Undisputed Legal Inc.

Review: I am an attorney in Indiana and I needed service on an individual who lives and works in New York. I used Undisputed Legal and was very unhappy with their services. The first address that I gave to Undisputed Legal turned out to be an incorrect address for the individual. This was by no means their fault. However, their website indicates that 90% of the work is completed in 72 hours. We hired them on February **. Undisputed Legal did not attempt to serve the individual for the first time until February **, **14. The second attempt was not made until February **, 2014. After we found out the address was incorrect, I made the unfortunate decision of paying again to have them serve the individual at her place of employement. This time they were hired on March *. The process server did not attempt service for the first time until March **. On this date we were informed that the process server was not able to get up to the floor of the employer because of security. We contacted the company and asked them to please not keep trying to get up there (because they only make 4 attempts) but if they could try to serve the individual when she was going into or coming from her employer's building. The process server did not do this. Instead he or she just tried to get up to the building 3 more times and were denied. The company was not concerned about actually getting the individual served, but rather just making sure they tried the requisite number of times. Undisputed Legal has now been paid $1*0.00 and we still do not have service. Their website indicates that they send "real time" email status updates. Throughout this whole month that it took them to attempt service at two different addresses, we received 1 email with a status update. We have had to call them approximately 13 times to get status updates. Further, the owner, Brian Ricks, was very unprofessional and disrespectful when we voiced our concerns.Desired Settlement: We have now had to hire someone else to effect service of process and incur an additional cost. We are not requesting the $75 for the first address to be refunded because we understand that it was a bad address. However, given all of the issues and that it has been over a month, when it is indicated that 90% of the work is completed in 72 hours, we would like the second $75 to be refunded. We do not believe that a good faith effort was put forth to effect service on the individual.

Business

Response:

We were contacted by [redacted] of [redacted] on February **, 2014 requesting service of process on [redacted] at her place of residence: [redacted]. In our initial conversation I informed [redacted] of the following:

1. The fee for routine service of process is $75, which consists of the process server making up to three (3) attempts on separate days, attempts cannot be made on a Sunday or a holiday, and the process server will make his/her first attempt within 3-5 days of receiving documents. The fee for Expedited service is $175 which consists of the process server making up to three (3) attempts on separate days, and the first attempt is made within 24hrs of receiving documents. [redacted] elected for routine service after hearing the options.

Our office received the documents for service via email on [redacted]at 3:48pm EST (friday). Given the date and time of receipt, the documents are processed for service on the following business day which in this case falls on Monday, Feb **, 2014. The first attempt was made on Feb **, 2014 at 07:36 which falls within our 3-5 day time frame. The following attempts were made on Feb [redacted]at 16:21 and Feb **at 20:17. Upon completion of the third attempt, we learned that the address provided is no longer a valid address for the subject and an affidavit of due diligence was issued.

After speaking to [redacted] and informing her that the home address is a BAD ADDRESS, we also offered a complimentary skip trace, which is priced at $35 in order to assist the firm in locating a valid address for [redacted]. [redacted] stated that she would contact us at a later time to request a new service at a new location on [redacted].

On March *, 2014 (Wednesday), we were contacted by [redacted] to request a new service on [redacted] at her place of employment ([redacted]) on a routine basis. [redacted] did mention that her firm was able to speak to [redacted] who confirmed that she no longer lives at the address we were hired originally to serve process and that she provided the firm with an address of where she is currently residing. [redacted] however requested service at [redacted]’s place of employment.

The first attempt to serve [redacted] was made on March **, 2014 (within the 3-5 day time frame), giving that the new address is on a place of business, no weekend attempts are made. The following attempts were made on March [redacted] and March [redacted]. During our first attempt at 13:09 on March [redacted], our process server was denied access to [redacted]. [redacted] and [redacted] were notified by email that we are being denied access to the defendant and a call was placed on March **, 2014 at 13:29 to [redacted].

During the next two (2) attempts, the process server strategically made attempts near the hours that businesses typically open and close in order to increase the probability of serving the subject and in hopes of speaking to a different front desk security attendant that may allow access or inform [redacted] that her presence is requested in the lobby. Attempts made on March [redacted] at 17:18 and on March **th at 09:58.

[redacted] did not request a stake-out which is a completely different service and fee structure compared to the service she requested. As licensed & bonded Process servers, it is obligatory to perform each service with due diligence and to ask for the defendant by name during each attempt that is made. If we do not attempt to gain access to the subject being served or gain entrance into the building, then there is no due diligence.

On March **, 2014, [redacted] contacted our office to request a refund on a service that had already been completed. She threatened to file a complaint if we did not refund her. In review of all the events, a refund is not warranted as we completed attempts within the requested time-frame indicated by the type of service we were hired for.

Sincerely,