Day in and day out there is one thing that remains consistent in the bedbug industry and that is the failure to react accordingly. Often times when we arrive at a location with an infestation it has been present for months or even sometimes years! What the common response to this neglect is typically 1 of 2 things which we would like to address today.
First, the infested space is in a rental property. When this happens, the property management and the tenant have a decision to make, who’s fault is it and who pays to get it treated? This regularly goes back and forth for weeks to months before a resolution is completed. By this time the infestation has had the opportunity to reproduce multiple times and what could have been an easy infestation to control has now grown into a very severe issue. In addition, when this happens it is not rare for the infestation to spread to a neighboring units causing another area of concern.
Second, self treatment was attempted in the infested space. This is the most common and is the worst thing for us to hear in the bedbug industry. Not only has the customer already lost money out of pocket on chemicals to try and self-treat, but has also been making the issue worse in most cases. Why? Because treating bedbugs with liquid chemicals is extremely challenging even to a bedbug professional, so to try and accomplish this without the proper training has a low success rate. Furthermore, treating with a liquid product only eliminates the adult bedbugs that it comes in contact with directly. Many times the “over the counter” product has also been around so long that the bedbugs have built an immunity to it causing a low fatality rate. This is why we use heat remediation. Not only can bedbugs not build an immunity to heat, but it also kills the eggs wherever they may be hiding, which liquid products cannot do.
Our recommendation. When bedbugs are noticed, call a professional company right away. There are several things that can be fixed without hiring someone to do it, treating an active bedbug infestation is not one of them. We at Georgia Bedbug Solutions understand this which is why we are always willing to perform a complimentary inspection, offer free training to property management companies as well as extend every effort to make our service as affordable as possible!