TANK SOLUTIONS

When selling my home, the buyer's realtor asked for a tank sweep and recommended Tank Solutions.   I hired them after their technicians came out and said that there was a tank in my front yard, which was a surprise because the previous owners of my home said there was no tank.  The technician had a difficult time because the detector was going off indicating something metal was in the ground, but it wasn't a clear-cut situation.  However, he had to make a call in one direction or the other, so he said there was a tank.  I asked him how much it would cost to remove the tank and he said $900 for an excavation fee to make sure a tank was there and another $600 (for $1500 total) to remove the tank.  Remediation and oil removal would be additional.  I ran around municipal offices with two kids getting permits expedited so we could sell the house.  When I asked the Tank Solutions staff if there might be any chance at all there could be a mistake,  they said "no", the technician had never been wrong before,  so I signed off on paperwork agreeing to pay $1500 to remove the supposed oil tank in my yard.  The excavating crew came by and were great.  They were diligent, neat, and worked through pouring rain - to find old car parts in my yard.  The owner came out to verify the find and the crew left without re-seeding the area torn up by the digger because another truck drove off with the hay and seed.  
After they left, I called the office to ask how much I would owe since there wasn't a tank after all.  I had already paid a $500 deposit.  The receptionist said she would check with the owner.  Later the owner called and asked me "why would I think that I wouldn't have to pay anything when he sent $250K worth of equipment out to work at my home" and the conversation went downhill from there.  When I told him about the excavation fee, he said that his employees weren't supposed to quote prices to customers.  When I told him I asked what my balance due would be since there was no tank, he said that his receptionist told him that I said I didn't want to pay anything at all (apparently disregarding that I had already paid a deposit).  I said that was not the case, to which he replied that he had had these types of problems before with the receptionist.  
Regardless, the owner was basically getting upset with me because of issues he was having with his employees.  In the end, he said he would accept an additional $400 for a total of $900, which is what the technician said would be the cost to dig and confirm whether or not there was a tank.  He also had the crew come out the next day to seed and put hay down to repair the torn up yard.  Overall, it was an incredibly stressful time thinking that I might have a 60 year old oil tank that might be leaking in my yard while I was in the middle of trying to sell a house and then having to deal with this company that made a mistake and became difficult to deal with when I tried to question the pricing.  This is something no one should have to deal with when trying to sell a house.

The work turned out good.  They were very efficient.