# Safeguard Vendor Web Speed?



## Guest (Apr 19, 2012)

Anyone having speed issues with Vendor Web... It is taking about an hour to upload 3 jobs.I am told they are adding more servers and should have it back up at 100% by the weekend. I have 150+ Jobs to upload that is on hold....


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## HollandPPC (Sep 22, 2012)

AffordablePS said:


> Anyone having speed issues with Vendor Web... It is taking about an hour to upload 3 jobs.I am told they are adding more servers and should have it back up at 100% by the weekend. I have 150+ Jobs to upload that is on hold....


Join the club. I have about 400 grass cuts that I need uploaded.


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## SwiftRes (Apr 12, 2012)

Ditto! It's miserable. I was on about midnight to 1:30 AM this morning and it was pretty fast. Ha ha. Have to pick the times when no one is on. Seems a little better during the day, too.


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## Guest (Apr 20, 2012)

HollandPPC said:


> Join the club. I have about 400 grass cuts that I need uploaded.


I was contacted by them asking if I would like to do lawn cuts for them. How do they pay flat fee or hud regs.


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## david (Apr 11, 2012)

*hi*

it was 30 flat fee in ohio,told em there was no way


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## SwiftRes (Apr 12, 2012)

HUD regs if you're a maintenance vendor, flat fee if you are a grass only vendor, from my understanding. 

The thought of inputting 400 lawns scares me. Even at 10 minutes each, that's 66 hours.


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## BPWY (Apr 12, 2012)

I'm lucky that as a 1x vendor (not full time) that I can email my stuff in.

I think I am going to go that route on the trash out I just did for them.
I DO NOT have time for 3 hr up loads, not in the middle of spring rush lawn care!

Their site is always slow for me.


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## Prestigious Property (May 30, 2012)

I was at a rate of 3 an hour up till Friday then it went back up to running really fast... I was doing about 40 an hour.... Well as of today site went down and now will not even load up after I enter my Log-In info... This sucks cause my crap is late and no way to get it in....


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## BPWY (Apr 12, 2012)

I wonder how pissed their clients are over the apparent inability of IT to get their poop in a group.


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## Prestigious Property (May 30, 2012)

Well said.......


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## HollandPPC (Sep 22, 2012)

Is there a day where Vender Web does not crash?


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## REO2Rentals (Sep 18, 2012)

HollandPPC said:


> Is there a day where Vender Web does not crash?


So incompetence


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## SwiftRes (Apr 12, 2012)

Spent an hour or better yesterday getting a large REO order to about 95% completion. Just needed a few more pics. Whole order is empty, and now vendor web is down again. Also another REO we're working on today disappeared from my list. Hope they come back. They must have some serious IT issues going on for it to be this messed up for two-three weeks.


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## Prestigious Property (May 30, 2012)

Finally all of my 80+ orders that went into cyber hiding came back .... Site is working atleast for a day or two..lol....


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## SwiftRes (Apr 12, 2012)

I had to get my order in so started over. I only had one or two disappear. Seems like all data done on I think Tuesday disappeared for awhile, whether it was new orders or data entry.


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## BamaPPC (May 7, 2012)

As bad as it is getting the orders in...and that's BAD. The worst is, you're not getting paid until the orders are in and processed.

And THAT sucks


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## Prestigious Property (May 30, 2012)

I expect to miss about 2 checks in about two weeks.. Yes SUCKS!!


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## HollandPPC (Sep 22, 2012)

AffordablePS said:


> I expect to miss about 2 checks in about two weeks.. Yes SUCKS!!


They owe me about 30 k right now that is "past due" my check last week was $65.00. Gotta love it.


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## BPWY (Apr 12, 2012)

I'm at $5000 for them thats been delayed because of this.


How in the H can a company the size of theirs be this messed up in their IT department?
When your web processing is this vital to your entire operation???
How long until their clients start to really get unhappy about not getting results???


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## BBJP (Apr 26, 2012)

BPWY said:


> I'm at $5000 for them thats been delayed because of this.
> 
> How in the H can a company the size of theirs be this messed up in their IT department?
> When your web processing is this vital to your entire operation???
> How long until their clients start to really get unhappy about not getting results???


This is just another ploy to not pay their vendors.


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## BamaPPC (May 7, 2012)

While I trust them about as far as I could lift the whole company off the ground with my little finger, they had an IT problem. I watch my invoices VERY closely. And I have a few invoices that I have to bring to their attention every month to get paid, it's usually just a two or three small amount invoices. This deal with the website was a real problem and not a ploy.

I'm not making excuses for them. They should have had the problem fixed during the first 48 hours, or not had the rpoblem at all if it was as they said, installation of new servers. If they had a melt down of the existing servers, then that's unforseeable and underztandable that they had the problem. But, it should have been fixed quickly.


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## BBJP (Apr 26, 2012)

BamaPPC said:


> While I trust them about as far as I could lift the whole company off the ground with my little finger, they had an IT problem. I watch my invoices VERY closely. And I have a few invoices that I have to bring to their attention every month to get paid, it's usually just a two or three small amount invoices. This deal with the website was a real problem and not a ploy.
> 
> I'm not making excuses for them. They should have had the problem fixed during the first 48 hours, or not had the rpoblem at all if it was as they said, installation of new servers. If they had a melt down of the existing servers, then that's unforseeable and underztandable that they had the problem. But, it should have been fixed quickly.


When these problems arise regularly, you mean to tell me a $500 million company can't forecast the need for additional servers 2-3 months in advance?


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## BamaPPC (May 7, 2012)

I 100% agree that if the root problem was a need for new servers, then the IT department head should be fired for not planning ahead.

But, that's not what I was told. I was told they had a problem with existing servers, and decided to replace/add a bunch when the problem occured. 

Kinda like changing the timing belt when you blow a head gasket. Since the motor is down and apart, and the car has 240K miles on it, might as well replace that timing belt while you have the chance.

Again, I am in no way defending them. I'm mad as hell at them. My check this week is about 7K shorter than it should have been. But, they have promised to try and correct the situation.
Here's the email I got - 

_Safeguard Properties and our management staff are aware of the impact that the Vendor Web slowness has had over the last couple of weeks . In our effort to show our appreciation and keep funds coming in, we will make an adjustment to the standard pay schedule for the pay cycle next week.

Thank you for working through the difficulties and your dedication to Safeguard._

That just does ring true with it being a ploy to not pay. But, we'll wait and see what adjustment they make.


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## GTX63 (Apr 12, 2012)

Yes, watch your checks. On a regular basis, they do not pay the amount that we invoiced, or the invoice numbers are flipped around and you can't figure out which invoice they are paying you for. It is like they put people in accounting that can't handle answering phones or doing front line work.


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## SwiftRes (Apr 12, 2012)

Site is down all day again.


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## BamaPPC (May 7, 2012)

You'd figure a company that's been in business for 20 years and is one of the largest in the country could keep a damn website up for more than a week at a time.


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## SwiftRes (Apr 12, 2012)

BamaPPC said:


> You'd figure a company that's been in business for 20 years and is one of the largest in the country could keep a damn website up for more than a week at a time.


You'd think. One of my trucks blew an engine so I am a little behind on orders. They were all over my case to get them in this morning, so I go to submit about fifteen orders and site is down all day. Email my contacts and they have no idea when it will be back up. Probably get more nasty emails in morning about late work.

Is it just me or is it about impossible to keep a good on time % with them? It may be that I'm covering a large 150 mile square zone for them.


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## BamaPPC (May 7, 2012)

SwiftRes said:


> Is it just me or is it about impossible to keep a good on time % with them? It may be that I'm covering a large 150 mile square zone for them.


It ain't just you. I really make an effort to stay ahead of the work load. I really do. And I usually have a high 80% to low 90% on time. Lately, I can't seem to get above 85%, and I can't figure out where we were that late. We just do the best we can and keep stroking.


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## HollandPPC (Sep 22, 2012)

Just got my scorecard. Not sure how I pulled it off but I got a 96. I must be dreaming. Lol.


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## GTX63 (Apr 12, 2012)

No offense to anyone here, but I couldn't give a rat's rear end about their scorecards. We have clients that pay better and faster and the only card I get from them is at Christmas, and then it might have a check inside. Those people are our priority #1. We told Safeguard point blank this spring when they started sending over grass cuts that were already two weeks late "Our service to you will be commensurate with the level of money you are willing to pay. Otherwise, you will need to reassign your lawn orders to Pepe. I should send them a chart with all of our customers and point out on the board where they are in professionalism, courtesy and pay.


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## HollandPPC (Sep 22, 2012)

GTX63 said:


> No offense to anyone here, but I couldn't give a rat's rear end about their scorecards. We have clients that pay better and faster and the only card I get from them is at Christmas, and then it might have a check inside. Those people are our priority #1. We told Safeguard point blank this spring when they started sending over grass cuts that were already two weeks late "Our service to you will be commensurate with the level of money you are willing to pay. Otherwise, you will need to reassign your lawn orders to Pepe. I should send them a chart with all of our customers and point out on the board where they are in professionalism, courtesy and pay.


At least you found the humor in my post.


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## BamaPPC (May 7, 2012)

I know most people on here really hate Safeguard. And I can understand most of it. They can be real bastards at times. But, knowing the rules, such as they are, going into performing work for them, I haven't had that much trouble. I occassionally get a reduced invoice, I send off the supporting documentation to the adjustment department, and sometimes, with the 30 day billing cycle, I get paid the adjustment a week before I get paid for the actual work. 

I've had very few chargebacks, mostly because I'm very throrough. The biggest problem I have with them is the reduced bids. I submit a bid and they cut it prior to sending it off to the client, without telling me prior to sending in my bid. This goes against everything I know about a bid process. I've had bids sent off to the client and then they come back with a reduced amount that they are willing to pay. I then can either negotiate that amount, or turn it down. But if the bid is cut prior to sending it to the client...I just turn it down.

I've had about 8 different regional coordinators over the years, some are good at their jobs, and are at least sympathetic to the contractor. Others have been real knuckle-heads. Incompetent almost to the point of stupidity. (side note - I can deal with ignorance, ignorance can be cured. But stupidity, that's like herpes - there ain't no cure) The good ones are promoted and the bad ones don't stay long.

Overall, Safeguard pays regularly, maybe not quickly but regularly. I've worked for a couple other nationals/regionals, and Safeguard is no worse, and in some cases better than others. Some didn't have a good system for updating orders, some didn't pay on time and/or not at all, some don't have a good system set up to deal with problems at properties. SG gets decent to high marks in these catagories.

Now, all that said. I will not defend them. I do not like some of their business practices. They take money from contractors going and coming. They use the FMN/FMC/FHA allowables to their advantage every chance they get. They trim money out of the allowables and tell you that just because the allowable says "up to $100" doesn't mean you get the max. You get $90, and then we're going to take another 25% off of that. They've said that FHA changed they way they pay for locksets. BS. SG is pocketing that extra money.

Man, I get worked up and don't know when to quit typing. I'll stop now.:whistling


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## GTX63 (Apr 12, 2012)

LOL. We don't hate them. If your willing to do business with Nationals like Safeguard, you have to go in with your eyes wide open. Our chargebacks are few and far between and yes, with the right person, you can get issues straightened out in short order. We had an order sent to us to tarp a roof about a month ago. The order was sent to us in an email but never appeared on their web page. Sent out a couple of guys to check it out and make the repair under the allowables. Later their web site crashed. The order never appears so we start making phone calls. Get a supervisor who tells us that we already uploaded pics. WTH???. I said no we did not and further, we need to upload the invoice. So she reopens the order, we upload the pics and the invoice. Guess what? A week later we get a billing penalty because there were photos in the order that were not date stamped. They are not our photos so we went back to the house and what do you know? Someone else tarped the roof too! LOL. Over an area that wasn't leaking. That can't even manage their own office and they penalize me for the other boob's work. Anyway....


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## SwiftRes (Apr 12, 2012)

In six months now with SG haven't had any issues. Fluctuating volume is an issue and hard to staff for, but other than that it's been fine. As far as their pay, it's the same as nearly everyone else in the industry.

The bottom line question GTX, did you get paid for your tarp?

Lawns are a whole different boat and I wouldn't compare their lawns to the rest of their biz. I am only in P&P and REO, haven't done hazard claims or repairs.


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## BamaPPC (May 7, 2012)

OOH OOH, let me tell you my roof tarp story.

This property has been in inventory for about two years. Bad neighborhood, many break-ins, all the copper and hvac gone...you know the type.

First visit, lock and grass. Roof is in horrible shape. It's old, it's leaking, lots of leaves in the valleys. Mold spot in a bathroom ceiling. We bid to remove the roof debris so we can get a full inspection of the roof condition. At the same time I also place a bid to replace the entire roof. Nothing comes back. Things rock along. We go through a wint season and then almost all the way through the next GC season before we are asked to go back to this property. It's an ICC inspection. I get there perform the inspection, someone else has put a roof on the place, but I notice that the mold spot in the bathroom hasn't been addressed and it looks bigger. I get back to the office, check my last photos of the mold, sure enough it is bigger, darker, and has changed shape. Well, I immediately call in to the bid desk and explain to them what I've seen, they tell me to tarp the roof. I get money approved and go do it. Some few days later I get an email saying I'm being charged back the full amount of my tarping because it was unnessary. There's a new roof on the place. I need to go back and remove the tarp and tar patch all the nail holes.

I was, to say the least, P.O'd. I call into the guy that sent the email. I get the run around about how I should have known that the roof had just been put on 4 months ago. And he even had the audacity to tell me I need to help train his people in situations like this.  He said I should have told the bid desk person that tarping was not neccesary.

I had to hang up. I was ready to chew nails and spit out barbed wire.
If I had not tarped that roof, talked his bid desk person out of it, and it turned out that there was a roof leak...I'm putting in all new sheetrock and a new roof and whatever else they can tack on.

I damn near quit. But, I took a few hours to calm down (beer helps), and then I went back to work, on figuring out how I was going to get back twice the charge back. A couple months later, I did. But, that's another story.


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## david (Apr 11, 2012)

*hi*

safeguard will eventually end up like fas,both companies are hard to understand..


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