American Home Shield was founded in 1971 and operated independently until it was acquired by ServiceMaster in 1989. It serves 1.4 million customers across 49 states and the District of Columbia. It is one of the largest home warranty writers in the United States, and has home warranty companies with active operations in all 48 contiguous states. In 2012, the company had around 1,500 employees, and handles roughly 2.5 million service requests each year. The company works with over 11,000 licensed contractors and 45,000 technicians in the U.S. The headquarters are in Memphis, Tennessee.
Mergers and acquisitions
American Home Shield operated independently from its founding in 1971 until it was acquired by ServiceMaster in 1989., ServiceMaster had announced plans to spin off American Home Shield to operate independently again, beginning in the third quarter of 2018.
Consumer reception
American Home Shield's home warranty products have been reviewed by its clients at trustpilot.com, sitejabber.com, and bbb.org with overwhelming negative feedback. All reviews on the BBB more than 1 sentence long have a first hand experience explaining how American Home Shield has failed to honor their end of the contract. American Home Shield also hires contractors that are either unlicensed, under delinquency, or permanently closed by their local state. American Home Shield's home warranty products have been reviewed by Consumer Reports. In June 2015, consumer and finance journalist Anthony Giorgianni, author of the Consumer Reports review, writing on AlterNet, described American Home Shield's complaint history with the Better Business Bureau : However, Giorgianni also reported the following response from the BBB when he asked about American Home Shield's complaint history: As of November 13, 2017, American Home Shield's BBB rating was B. WJLA-TV has reported on a case in which American Home Shield refused to pay for replacement of a clothes dryer that caught fire, on the ground that the localfire department had removed the dryer from the home when responding to the call. WJLA-TV repeatedly attempted to contact American Home Shield about the incident, but received no response.
