American Home Specialists American Home Specialist fraud ripoff greedy criminals Latrobe Pennsylvania

I am a former employee of this company and I am writing this to keep others from being ripped off by American Home Specialists, which is based out of Waldorf, MD.  The company has offices in Maryland, Virginia, Missouri, and in Pennsylvania where I worked.  Most of the salespeople that worked for the company have quit over the past three years because this company routinely rips them off for their commissions.  Most recently, after hiring nearly 20 salespeople to work a storm in the Atlanta area, they changed the pay plan mid-storm and mid-contract with no prior notice.  Most of these salespeople traveled across country to work this particular storm, and were away from their families for weeks and months at a time, only to get cheated out of their commissions.  This led to complete chaos among the ranks, and many people quit except for a couple of the managers who were on salary.  After this happened, the president of the company had the gall to ask those who wanted to stay on to work for free for a couple of months while the company "got back on its feet".  I'm not sure how the company got off it's feet int he first place, because many thousands of dollars were collected from homeowners but not paid out as promised for commissions.

When he is asked about paying commissions, the CEO, Michael S. Hoppe, will typically respond that he is busy and will get around to it but he never actually "gets around to it".  I have been waiting to be paid for almost a year now for deals that I closed last fall and winter.  Because I became concerned about my money, I began to investigate this company and discovered many lawsuits filed against them, along with a number of criminal charges agains Michael S. Hoppe and Jonathan Scott Hoppe (President), who are the two leaders of the organization.  These criminal charges in the state of Maryland are public record, and include assaults, resisting arrest, along with many other civil, traffic, and criminal complaints.  Yet they try to appear to customers as though they are a charitable organization and will tout their standing with the American Red Cross and the UASRC (United Association of Storm Restoration Contractors) as supposed proof that they are ethical.  Meanwhile they continue to rip off the hard-working people who went out and solicited business for them.

Add to that, we had another gentleman who while working for them fell from a roof and sustained severe life-altering injuries.  After his fall, he discovered that this company does not carry workman's compensation insurance as mandated by law, and that he would be responsible for paying his own hospital expenses which were well into the six-figure range.  He had to go to court to get them to pay for his hospital expenses, and this was after having worked for them for three years and even knowing them personally prior to working for them.

Please do not support this company by hiring them, or by working for them.  A simple search using sites like Angie's List (which has a poor ranking for this company) will afford you much better-reviewed alternatives for your restoration work.