Jan-Pro Franchising review: Deceit and Fraud 26

This person who calls himself the Voice of reason is someone from corporate at jan-pro. Maybe I should have some of the Vets that have called me call you and maybe they can tell you how they got ripped off. How can you Ripoff people who put there lives on the line to give us Fredom! We know jan-pro is waching this Blog but we will not back down. We will fight for justice!

1. First of all jan-pro did not do what they promised they lied to people to get there money. They told me that I would make $25.00 Dollars an hour. That was a big lye. They also underbid accounts so Low that they bid them to pay Less than Minimum wage!

2. Second they comited Fraud. I have talked to many people across the country and most had there accounts stolen. The operation managers would tell the cleaner that the customer wasn't happy with there work and that they would get them another account. So they would get the cleaner to turn in the keys. Later on the cleaner finds out that the customer had no complaints and that infact the customer was very happy with the cleaners work. This is a Racket that needs to be prosecuted.

3. Third Judges have already said that the way some cleaning franchisors operate are like Ponzi Scheemes and they have also ruled a cleaner an employee and not a franchisee this acording to the Law.

To jaboy I dont believe you. The reason I don't is because did you just wake up one day and say I'm going on complaintsboard today and post how good I have it. No you didn't your just someone at corporate who comes in here trying to do damage control. I have heard many complaints from people in Charlote.

To Lying Source. I see you can't handle the truth so now you try and say its hearsay. LOL What are you going to say when hundreds of us who got riped of go into court with proof! What are you going to say then?

Again you just make up LIES about me. You are a LIAR!

The accounts that I cleaned never ever asked for me to be removed. Infact they wanted me to stay but I could not because jan-pro made it imposible for a hardworking man to stay in business. jan-pro makes there money by ripping off people.

1. jan-pro tells people that they can make $100, 000 Dollars a year. They tell you that you will grow your business and be able to hire people. Then they give you accounts that pay less than minimum wage. That is Fraud!

2.They take accounts away from people for no reason other than to rip them off. that is Theft!

You say more LIES. You are a Big Fat Liar!
Attorneys are working on a constiguency basis. We are not paying them $400.00 Dollars an hour.

More Lies that you tell. You are a Liar.
The lawsuit hasn't been going for 7 years. The lawsuit is 2 1/2 years old.

Why do you lie so much ?

Taking off the Gloves
Commercial cleaning franchisees sue

By Julie Bennett
As published in: Franchise Times - August 2009

Several pending court cases, which are all seeking class-action status, challenge the business model on which some of the largest commercial cleaning franchisors have operated for decades.

Lawsuits have been filed against Jani-King International of Addison, Texas; Coverall Health-Based Cleaning System of Boca Raton, Florida; and Jan-Pro Franchising International of Alpharetta, Georgia.

That business model, developed by Jani-King’s founders in 1974 and since copied by competitors, is promoted as a low-cost business opportunity. Each franchisor sells off regions of the country to master franchisors who then sell unit franchises to individuals–mostly minorities and immigrants–who pay franchise fees of $2, 000 to $5, 000, plus “finders’ fees” for a specific amount of monthly business. At Coverall, for example, a franchisee would pay a total of $10, 750 for a franchise package that provides $1, 500 of commercial cleaning business each month. The Coverall regional franchisor then provides all the training, obtains and distributes all the cleaning contracts, sells required supplies and insurance coverage and does all the billing and collections–services those with a native language other than English might find useful.

But the lawsuits, filed recently in Massachusetts against all three companies and in Pennsylvania, Minnesota and California against Jani-King, contend that the cleaning companies misrepresent their offerings, because they do not have sufficient customers to guarantee each franchisee the amount of monthly cleaning business they purchase. Instead, the lawsuits allege, they breach their contracts by underbidding the amount of time and staffing required for each job, refusing to allow franchisees to inspect cleaning jobs or bid sheets before accepting or rejecting a job, offering geographically inconvenient jobs and unjustly taking jobs from one franchisee to re-sell them to others.

Perhaps more damaging is a second contention–that these so-called franchisees have so little control over their livelihoods, they should be re-classified as employees of the janitorial franchisors and, therefore, entitled to minimum wages, overtime pay, unemployment benefits and worker’s compensation.

Lawsuits over misrepresentation and breach of contract are nothing new. According to its 2008 FDD (Franchise Disclosure Document), Coverall has settled 26 such cases in the past 10 years, admitting no guilt, but paying former franchisees settlements of $3, 575 to $450, 000. Many of the 52 pieces of litigation listed in Jani-King’s FDD also ended in settlement payments. Commercial cleaning franchise contracts are usually written only in English (Coverall has offered a Spanish translation since 2004) and are so complex that the state of Maryland adds a warning page about potential risk factors to their FDDs, said Dale Cantone, Maryland’s assistant attorney general. The Federal Trade Commission distributes a 19-page booklet of cautions for people considering commercial cleaning franchises.

What is new is the second charge, that commercial cleaning franchisees are merely buying themselves low-paying jobs and should be treated like employees. In 2006 the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that a Coverall “franchisee, ” Rhina Alvarenga, was actually an employee and therefore entitled to unemployment benefits after Coverall removed her from a nursing home cleaning account. Attorneys representing Jani-King, Jan-Pro and other Coverall franchisees cited that decision in their complaints. “It’s possible that the business model under which they’ve operated could be ruled illegal, ” said one of the attorneys.

Shannon Liss-Riordan, an attorney with the Boston firm Lichten & Liss-Riordan, who has filed lawsuits against Jani-King, Jan-Pro and Coverall, said, “It’s heartbreaking to meet immigrants who have put their entire life savings into these franchises thinking they will have businesses to support themselves and their families. Instead, they are buying jobs that are terrible, that pay less than minimum wage. When they do get a check, the franchisor has taken out so many deductions, for royalties, supplies, management fees and bogus insurance policies, that they receive very little. I’ve seen pay stubs that say the franchisee owes the company money.”

The other side responds

Representatives of the janitorial franchises disagreed. Jacqueline Vlaming, Coverall’s general counsel, said, “Every franchise owner who runs it like a business can make money. Ninety-nine percent of the people who buy a Coverall franchise are committed to it.” Ron Rosenwasser, of Friedman, Rosenwasser & Goldbaum, of Boca Raton, who represents Jan-Pro, said, “We have thousands of franchisees who work hard and develop their franchise; others fail because they do not work the territory or are distracted by personal problems.” And Don Burleson, executive vice president of Jani-King, said, “We have over 12, 000 franchisees worldwide who have been operating for decades and have many success stories.”

All three top cleaning franchises claim to have thousands of unit franchisees. Jani-King and Jan-Pro, in fact, trade titles as the country’s fastest-growing franchise. But when Franchise Times made random phone calls to “active franchisees” listed in FDDs from all three systems, we found only a handful of people who said they were still happily working the franchise.

Since they operate through regional master franchisors, Coverall, Jani-King and Jan-Pro do not file FDDs that list all their unit franchisees. Their master franchisors are required to file their own FDDs, including franchisee listings, in registration states. New Venture of San Bernardino, a Jan-Pro regional franchisor in California, lists 94 franchisees in its most recent FDD.When Franchise Times called 39 of them at random, only three we reached said they were still active (two said they were making money and a third said she was “doing all right, but I’m not glad I got into this.”) Of the rest, 10 phone numbers had been disconnected or reassigned, seven phones were never answered, 11 people never returned our messages, four people spoke only Spanish and four others said they had left the franchise because they never made any money.

Out of 17 franchisees listed in Jani-King’s Los Angeles/Colton region, we reached only two that were still active. An Ohio woman listed as a current Coverall franchisee said, “I gave them $16, 000 and didn’t get squat. After two years, the most I made was $600 a month.”
Celeste Iles, of Rialto, California, said, “I paid Jan-Pro of San Bernardino $5, 000 for $1, 600 worth of work every month. Before I paid the money, I was told that I’d get accounts in the Rialto area and that I could decline jobs in cities I didn’t ask to be in. Once I started, they offered me one cleaning account in Chino, which is 25 miles away, and others 15 to 20 miles away. When I turned those down, they said the offers fulfilled their contractual obligation. They did give me a few little accounts, but I never got my maximum volume.I cleaned one building diligently for over a year. Suddenly, the person in the Jan-Pro office said my level of cleaning went down and I lost the account. When I went back to the customer, they told me they never had a problem with me. I discovered that Jan-Pro would take accounts away from one franchisee to sell them to another franchisee.”

Gerardo Vazquez, of Bloomington, California, said he, too, had purchased a franchise that was supposed to generate $1, 600 worth of business each month from the San Bernardino Jan-Pro office. “But the office would underbid each contract, and no matter how hard I worked, I never made more than $4 to $5 an hour.” After Vazquez posted his complaints on Internet blogs, he was contacted by so many other Jan-Pro franchisees, they decided to file a class-action lawsuit. He is now one of the 12 lead plaintiffs involved in Liss-Riordan’s Jan-Pro lawsuit, filed last December in federal court in Massachusetts.

Fulton Connor, Jan-Pro’s master franchisor in San Bernardino and San Jose, denied that his office underbid contracts. “Some people, like Mr. Vazquez, took too long and were not following the cleaning schedule. In general, our franchisees are happy. I’ve had owners thank me because they were able to buy homes for the first time in their lives.”

Jan-Pro CEO Richard Kissane called the lawsuits “witch hunts” and said, “We have only one lawsuit in our FDD. If we didn’t have wonderful relationships with our franchisees, we’d have lawsuits out the yin yang.”

Liss-Riordan said, “The reasons we see so few complaints from commercial cleaning franchisees is that immigrants are often nervous about exercising their rights in the U.S. legal system. They don’t know who to contact or they’re embarrassed about losing so much money.”

That may soon change. Thomas Pahl, of Foley & Mansfield in Minneapolis, who specializes in class-action cases, filed his case on January 27, 2009, on behalf of 52 Jani-King franchisees who were referred to his firm. In that case, Jani-King, represented by the Minneapolis firm of Faegre & Benson, won motions to dismiss 11 of the plaintiffs because their claims were too old and to move the action from state to federal court. But a request to dismiss the case altogether was denied.

The companies’ business model might have worked a few years ago, before all three had recruited so many franchisees, the attorneys for the plaintiffs agree. Now they’re so desperate for cleaning contracts “they’re racing each other to the bottom, making bids so low it’s not possible to do this work and make a living, ” said Liss Riordan. “If we’re successful, ” she added, “we’d like to see cleaning work done by employees who receive the benefits of employment.”

Jani-King’s Burleson predicted a different outcome. “I don’t believe there’s any merit in these lawsuits, ” he said. “There’s nothing different now. We’ve been doing the same thing for decades.”

The Coverall case is still going on. Infact the Supreme court has now taken over that case and they will decide how much Coverall will have to pay for hurting all those people. You are trying to confuse people and use the same tactics that the cleaning franchisors use Deceit and Lies! The jan-pro case has only been around for a little more than 2 years so quit trying to confuse people. The coverall case has gone for a little bit longer. However as long as these fake cleaning franchisors keep ripping off people and families. They will keep getting sued. Just look at all the lawsuits coverall, jani-king, jan-pro, cleannet, stratus have!

If you have been riped-off by jan-pro you should file a complaint with the FTC Federal trade commision and attorney general

www.Ftc.Gov

You can also go to www.llrlaw.com this is one of the many lawfirms suing jan-pro.

You can also contact me if you want any information on this Lawsuit

Jerry [protected]

Climaco Guzman and Cielo Guzman vs. Jan-Pro Cleaning Systems, Inc. and Carol McLennan (Case No. C. A. P96-4703, Superior Court of the State of Rhode Island, and Providence Plantations) was filed on September 4, 1996. Mr. Guzman, a JAN-PRO unit franchisee, brought this suit against Jan-Pro Cleaning Systems, Inc., a Rhode Island regional master franchisee, and Carol McLennan, who at that time was the regional master franchisee''s vice President, alleging breach of contract and fraud because of the defendants'' alleged failure to provide Mr. Guzman with the customer accounts provided for in Mr. Guzman''s Unit Franchise Agreement. The Trial Court ruled in favor of Mr. Guzman and awarded Mr. Guzman damages of $120, 00 0 and attorneys'' fees of $7, 500.

Ellen Morales, Plaintiff vs. Clean 17, Inc. (d/b/a Jan-Pro Cleaning Systems of Southwest FL), and Jan-Pro Franchising International, Inc., Defendants; Circuit Court of the 20th Judicial Circuit, Lee County, Florida; Case No. 07-CA6992: Ellen Morales ("Morales"), a franchisee of Clean 17, Inc., ("Southwest Jan-Pro"), filed a complaint on July 8, � 2007, against Southwest Jan-Pro., � a Florida regional master

6012FranDocs-CAAgt-FDD-RegionalMaster-CA-TST.doc 1.29.2008 14:001.11.2007 14.2S 4

franchisee, and Jan-Pro Franchising International, Inc. ("JPI"), the franchisor. The complaint asserts the following causes of action against Southwest Jan-Pro: 1) . breach of contract, alleging that Southwest Jan-Pro: failed to pay total gross monthly revenue or monthly gross billing owed for customer accounts; failed to provide the minimum number of customer cleaning accounts; failed to provide start�up equipment and cleaning supplies; failed to provide adequate advisory services; failed to provide invoicing and billing services; failed to provide mandatory training; and failed to provide adequate assistance with customer accounts; 2) fraud in the inducement, alleging that Southwest Jan-Pro made misrepresentations to induce Morales to purchase the franchise; 3) general fraud, alleging that Southwest Jan-Pro''s misrepresented Morales''s ability to recoup investment and obtain replacement accounts; and 4) quantum meruit, alleging that Southwest Jan-Pro was unjustly enriched because it failed to fully pay Morales for labor, services, and materials. The complaint also asserts negligence against JPI, alleging that JPI failed to perform its duty to properly train, supervise and implement company policies, procedures and obligations. Morales is demanding damages and attorneys'' fees and payment of $32, 094.05 for labor and materials for service she allegedly performed. On October 19, 2007, JPI filed a Motion for Extension of Time and has not filed any response to the Complaint.

Coverall LOST ! HIT HARD !

AWUAH WINS !

Jan-Pro is NEXT !

The Supreme Court RULED that franchisor must PAY BACK.

Here is the link to the article
http://www.bluemaumau.org/10644/franchisor_hit_hard_pretending_employees_are_franchisees

BOSTON – Today the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court smacked Coverall janitorial franchise system with a huge bill for labeling its employees as franchisees.

The high court ruled that the franchisor must pay back franchise related fees, including franchise fees, promissory note payments, additional business fees, and payments for insurance.

Experts think the ruling that franchisees can be disguised employees will ripple down to other franchise systems and other states.

Coverall argued that the franchisee should only be allowed to collect fees directly related to the misclassification. Because the additional fees Pius Awuah sought were the result of his contract agreement with the franchisor, Coverall asserted that they should not apply to the damages he sought.

Coverall SJC Decision
U.S. District Court Judge William G. Young ruled (pdf) that the misclassified employees could collect wages, insurance premiums and other employment benefits, but the attorneys for the franchisees weren't satisfied. Shannon Liss-Riordan of Lichten & Liss-Riordon stated that her clients should also be paid all fees. She said, "By requiring companies to fully reimburse employees for all the fees they incurred as a result of misclassification, the court will send a message to employers that wage law violations will not be tolerated."

The judge then certified the Awuah v Coverall case to Massachusetts highest court after determining that state wage laws require employers to cover certain statutory costs of doing business, and that shifting such expenses to a misclassified worker constitutes damages incurred. Because the Supreme Judicial Court had no controlling precedence, Judge Young submitted pertinent questions to give the court the opportunity to set a precedent in defining the damages that should be available to the employees misclassified as independent contractors.

On one pertinent question addressing whether Coverall could deduct franchise fees from the employees' wages, the state's Supreme Court concluded, "No. . . the Wage Act forbids the deduction."

Prior to the decision the case had brought criticism from the franchisor community. Coverall attorney Michael D. Vhay of Boston's DLA Piper stated that broadening the damages beyond wages and benefits would produce a flood of litigation and drive franchisors from the state because they would be unable to collect fees from franchisees.

Steve Calderia, CEO of the International Franchise Association said, "On behalf of the franchise industry, we urge the court to fully take into account the unique attributes of franchising and the federal regulatory oversight of the franchise business model."

Following the court's decision, Liss-Riordan said, "Today's ruling from the SJC is a long-awaited victory for potentially thousands of cleaning workers throughout Massachusetts. The court determined that Massachusetts wage laws and public policy prohibit employers from selling jobs to employees." Liss-Riordan added that the commercial cleaning industry has been plagued by companies such as Coverall that claim to be franchisors but are really employers who make their money by profiting off of their own workers. She said, "This ruling will allow commercial cleaning to be performed in Massachusetts by legitimate employers who do not charge their workers for their jobs. The ruling will have huge ramifications on the commercial cleaning industry, as well as potentially other industries, and the ruling will likely have ripple effects in other states."