It has come to my attention that ISN inspection support network has taken it upon itself to override your emails to your clients and hide a PORCH app download for your clients to open reports and redirect your emails and phone calls to PORCH essentially stealing your client’s information without your permission or commission. This may also put you in a legal bind if you have sensitive clientele that does not want their info being sold. This is occurring even if you are not subscribed to PORCH. They have done this without any consent. I have called ISN and PORCH to resolve these unethical business practices. Please if your are using ISN to CC yourself on all emails and check what happens when you open the report download links. If this is also happening to you contact ISN and PORCH. As of now, I have lost all trust in both companies. Below are porch contact emails to file complaints ISN can be reached via chat on their website.
Porch owns ISN. When you give your client’s private data to ISN, you are giving it to Porch. They are one and the same.
Been going on for awhile now.
It sure is misleading!
I use ISN but only for scheduling and to send agreements, confirmation, notification, and verification emails.
I always send the verification and agreement emails to myself first to make sure it doesn’t get bounced.
I don’t send reports or get paid through ISN.
Have you verified that you have Porch “deactivated” in office settings?
I agree with you. The placement of the button is purposely misleading.
Thank you for publishing this in the public domain where prospective homebuyers searching for home inspectors can protect their privacy and screen potential candidates by eliminating those home inspectors who use these services.
That’s the entire problem I never activated it and is in deactivated state, however They totally bypassed my permissions.
I just added an instruction to the email notification to buyers and agents that, “You do NOT need to use the Porch app to view your report. Scroll below the QR code to get directly to PDF versions of your report(s).”
I put that right after the link in the email and so far it’s cleared up the confusion. After they changed the report delivery page with the app I got numerous calls and complaints.
Do they also give away fart candles? If so you can expect a call from the Fart Candle Man’s attorneys for this post.
Good for you to make it known though.
Unfortunately selling peoples information, whether part of the scheme or not, can result in threats of lawsuits. There is a way to shut it off and that is to totally dump the provider.
A very good concept but unfortunately to many consumers do not properly screen/vet their Inspector.
This makes me wonder if it is happening to HIP users as well since the software can be linked to ISN and @dmaricic sold to Porch… Maybe Dom will see the flag and shed some light on this??
Porch is a lead broker that sells leads to contractors. Where do you think they get the leads they sell and why do you think they would buy up home inspection software and telephone answering companies?
I’m surprised to find that this is new information to anyone in the home inspection business. I have always considered inspectors cooperating with this to be complicit and consenting front men for this operation.
This should be a key factor for homebuyers to use in selecting a home inspector, IMO.
James they have as an option to opt-in or out of using porch with ISN. We have never opted in and the porch section has always been deactivated in our office settings since day 1. I don’t ever sell or disclose my client’s information as it is unethical to sell their information for profit in my opinion no one likes spam and cold call salesmen. We discovered this when we had a client threatening to sue for exposing their information. Porch decided to sneak in through the backdoor after clicking the report download link to mislead clients to click their app download link in order to open my reports as seen in the screenshot in earlier messages.
I think this is little more than wordplay. If Porch owns ISN, everything that ISN has is owned by Porch, which includes everything about your client’s new home described by you in the report, including his personal data. You don’t “opt out” of having your data owned … you simply opt out of knowingly participating in that particular part of their business; but they may do anything they wish with their own property, among which your inspection report is included.
Dom has already addressed the subject of Porch selling information. Saying you have to opt in. I do not use ISN but do have a bit of a concern about them pulling information through the cloud. Might be best to start labeling inspections with a code instead of an address and waiting until you get to desktop to put in client information.
I don’t either but was curious about them pulling the info through the HIP cloud myself. Even though the pdf reports are supposed to be encrypted so they can’t be tampered with or information copied, I would imagine they have a way around that . Hence why I tagged Dom. Maybe he would know if this is happening in the HIP cloud also.
How did you find out about emails and phone calls being redirected?
After a threat to be sued, I send a copy of the client’s email to myself and open the links to check what they see on occasion now and this is supposed to have the realtor’s bio and report downloads. This is where they are going in the backdoor and putting the download button and removing my company contact. The only way to resolve this is to contact porch directly if your having this issue.