MarBorg Industries — Local services in Santa Barbara

I changed it from one star to five stars because they responded, met with me, confirmed there was a problem with calling center and refunded me.

Today a friend asked me if I knew anybody with a pick-up truck. He wanted to help to take all the plastic recyclable bottles and bring them the money.

I told him I’ll be happy to help and rented a large U-haul truck to avoid wasting gas, time, and money. He was trying to figure out a time next week and with my lunch hour coming up, I said “Why not now? It should be quick. “

He called Marborg to ask if there was a limit to how much material we could bring. He got no response the first time after about 15 rings. The second time he called and they said nope, there’s no limit.

So off we went to pick up 19 bags of empty water bottles. We filled up the truck and made our way to UHaul and unloaded the truck. I left the parking lot to go return the UHaul and pick up my car.

A Marborg employee then approached my friend and said that he and I can’t deposit over 100 lbs. It looks like it might be 100 lbs., and if it is over 100 lbs of recycling, then you have to take it all back with you.

My friend replied: I was told on the phone that there’s no limit.

Marborg: Well you were told incorrectly. Which number did you call?

The number on the website (and on the dumpster bins).

Marborg: Well if it’s over 100 lbs you need to take it all back. Friend: My friend is gone and doesn’t have his phone. How many pounds is this?

They measured one bag and it was about 6 pounds which would estimate to be about 114 lb.

My friend: Ok, so we’ll take 100lb and the rest we’ll take away in our car.

Marborg: We can’t do that. It’s against the law. You have to take it all back. Get the guy with the truck back here.

My friend: He returned the truck. We can load ½ of them and I can figure out how to take ½ of it back in my car and my friend’s car.

Marborg Guy: This conversation has gone on too long. I’ll get my supervisor.

The supervisor came and said they can’t accept it. After further discussion the supervisor called his supervisor at another office. That supervisor agreed to speak with my friend. The supervisor’s supervisor said, after being told that we came in multiple cars, that he would confer with the local supervisor.

They spoke on the phone and the local supervisor reportedly told his supervisor we brought it all in one car. Of course we did – why would you carry trash bags of recycling in other cars when you have a truck that you rented for that purpose? So their “final decision” was made – that we had to take away all the bags and come back another time.

Two other Marborg employees who heard about the situation came by. One advised “We could’ve worked this out here if you didn’t appeal to a supervisor.” My friend answered him saying he didn’t ask to speak to any supervisors; that decision was made by Marborg employees.

So my friend asked these guys a question: if we came back with half on Monday and half on Tuesday, would that be okay?

Marborg: Sure, that would be fine.

Friend: What if we leave with the bags and come back today? Would that work?

Marborg: Sure.

Friend: Is there a certain amount of time we need to be gone?

Marborg: Maybe an hour? If you come back in an hour it should be okay. Friend: So what if we carry these bags across the street to my car, put them down, and bring them back? They’ll be officially off the lot. We can bring them back with the two cars that we have and deposit them that way.

Marborg: Let me ask and see what we can do.

After speaking to his supervisors the decision came back that there was nothing to be done. We had to take all the recycling back. We then asked “what if we just leave the recycling in these bins that say ‘PLASTIC’ on them?” They said “that’s fine, we just won’t pay you for them.” So that’s what we did.

Nobody said that the whole time. Obviously, we would’ve preferred to give the money to the non-profit, but they could’ve let us know about that option and saved multiple arguments.

So much for rushing to do...

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