WATCH OUT FOR THE THINGS THAT DON'T MAKE SENSE!

Consumers Beware Of What SHOULD Be Obvious But Might Not!

This is how you might see crews showing up to do a job (these are paving crews there's sealing "rigs" below)
We inserted the rig in the center because it is totally unrelated, parked 60 miles away, different names on the doors but while we couldn't get as as good a photo of the trailer because of the fence, but VERY similar, down to the brand of the loader & paving machine-but more below...
All these trucks with all this small equipment perfectly sized so they each have a small paver, small Bobcat type loader, small roller, and of course the dump trucks. All of which enable easy "travel". While the red trailer above contains a roller large enough for proper driveway work on a "heavy duty" trailer often you will see much smaller rollers (small rollers are the easiest place to cut weight to avoid weigh station problems crossing state lines.)
 

  
Here we have a "yellow crew" and a "Red Crew" working together. Having a "company color" for any business is not unusual. But normally you would see businesses with different company colors working separately but for big jobs these type organizations will get the "family" together, we missed a shot 3 days ago of 3 different "color" groups working on a larger job about 10 miles away.
But it's obvious these 2 "crews" both complete with paving machines/Bobcats/dumps & trailers but different names and phone numbers from hundreds of miles apart are working together.

Not far from the patching job above there was this was a small paving job (less than 1/4 mile) by totally different people. But notice the similarities. Same brand small class "paver", smaller roller (as mentioned above-while it looks very similar this one is approx. 1/2 the size of the one on the red trailer above and was not suitable for the job being done) ...Again it's "companies" from far away apparently BUT

Here we have different yellow & white trucks together with a black seal rig (below) with Utah phone numbers (again 2 cooperating on a job too big for 1...) but trucks with TX license plates? A similar pattern you might not notice if you didn't check the area code of the phones if you were in TX or the the license plates of the trucks if you were in Utah and the phones "matched"?

Because we do not want to imply anything about any of these crews we have made sure there were no identifying marks but here is BIG CLUE NUMBER ONE if you were called on & about to have a job done by a group with equipment resembling one of these (as you can see generally they are similar, just different "groups" across the USA). The "Red" Trucks above have a different symbol and if you check the area code on the phone number you will find they are from the Austin/San Antonio area and thus are 200 miles from "home"...the yellow vehicles on the same patch job have numbers which go to a residence --about 70 miles away but that's 70 miles farther from the "red crew's" area and unlike the red crew who does have an ad on the "Asphalt King" web site (we have had many complaints about that site) the "yellow's" number just goes to a residential phone, we didn't back-trace the phones in Utah but why Utah numbers on trucks registered & licensed in TX?...Hmmm...
(The "parked" white rig is from a different area entirely and seems totally unrelated but was located closer to the yellow one's (top) address than where their trucks said they were from.)

Professional "contractor spec." sealcoat won't pass through a 'car wash" type "squeeze trigger" handle...Sealcoat wands have a large ball valve to turn off and on and larger pumps & air compressors if they use air driven units and preferably they are hydraulically agitated instead of hand cranked (nothing "bad" about hand cranked itself, just the sheer labor required to mix a top-quality sealcoat with a hand crank is immense since it takes a minimum of 10-20 minutes of constant agitation to mix and constant agitation while applying is in commercial specifications. So often sealer is over-thinned & lower quality to make hand-cranking easier), it's the tiny pump on the one with the "car wash wand and the "trash pump" type pump on the other coupled with it having no agitation--both have things that when taken together give cause to question.

The sealcoat trailer on a truck from the Austin Texas area working with a company from ~200+ miles away had Iowa license plates! The black truck had TX License Plates & registration but a Utah phone number! Strangely unrelated but similar kind-of strange inconsistencies.
And these jobs with yellow/red and different yellow/white/black were less than 1/4 mile apart.
(The rig pictured parked also had a sealcoating rig & second dump truck but were not in a position where they could be photographed)

For a little extra info you can tell the "rank" (and it really does wok that way) of one of these "clans". You may not always see him but there is a "head" of the group as described on 60 Minutes-like a "patriarch" . This would be the one who decided these two diverse groups would meet in this location to handle this work. He arrived at the patch job above as they finished and was older & gray haired in THE truck shown here: you can click to see a larger image and we have distorted the background on purpose but if you look at the big view this is a big "dually" maxed out with options and a small strobe bar on top to make it look "official". You probably won't see a "head man" on a driveway job or at your door unless you have a large job or things get slow and he's out "selling"; but he will coordinate who comes from where for jobs like this. He might have been checking these groups & giving instructions for the rest of the day or finding out how the day was going. They will make sure their groups are as efficient as possible in $$ per day.

It really is so complicated in the travelling asphalt paving & sealing world most people can't believe a "clan" type system still exists in today's USA; but as shown on major new programs, they do.
A "head guy" would be the only one to know where all the ones under him are at any time...normally the guys in the red trucks might have no idea where the yellow trucks were working because sometimes traveling crews will be on assigned "routes" that take them all over; some all over a big state like Texas maybe 2 states & some that travel a "route" all around the USA to put them in the northern states in mid-summer & the southern states in the cold weather so they can keep working year-round.
People like the crew in the smaller trucks can move up to a bigger truck like other crew and a better "route" assignment by bringing in more money over the year or they my do well and not have to "travel" except in the area around where they live. 
As described on 60 minutes and 20/20 it's an elaborate "clan" system  with the clan members running things and maybe a few "outsider" laborers who are paid a daily wage to travel with them (like the kids that go off with the carnival or "magazine crews") however the "good cash pay" they are promised they later find is before expenses. So some rainy days in a row & paying for their own meals and hotel rooms and that $200 a day or more goes away quickly but often the laborer is 18 or so and a thousand miles from home so it's hard to get back. We have seen hotels with groups of these guys coming out (not legal for us to photograph them on private situations like that) but seeing 3 or 4 of the laborers with their sleeping bags coming out of 1 hotel room so they can cut their expenses ...it's a wild world, foreign to those who don't understand it but these are how the folks look that will show up at your place that were "just working down the road" or "with a load of material left over from another job" or "a nearby job that cancelled after we got the materials" or whatever the line is they think will work on you... we have even seen one group send a female with baby in arms to doors with a story that a big job cancelled or whatever and they wouldn't be able to eat if they couldn't get a job "today". 
As on the Consumer Beware page there is almost always a reason they have to do the job "right now" before you have time to think about it, notice the details like the phone numbers etc.
If they give you a written proposal and a few days to think about it and YOU are to call THEM back when you decide; you can call a few references and go by and look at those jobs (always at least 2 years old) they may be fine; regardless of what the equipment looks like.