaps your wife can put an article together and explian to everyone how to work their system???? Sounds like you guys have a pretty good system and your information could help everyone working with SG that has upload issues with their system.....


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## BRADSConst

JDRM said:


> REALLY????????????? :whistling2::whistling2:


It might take me a while to look for the training slide I got, although I may have deleted it too. If I find it, I'll post.


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## BPWY

tak said:


> Residential lawns in my area are $20-40 and includes bushes and bullcrap from picky owners. I make alot more than my residential buddy who cuts 70 properties a week.







You are a special operator for sure.

Its very rare that bank work pays better than local work.
Sure ain't like that for me.

Plus I get paid sooner, sometimes with cash.


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## tak

*tricks to safeguard system*

there are few tricks up my sleeve for the safeguard properties Ill get a list together I know that can be certainly helpful as soon as i get back into the office


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## ontimepres

For a grass cut update you should be able to get it done in 5 minutes or less ... unless it's a day their site is really having issues in which case I just consider it to be "down" and try again later. We're also in Florida and our zone or volume hasn't changed at all! Since we have a decent volume we make a good little profit with it. Sure we have complaints, but I'm happy to have the work and the $$. What made the biggest impression on me after the conference call was comparing the 2012 manual to the 2010 manual ... a ton of changes requiring extra work on our part but no change at all to our pricing.


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## BRADSConst

BRADSConst said:


> It might take me a while to look for the training slide I got, although I may have deleted it too. If I find it, I'll post.


Found the email. It contained a link and the link no longer works. I guess you'll have to take my word for it..:innocent:


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## STARBABY

ontimepres said:


> For a grass cut update you should be able to get it done in 5 minutes or less ... unless it's a day their site is really having issues in which case I just consider it to be "down" and try again later. We're also in Florida and our zone or volume hasn't changed at all! Since we have a decent volume we make a good little profit with it. Sure we have complaints, but I'm happy to have the work and the $$. What made the biggest impression on me after the conference call was comparing the 2012 manual to the 2010 manual ... a ton of changes requiring extra work on our part but no change at all to our pricing.


 
The whole industry has did this, more work for same or less money! The only way it going to change if people start saying no! But then again we have people on here that have said that $25 lawn cuts are good, so do not think things will change!


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## tak

I use to be a vendor directly for a few nationals , NFR and 5 Brothers for instance. I have found it over the years that it was better for me to move away from the nationals and go with regionals instead. I did this because it's less paperwork on my end, quicker and easier upload times and frankly some of the best regionals I work with I have great relationships with and know them on a personal level plus I can drive to their office within a 1/2 days drive. The pay is lower of course but I usually always get what I bid and less headache on my end.


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## GTX63

My office manager used every shortcut and trick she knew from 7 years of doing Safeguard uploads. Grass cuts were 10-12 minutes per order if the site was running as advertised. 2-3 minutes, not yet.


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## tak

Cleanupman said:


> You are the first person in over 5 years that has stated 2-3 minutes an upload for this company...That's great when I keep jearing that you have to also do a PCR for any visit to a property that is SG's....with you only doing grass cuts this may not be a manditory thing for you but everyone else states it is....
> That is great though.....perhaps your wife can put an article together and explian to everyone how to work their system???? Sounds like you guys have a pretty good system and your information could help everyone working with SG that has upload issues with their system.....




Ok so here are a few of my hints to getting the safeguard site to work in my favor.
First of all make sure you have every platform that safeguard currently works on i.e. internet explorer, firefox, google chrome... This is due to that we all know internet explorer can be a bit squirrely and it is always good to have a backup just in case.
Second prep, prep all your photos and notes per property. For our grasses we take a photo of the work order prior to completing the job and everything is taken mostly in sequence so this really helps when submitting the grasses with the drag and drop system. during my prep I usually take the list from the crews that they completed that day and number them to align with the order in which they completed them (this speeds up the process as to I don't have to search for a property I can quickly scan through them)
Third once everything is prepped you are ready to go I always turn in those due asap first, one thing that does help is the memory tool on your browsers, this enables for pre-filling, when filling out certain aspects of your forms i.e. invoice numbers and amounts.
Fourth since multiple computers can be logged into one account at a time i sometimes bring up all three browsers and continue to work on orders in all three or bring up other laptops along with desktops and process at the same time. (do not submit at same time wait for one to save the update then clear out the next this helps to not slow down the system)

**** Helpful hints memorize your properties we may have 300 plus properties for one client but over time I have learned to memorize the properties this also helps when going through the work for the day to process. 
The later at night the smoother the SFG system is.
Stay ahead to avoid lates due to technical problems 
Keep plugging through on orders even if you have uploaded them several times eventually they will fall out of the system (had this problem in December orders weren't saving the updates weird).
Also type fast and always click fast on the next buttons that's why it only takes about 2 minutes for me on grass orders I can usually send in 20 within 45 minutes or less.

Have any questions just let me know
tak's wife


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## cvalley

*Sfg*

I've found that the only time you can do uploads in 3 minutes is at 4 AM. Otherwise, it's 4-5 with no tech issues. (Grascuts only).

I received their email Monday saying that zones were smaller and some other small changes. 

To my dismay, my already huge zones didn't shrink..."THEY DOUBLED IN SIZE!" Needless to say, I'll be speaking with my regional to see if they are going to be changes to this zone. There is no one...lowballer or otherwise, that is going to take these zones for what they want to pay.


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## Blue Granite PPs

tak said:


> Ok so here are a few of my hints to getting the safeguard site to work in my favor.
> First of all make sure you have every platform that safeguard currently works on i.e. internet explorer, firefox, google chrome... This is due to that we all know internet explorer can be a bit squirrely and it is always good to have a backup just in case.
> Second prep, prep all your photos and notes per property. For our grasses we take a photo of the work order prior to completing the job and everything is taken mostly in sequence so this really helps when submitting the grasses with the drag and drop system. during my prep I usually take the list from the crews that they completed that day and number them to align with the order in which they completed them (this speeds up the process as to I don't have to search for a property I can quickly scan through them)
> Third once everything is prepped you are ready to go I always turn in those due asap first, one thing that does help is the memory tool on your browsers, this enables for pre-filling, when filling out certain aspects of your forms i.e. invoice numbers and amounts.
> Fourth since multiple computers can be logged into one account at a time i sometimes bring up all three browsers and continue to work on orders in all three or bring up other laptops along with desktops and process at the same time. (do not submit at same time wait for one to save the update then clear out the next this helps to not slow down the system)
> 
> **** Helpful hints memorize your properties we may have 300 plus properties for one client but over time I have learned to memorize the properties this also helps when going through the work for the day to process.
> The later at night the smoother the SFG system is.
> Stay ahead to avoid lates due to technical problems
> Keep plugging through on orders even if you have uploaded them several times eventually they will fall out of the system (had this problem in December orders weren't saving the updates weird).
> Also type fast and always click fast on the next buttons that's why it only takes about 2 minutes for me on grass orders I can usually send in 20 within 45 minutes or less.
> 
> Have any questions just let me know
> tak's wife


 
Geezus, you forgot "cross your fingers" and "pray" LOOOORRRRDDDD


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## ADP LLC

BPWY said:


> You are a special operator for sure.
> 
> Its very rare that bank work pays better than local work.
> Sure ain't like that for me.
> 
> Plus I get paid sooner, sometimes with cash.



Always prefer bank work to residential. You do get paid faster on residential work but you have to deal with emotion when considering your prices. I have separate mindset when pricing residential jobs and it is almost always lower than what I could get on the flip side. I would rather get paid more to deal with the extra bs any day of the week.


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## 68W30

real quick and as a favor get us pics of the meters and tell us if the power is on


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## cvalley

Never had SG ask for any "extra pics" just the required ones. That is since 2009.


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## cvalley

Just got an email this afternoon that zone maps are now available...lol.
The web page for maps is currently down. Oh boy, this is gonna be a looooonnnngg spring


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## ontimepres

@cvalley and it's still not posted there! I know it was for a short period of time but I missed it. Talk about raining on my parade, anybody get a peek at their area?


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## tak

Yeah I did. I had to calll in and request. I used to cover a large zone but it is now 5 zones. I now have 2 zones but a lot closer to my office.


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## cvalley

I saw the link, but I think that it crashed the page because they took it down and I wasn't able to get on. I was sent maps of my "new zone" earlier in the week. However, they DOUBLED in size. I have a feeling they want me to cover where they cannot get anyone to cover north and west of me. Looks like I may be looking elsewhere for work if they think I am covering 2 hours in one direction away from my shop.


Let me know if the link is back up...I'll keep checking, too.


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## cvalley

Just found that if you log into vendor web it has the address you can log in and see the zones. it's something like [email protected]/maps/


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## mtmtnman

I honestly don't know how anyone can make it on SG's grass prices. $25-$30 recuts??? Hell we can drive 30-40 miles between properties! $25-$30 don't cover fuel and wear and tear! I'll stick with my vacation homes. 2-3X the money and no hassles!!!


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## cvalley

Who said anything about 25-30 per cut? We get much higher than that. Most of our driving is 5-10 minutes between stops. A few more out there, but that's the majority. However, this years maps are ridiculous in my area. May be done with them.


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## GTX63

*https://vnet.safeguardproperties.com/Maps/ *


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