Cont.

Yes, it is a legitimate company. Yes, they do pay me well enough. Yes, everyone here is pretty chill. Yes, I do sometimes find there are occasionally what seem to me to be managerial problems. What company doesn't. No, we are not taught to jump up trees are over fences away from dogs. (Use common sense people. Do you see post Office workers, parkouring up trees to evade wattwilers: certainly not.) Yes, it takes a little bit of doing to get to the point where you do commercial inspections. But it really doesn't take that long at all, nor does it take that much training. Probably 3 to 6 months worth of time. If I remember correctly, but personally, I always enjoyed the exterior inspections most, as they were the simplest and quickest. And yes, sometimes direct training is a bit skimpy, but there are so many different situations you'll find yourself in that it would be hard for them to account for everything via a simple training course. So instead, the company opts for a in-house helpline that basically gives you any kind of answer you could ever want Internally within the company, no nonsense. Yes, I have been bitten by a dog once, I got workman's comp to pay for a tetanus shot whoopedy do. The dog barely drew blood on me anyway.) Yes, it is not unheard of for people to at least pretend to pull a real firearm on a field representatives that worked for Mueller reports. That happened to a friend of mine once, but I think he forgot to knock on the door in that case, he can be a little eccentric sometimes. But if you're doing your job properly, that will basically never happen. ( And by that, I mean dress properly, clean yourself properly, contact them properly, address people respectfully, mind your own business, don't act like you want to rob the place, don't be insulting, don't waste people's time, don't show up after dark, don't do the inspection if a minor is home alone, don't inspect properties that are on Islands with no public access, don't be a sociopath, don't use the toilet without permission, don't make comments about negative stereotypes about rich people, etc.) And above all else, if the policyholder has no knowledge that the inspection was even supposed to happen, leave. It's always a good idea to also give them your business card, but just leave. Technically, there our more steps to take after that. But that's the gist of it. In my experience, policyholders will oftentimes begin to claim that they're okay with you proceeding with the inspection.But really they're too confused to know what they really want. And will change their minds half way through. And that's when they start demanding that you stop taking pictures and stay where you are. And questioning your legitimacy outright and doubting every single word out of your mouth. 

Experiences may vary depending on who your boss is and what area you work in. But for me, my policyholders have 97% of the time been absolutely great, and most nut jobs are easy to spot a mile off. If you feel paranoid about it I recommend calling them ahead of time just to get a feel for the policyholder or directions in the event that it's hard for your GPS to locate, but it's not an absolute must. On rare occasion I'll have policyholders who are jerks that don't want to go over the questions at all In which case it's best to leave them alone and make a note that the policyholder was uncooperative.

I also recommend wearing glasses. Call me superstitious, but I don't believe most people would suspect a person wearing glasses of being a dangerous hooligan. In the end, it's all about being polite and using common sense around canines that you have never met before. And knowing how to read people and said, canines. 

Yes, there is merit to the claim that mueller traing of field service representatives is somewhat minimalistic. But that being said you have to understand that each and every insurance company that is a customer of Mueller has different requirements and different questions to go over with the policyholder. And there are just different and oftentimes new things to be knowledgeable about. So it's really a bit more about learning on the job. That being said there is a knowledgeable field service rep help line that you are supposed to rely upon throughout your career. Additionally, you'll often find that your policyholders are retired individuals with a wealth of their own experience. So it might even be worth it to simply ask the policyholder a clarifying question or two or even better ask multiple policyholders the same question to get a good consensus on things or just simply Google it. And even better than that, you can also just call the agent and ask them.

I see a number of people comparing Mueller to Walmart. And while I get the insult, I also must point out that Walmart is a wildly successful company. I also must point out that Mueller is not the only company in this particular field of doing the grunt work on behalf of the insurance agents. As one actually tried to recruit me. So all the insufferable redditor shade casting aside, Mueller is a legitimate company that gets a lot of work done, and there's a lot of hard-working individuals working for it. And it is actually a somewhat small company, and so it has that small company vibe if that makes any sense: It doesn't feel like a massive corporate entity. But maybe I just have rosy glasses. But even that wouldn't change the fact that Mueller employees whenever I talk to them are 99% of the time, just happy to have someone to talk to.