Immediate Response Locksmith Charged a service fee to come out and tell me I needed someone to pick the lock. San Antonio Texas

Yesterday, my son googled Pop-a-Lock and got this number for a placed called Immediate Response Locksmith.  We needed someone come out and pick the lock and maybe re-key or change the lock on the overhead garage door.  I never had a key for this door.  Son told them that we recently had that overhead door enclosed; half of the garage from the inside was now a rec room.  Due to the enclosure, we are unable to unlock the door from the inside.  One of my sons’ friends turned the handle and unknowingly locked the door.  My son said he could not get the woman to give him an estimate on the phone and that she was talking in circles and very vague.  So I call them.  I try to get prices and sure enough the woman on the other side of the line is very evasive and unclear.  So to make the conversation as quick and simple as possible, I ask, “Will I have a price BEFORE any of the work is actually performed”?  She said yes.  I was content with that answer.

Fast forward to today.  They send this guy out (in an unmarked vehicle) who knows NOTHING about picking a lock.  He stands back as to assess the situation, he looks at the overhead door, he then bends over and puts his eyeball in the lock, and then looks at me and says, "can I go through the inside to see if I can unlock the door?"   *insert dumbfounded looked here*.

I told him that if I could get in through the inside I would not have needed to call him.  All I would have to do is turn the knob from the inside!  He then says to me, you need someone to pick the lock.  So, he proceeds to call someone else.

By this time I walk back in the house, because I know he has no idea what he is doing and that he is not a locksmith.  He then turns to my son and said there is a $10 service fee.  Son comes in to tell me he needs $10 to pay him.  I came back outside and tell him I am not paying him for doing absolutely nothing, I specifically called/asked for a locksmith.  He said it was his “service fee”.  After a little going back and forth, I clearly told him I was not paying him. He said the fee was for gasoline to put in his mother’s car.  He said that if I did not pay the service fee, he would call the police.  I was so upset by this time that I told him that I would call the police myself!  He got in his unmarked car and left.