MOLD SCAM ALERT! - Duct Cleaners Using a “Field Test Kit” or “Instant Mold Test”

How It Works:

Many Duct Cleaning companies are owned and operated by honest and reliable owners and they offer a valuable service. However, some “Duct Cleaners” or other untrained mold inspection service providers have perfected this scam.

They offer a very low “Duct Cleaning” service to get their foot in your door. When they show up to clean your ducts they offer you a free mold test OR they claim to find hidden mold in the duct work. They basically scare you into a very expensive “spray treatment” and sign you up for a regular “treatment service”. This is a very bogus and risky proposition.

How To Avoid It:

The best way to avoid this scam is to avoid using a service provider that uses “Instant Mold Tests” to conclusively determine if you have a mold problem or not. The manufacturers of these field test kits specifically state in their literature that a positive test result should be followed up with laboratory testing.

Furthermore the EPA specifically recommends AGAINST using a biocide as the sole source of remediation. The biocide used by these scam artists may be much more dangerous than the mold that it is being used to control. The EPA recommends “physical removal” of any mold or mold damaged building materials.

Another interesting note is that many modern homes use a vinyl or plastic “flex duct” that will not even support mold growth, but can also be damaged by improper duct cleaning. If you are going to use a firm to clean your ducts make sure that they are a National Air Duct Cleaners Association (NADCA) member and verify this yourself online – don’t take their word for it.

We have had reports from consumers that these con-men always seems like the nicest and most believable guys in the industry.

For more information on this and other scams: Please see "Mold Scams and Fraudulent Mold Practices".

For more information concerning mold and other indoor air quality issues please visit the AMI Environmental Testing Northwest, Inc. website or call us at 503.383.9457.

Bleach May Actually Make The Mold Worse

The use of Chlorine Bleach has been a common recommendation for cleaning and killing mold. However, the fact is that bleach is not an effective chemical for killing colonized mold. It may be effective on hard, non-porous surfaces such as shower walls or countertops, but so are other milder, less noxious, solutions using other detergents. Because non-porous surfaces do not allow the mold to take root into the material itself, the mold is actually growing on dust and other debris that may be on the surface and will typically wipe off with ease.

On porous surfaces such as wood and drywall mold takes root (hyphae) in the material and colonizes. Cleaning the mold off the surface with bleach does nothing to kill the roots. In fact, because bleach is 98% water it can actually make the problem worse because the chlorine in the bleach does not soak into the porous materials, but the water in the bleach does. Since mold requires water to colonize and grow it will likely grow back in a few days - worse than it was before the bleach was introduced.

Both OSHA and the EPA have determined that bleach should not be used in mold remediation. True, the EPA used to recommend the use of a bleach solution to clean mold, but has since removed that recommendation.

The goal of mold remediation is to get rid of the mold; not kill it! Dead mold can still release spores into the air and the concentration of mold spores in the air is the main potential for health problems. If you see visible mold growth on building materials, the chances are that there is more that you cannot see (see the post title “I Don’t See Any Mold”). It is best to hire a certified mold inspector to assess the situation and help you decide the proper plan for remediation.