Trucking company deals with $46k towing bill after bridge strike by calling news station to make company scatter “like bugs”

A trucking company was able to deal with a $46,000 tow bill by calling a local news station to expose the tow company and make them scatter “like bugs.”

Tim Smith with DPW Trucking says that one of his trucks got wedged underneath a viaduct in Chicago in early April. The initial quote from the tow company was only a few thousand dollars, but by the time he went to pick up the truck, it had risen to $46,000. 

“It was like: ‘You have to be kidding me! How do you come up with $46,000!” Smith said. 

DPW Trucking owner Kristin Crawford then searched the internet for the name of the towing company demanding such an egregious price, Official Towing, and discovered that the company had been in the news for charging excessive prices for semi truck towing in the past. 

“They don’t want to talk to you on the phone,” DPW Trucking owner Kristin Crawford said. “They literally hang up on you. And then they, it says on their email, they will not negotiate the rate.”

“I actually called that [trucking] company and talked to them and asked them how they got through this and they said the only way that they got through was when you guys showed up,” Crawford said to WGN News. 

Crawford and Smith then met with WGN News outside of Official Towing’s lot in the 9200 block of South Kilpatrick in Oak Lawn, Illinois and eventually received a message from the towing company’s owner after an unsuccessful phone call – DPW could retrieve their truck for $5,000 instead of the $46,000. With the help of Oak Lawn Police, the trucking company eventually got their truck back and took it back to Wisconsin. 

“They’re like bugs,” Crawford said. “They scurry when the police or the news to come…. We wouldn’t have our truck if it wasn’t for you,” Crawford said to WGN. “We would not have it back. It would still be sitting there and we would still be fighting with them and losing sleep.

Official Towing has faced complaints for excessive towing bills in the past. The recorded owner, Ahmed Shalabi, has also given conflicting information about whether or not the company is actually licensed to operate within the city limits of Chicago. He says that the city is “notorious for how difficult, time-consuming and expensive it is even to get a basic city license.”

“Conflict with customers, and with other towing companies, is also bad for business. Official Towing values its ability to serve the public in Chicago above its right to collect every penny it is owed on every tow,” Official Towing said in an email.