Well I have spent most of my afternoon trying to fill out my annual questionnaire for Contro Scan to be in compliance for my Signature Card and able to continue to accept credit card payment. What a pain in the rear. I just recently joined up with ISN and this is the first year I had to include them in my questionnaire. After a bottle of Tylenol and an afternoon of banging my head against the wall, I now have my compliance renewed. ISN was alot of help in this process and I have learned one thing from today. The more methods of processing credit card payments not only makes you and your clients more vulnerable but it also makes the process of compliance renewal tougher. And from what I gathered from Control Scan, using ISN only to accept payment substantially lowers my liability for my clients card information and makes the renewal process a lot easier. So as of today I only accept payment through ISN. Thanks ISN!!!
Agree
ISN is indeed awesome.
I can’t imagine being in business without it.
Work Smarter NOT Harder with ISN
ISN is one of the best tools in the industry - no doubt!
It used to be.
I am questioning my statement above now…
How ironic!
LOL, very true! I have to say though, it WAS one of the best tools. Now… well… :roll:
This is too funny. Things change in such a short time.
Hey all,
I’m just making my start in the industry and at first glance, ISN looked like an incredibly valuable tool. Now it appears that a lot of you seasoned vets are on the fence about them. I currently don’t use their services, but like I said, I’m new at this (haven’t done a paid inspection yet). Are they worth it?
Thanks for your insight. At the moment, you guys are my most valuable tool!
ISN is like having a secretary manage the business end of the inspection business for you. You input the information, it sends out your agreement to your client for online signature, sends the info to your inspection software (supports a dozen or so different programs), provides the means for online payment with a credit card (through third party providers) distributes the reports to the appropriate parties, and lots of other things. Absolutely the best thing since sliced bread.
Until…
They breathlessly announced their partnership with Porch, giving you the opportunity to offer an easy create-your-repair-request-by-clicking-on-the-concern-in-the-report feature to your client’s Realtors. Great news until they mention “oh, by the way” that your client’s information would be passed along to Porch (which has a truly dismal reputation among professionals and the general public) for marketing purposes unless you opt out.
They rolled this out in the worst way possible, announcing it to only 10% of their clients. A massive sh*t storm ensued, and the webinar/mea culpa sounded like the corporate version of a kid getting caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
It has been discovered that Porch has purchased a sizable share of ISN (and they refuse to tell us how much), and that if ISN were to sell out to Porch (which many fear may be a fait accompli), then whoever they did sell to could also sell the inspector’s information, which many assume to include their client’s information.
ISN has been so respected and trusted in the past, to learn of this turn of events has to some seemed like learning that your preacher has been making passes at your wife.
Some have said they are no longer using ISN. The majority, I suspect, have gotten so dependent on it that they are staying with it hoping that opting out of the Porch partnership will be enough to keep their client’s info safe. That describes me.
So, we sit here with this doubt hanging over us like the Sword of Damocles, hoping that ISN still has the ability to undo its horrible blunder.
Sword of Damocles, nice analogy but I’d venture another tale which may be more apropos… This girl finds a snake that pleads with her to place it in her winter coat because otherwise the snake will freeze. The girl goes “No you’ll bite me blah blah blah”. Anyway the girl eventually puts the snake in her jacket to keep it warm and she continues on her walk. Then she feels a sharp pain in her side, the snake drops out and begins to slither away. The girl say something like “Why? I took care of you, blah blah blah”. The snake simply replies “You knew what I was when you found me”.
Familiar with the tale. Sort of similar to the lying down with dogs and waking up with fleas analogy, but does this apply to ISN? I thought they were well-regarded up until recently.
You can’t blame these people, they don’t accept the notion that sharing client contact information is a fidelity breach especially if everyone’s position is assumed to be improved.
This isn’t the first vendor to receive a black eye from NACHI and I don’t know anything about ISN, but if they are in possession of hot client referrals it becomes very tempting not to take advantage of the possibilities to expand market share. My rule of thumb when dealing with any service company is to first try to understand what their metaphysics, ethics and motives are to truly know what their real mission is. Unfortunately in most cases your contacts are simply more valuable than you and business is business.
You can’t blame these people, they don’t accept the notion that sharing client contact information is a fidelity breach especially if everyone’s position is assumed to be improved.
This isn’t the first vendor to receive a black eye from NACHI and I don’t know anything about ISN, but if they are in possession of hot client referrals it becomes very tempting not to take advantage of the possibilities to expand market share. My rule of thumb when dealing with any service company is to first try to understand what their metaphysics, ethics and motives are to truly know what their real mission is. Unfortunately in most cases your contacts are simply more valuable than you and business is business
ISN and their sleazy marketers who cold call me every month suck a fat one!
Definitely like having a secretary. However, as of late the secretary has been calling out sick every other day. Over the last month or so, our business has been crippled on a regular basis with messages like: " 504 Gateway Time-out", and repeated emails such as the below. Typically, when a software upgrade goes bad, there is a backup/backout plan which is executed. Apparently, ISN does not have such a plan.
Dear Gregg
We regret to inform you that we are currently experiencing some intermittent issues with the Inspection Support Network.
Summary of the Situation:
Due to some recent system upgrades, you may be experiencing reduced speeds, intermittent log in issues, and loading issues in your ISN.
Immediate Actions Taken:
Our dedicated technical team has identified the issues, and are currently working to resolve these issues.
We will provide hourly status updates via email.
Please accept our sincerest apologies for the inconvenience this situation may have caused. We assure you that we are doing everything possible to restore the Inspection Support Network service as quickly and safely as possible.
For any immediate queries or additional assistance, feel free to contact our customer support team at help@inspectionsupport.com .
Your patience and understanding in this challenging time are highly appreciated.
Thank you for your support.
Warm regards,
ISN Team
I’m looking at software and ISN looks nice but lots of people seem to have issues with them…
This thread and all but one of the responses is seven years old. In the world of systems and services like ISN, 7 years is several lifetimes. Since this thread was started ISN was sold by it’s creator/founder to an operation called Porch (Nasdaq symbol PRCH). Lots of experiences… Some good, some bad, many in between. If you’re looking for info and experiences there are a ton on this board that aren’t 7 years old.