Total Bay Locksmith

this is a great company to call if you like falling victim to the bait and switch. they will quote you one price and charge you another. here’s what happened to me:
my landlord came by to do some work while i was at work. when he left he flipped the switch that keeps the doorknob from turning. not the dead bolt — just the doorknob. so it’s not locked as much as it’s just impossible to turn the handle.
i never do this and i didn’t realize he had done it. i left the house to throw out the trash slightly after midnight. it was december, so it was freezing out. i was in a tshirt since i was only throwing out the trash. i didn’t have my coat, wallet, or cell phone. i realized i was locked out about ten seconds later.
i went to the only open store in my neighborhood (a liquor store) and asked them to help me find a locksmith. they didn’t have a yellow pages, so we used one of their phones to find a locksmith and they let me call.
the guy told me it would be $ 29 for the call and $ 29 to open the lock since it wasn’t a deadbolt or anything.
a younger guy showed up in about 30 minutes. he then told me it would be $ 180 for the call and $ 29 to open the lock. i argued with him about this since it was six times what they had quoted. i finally gave in since it was now 1am and the store had closed (keep in mind — no jacket, no phone, no wallet).
so the guy opens my lock using a little pick thing and a hammer. takes him about a minute. he then says he’ll only take cash. i tell him i don’t have any cash and that he’ll have to take a credit card. i demand ID. he refuses to show me any. he tells me that he’ll drive me to the ATM. i refuse to get in his car. etc etc.
we argue more. he finally relents when he sees that i’ve taken a picture of his license plate. then he’s like, let me see if dispatch will process this for me.
so yeah, they quoted me $ 60 and charged me $ 209. and they messed up my lock in the process.
OH, and when i called to complain about the technician (he gave me his card eventually) they claimed they’d never heard of him. they billed me on his behalf, but they’ve never heard of him? amazing.
these guys are crooks. plain and simple.

these guys did not give me receipt, which is actually nice to have taking into consideration that the service is not cheap.

Very disappointed in this company! I called a company and they must have subcontracted this company. I called about 9am for my friend’s car who locked her keys inside. I asked over the phone and they said they’d be there in 15 – 20 minutes and charge ~$ 35. So I say OK. He arrives 1 hour later, my address supposedly wouldn’t show up on his GPS, I had to stay on the phone with him for the last 10 minutes to guide him to my home.
He wanted to charge $ 96! I’m sorry but that’s just unheard of. If it was out in the ghetto or 2am I’d understand. But we’re calling you on a weekend, late morning, no traffic, just a few exists from your company, safe easy access neighborhood.
She didn’t have that much money so we had to call someone else. Sadly, not a good experience with this company and I can’t recommend them.

I’m surprised to see that this is the first review for this business, but either way, I found them originally in the Yellow Pages after I was locked out of my room. This was around 11: 25, I called, and then the technician showed up at 11:33. Perfect.
He tried lots of ways to open the door, but ultimately had to pop the entire locking mechanism out of the door (with some damage to the door handle) to be able to open up the door. He got it open for $ 120, which seems reasonable considering the emergency call. All in all, I was happy to get into my room.