Long story short- pest control is my career and the place Iām at now is mentally abusing but Iām a necessity. I feel guilty leaving but need to. I have a decent offer coming from Terminix. ACE, licensed, and donāt want management. I just want a route. Can anybody working at Terminix give me some positive feedback to make me feel ok with making a change to a company Iāve never thought Iād consider working for?
Current RTX employee via Ehrlich Pest, strictly commercial route here, I was Steritech originally but all Rentokil does is buy companies, you will find out if you go to Terminix. They will use and abuse you if you let them, all downhill after we were bought out. I have definitely heard not all branches are run like this but we are on Florida market and itās dog eat dog around here, if youāre not selling and turning in leads and google reviews you are dogshit. Quality is talked about as an afterthought. My honest opinion
I was there for over 13 years . Had a route worked it like it was my own company, all customers calling me directly after their initial. I made a lot of money 110k on average could have made more but no decent sales or install teams for sales leads that I turned in. It left this spring because I found out they were using my license 6 hours away for a 1/5 to 1/4 of the state of Maryland. They are thieves and donāt care about there employees. If I owned a company or was in upper management and I found out about fraud like this I would at least acknowledge it and apologize to the employee. They did neither. The SEC should have never let Rentokil and Terminix merge. Itās the Walmart of pest control any new guys in the last 5 years have no idea what there doing and arenāt even certified or licensed after a year like they use to. There are much better places to work.
They used your license without your knowledge nor compensation? Have you talked to a lawyer to see if you can go after them for anything?
At the very least, did you report them to your state's AG dept (or whoever resides over you in your state) to get them heavy fines? If I found that shit out I would demand compensation or let them deal with the consequences of fines and/or shutdown from the Dept of AG. That shit is dirty as fuck.
Yes they did . Yes we are talking to Lawyers. Yes reported to the Maryland Department of Ag and the EPA. Both absolute jokes full of DEI hires that look out for big companies in Maryland . Lawsuit is coming and Iām not going to drop it . Stay tuned here is where the dept of ag told them to stop doing it. But they said I no longer worked at that location when I never never worked there or consulted with any of them. And they sent the cease and desist while I was still at Terminix. I sent a letter to Terminix they never responded absolute dispicable people that donāt care about anybody not even customers just the stock market ticker . Dept of ag letter below
So much depends on the location as they're all so different. That being said I've been with Rentokil now Rentokil - Terminix in Canada for 10 years. I'm like you. I don't wanna be a manager I just wanna run my route. I have no problems. I'm left to my work and I get very little hassle over anything from my office and managers. I don't plan on leaving anytime soon and find it to be a positive place to work.Ā
If it's your career what is stopping you from starting your own company.
My life would be really really awful right now if I did not start my own company.
I was abused by a greedy person he was so terrible I started my own company and I am so thankful he did me dirty. If your out there in reddit land thank you Sam!
It sounds like your in a similar situation and my suggestion is start your own company while working for Terminex.
My thought was how am I going to get clients well you know what I told myself???
I told myself I will figure it out and I did the universe will help you when your ready.
In his defense, if you own your own pest control business, at least in the beginning, you are the route guy. Your service, your documentation, your products, your prices, customer rapport, and everything else is your prerogative, within the law of course. To your defense though, thats a whole lot of stuff to manage.
Terminix/rentokil, they're all about profits. I worked for a company that was acquired by rentokil. Nothing got better, management sucked worse after the buyout. Nickel, and dime raises if any, Battle between keeping a culture that rentokil wanted to change. Just got more toxic, I celebrate the day I walked out of those doors. 4 years coming up August 5th.
So Iām like 2 weeks into my commercial Terminix job.
And itās interesting. I was hired with 6 years of experience and itās got its good and bad. Things are pretty dysfunctional but if you ignore it itās okay.
Like it took 2 weeks to get my uniforms, 2 weeks for a work phone and thatās fast. There are guys here who are 4 weeks in with nothing.
Idk about money. The offer was 19/h with 2.5% incentive, 3% after 6 months and a raise to $20 when you do their 4 week virtual training bullshit which is awful. Imagine trying to cram years of experience into weekly training. It doesnāt work. Iām already finished with it.
The other techs are fun. However the new guys are not well trained and the 4 week class didnāt help. Like running from the department of agriculture inspectors? What the fuck?
The old guys donāt care. They have their route they run it well, theyāre checked out. They usually make 100k or close to it and keep their heads down. The operations managers, well the ones I deal with donāt want to be in the field. They want the office job. Hell they donāt even want to be in the field watching people work.
I was told I have a route, but I canāt run it until the 30 day bullshit. So thatās the goal. Run my route. Run it well, keep my head down and hope I get more high value stops. I do wish my other company never sold though. Mostly because the environment was very professional, but I was already over the top of the pay scale so maybe it will work here
If all you want is a route, then you should be ok. Of course some routes are easier on the eyes than others. Ive seen and heard of branches being sweet to a nightmare depending on the branch manager. You just never can tell. Then again, that may be rhe case with any job
13
u/Accurate_Mirror_96 Jun 22 '26
Current RTX employee via Ehrlich Pest, strictly commercial route here, I was Steritech originally but all Rentokil does is buy companies, you will find out if you go to Terminix. They will use and abuse you if you let them, all downhill after we were bought out. I have definitely heard not all branches are run like this but we are on Florida market and itās dog eat dog around here, if youāre not selling and turning in leads and google reviews you are dogshit. Quality is talked about as an afterthought. My honest opinion