(212) 219-8218
“I’ve lived here for x amount of years (sometimes decades) and I’ve never had a pest problem!”
Lately, we’ve seen an uptick of clients who have never had to deal with pest control. Seeing a pest in our safe space can leave us on edge for days or weeks, and we understand that it can feel overwhelming at times.
If you are seeing pests in your home and you’ve never used pest control services before, here are a few tips and what to expect when setting up an appointment for the first time.
Don’t Wait Too Long!
Seeing one or two pests here and there is usually not a big concern, but it does suggest that you may want to start monitoring for further activity.
If you’ve had multiple pest sightings on consecutive days or during daytime hours, you might be facing a problem that requires professional help. Daytime sightings are a sign of pest populations getting to a point that competition for food and harborage drives part of the population out to find alternative nesting sites—a sign that an infestation is growing.
Using glue traps in various places is a good way to monitor for activity and activity levels. If you do catch something in a trap, be sure to at least get a good picture of it for identification. If you don’t know what it is, send the photo to our Free Pest ID Center. Our experts will help confirm what pest you are dealing with and provide recommendations for treatment.
If you are seeing pests consistently, don’t wait for it to become an emergency. Instead, treat early and head the problem off.
Helpful Details to Provide
When hiring a pest control provider, we may ask for some details that you’ll want to prepare for before calling. Here are a few common ones:
- Square footage of the home? You may want to refer to your lease which may have it listed. This helps inform as to how much time we’ll need for service and how much insecticide (when applicable), bait and traps we will need for this visit.
- Where did you see the pest or evidence? Identifying the problem areas will help us suggest the most appropriate treatment.
- What did the pest look like? This will be a good tool in identifying the pest species and understand how to treat. You can always send is a photo for Pest ID if you have one to share.
- Any kids or pets in the home? This is important to us so that we make sure all treatments are done in a pet and child friendly way.
What to Expect
First time clients often don’t know what to expect when it comes to the process of setting up initial and follow-up treatments. Below is the general flow from start to finish for the majority of our clients:
- Initial Contact / Phone Call – This is our first opportunity to get to know your situation and recommend an initial treatment.
- Prep – Preparing your home for the initial treatment. This may mean moving things out from under sinks, clearing drawers, etc. MMPC will provide you with a preparation guide if specific steps are necessary.
- Initial Service – This involves applying eco-friendly insecticide spray (when applicable), baits, and glue traps in the home or service location. In our 25 years of experience, we can tell you that completely eliminating a pest issue often takes more than one session. The goal of the initial service is to provide some immediate relief by whittling down the current pest population before deciding on a long term solution. Therefore, the initial service is usually not guaranteed and follow ups may be necessary for most people.
- Follow-up Service (if necessary) – During the initial visit, the technician may do an assessment for entry points and/or make recommendations for follow-up treatments with the goal of providing a more permanent solution. If you approve the proposed work, we will schedule your follow up service as soon as possible.
Monitoring
Whether it was a single service or a series of follow-ups, recurring services, or pest exclusion, it’s important to monitor for any residual pest activity or stragglers (we will leave you with glue traps and bait stations for monitoring).
If after about two weeks you are not seeing activity, you can go on about your life. If you are still seeing activity after about two weeks, call back and we can come back for another follow-up treatment.
Contact MMPC
We hope these tips will assist you when looking for a pest control provider for the first time.
If you have any questions about controlling pests at home or seeking professional pest control help, please don’t hesitate to contact MMPC by sending us a message or calling (212) 219-8218.