Protecting Yourself From "Phony Locksmiths"

Written 5/20/2009

They call them "Phony Locksmiths" and they're flooding the market place all across the United States with large phone book ads and a never ending list of real phone numbers but phony addresses that do not exist. This is to make you think they're a trusted local company.

What They Do

In short they mislead the consumer by quoting low prices over the phone but delivering an outrageous bill. The most outrageous story I know of was an 80 year old man that was charged $1700.00 to get back into his house at about 2:00AM (see first video). They threatened and intimidated him into paying.

Usually an unqualified person shows up at your door in there personal unmarked vehicle. Then instead of trying to pick the lock they just pull out the drill and drill it open. Now you need new locks also.

So to open a house, a $35 quote would go something like this...

$35 is just the Service/Trip charge, then however much they think the customer can pay for drilling (i.e. $100, $200 or even as much as $1000) then $189 for a lock.

Another one where the quote is for $55 to open the car but they try to charge $150.

See The Videos

I've placed a few videos below so you can see how they work to help make you a more informed consumer. These news reports are from back East but they ARE here in Utah.

See more stories here at the Ripoff Report web site Click Here.
For more information just Google "phony locksmiths"

How Can You Protect Yourself?

Maybe the best way to protect yourself would be to choose a locksmith that you know is from your town. Or one that a friend has used before or recommended to you.

Some say (I agree) you should find a Locksmith before you need one. Just keep a Locksmith in mind or better yet, program there number into your phone now just in case you or a friend ever needs one.

Unfortunately I've found YellowBook.com (who I advertise with) to be one of the worst offenders when it comes to allowing these fraudulent deceptive ad's on there web site. I counted over 60 locksmiths with the same name "1 2 3 24 Hour A Locksmith" and they are all listed one after the other. That's 6 or 7 pages in a row. And most, if not all the addresses they list as locations do not even exist. They show one right around the corner from my house. It's not there.

I contacted YellowBook about this but they have not responded.