When you have your home or business painted, you have to see it for the type of investment it is. Like buying an appliance for your home, having a paint job done is investing in an important part of your home or business that has to last for years. It is meant to last for years, and if something should go wrong that compromises that, you want a painting contractor who covers repairing whatever problem may have occurred. Dan Mahaney is a franchise owner of a CertaPro Painters location. Here he explains how a painting warranty should work.
Just as you would want a warranty for your television, you should have a warranty for your paint job. This is because if the job is done right, the paint job should last for X amount of time. If something happens before that time is up, say the paint starts peeling or chipping, that is considered the responsibility of the painters, as the paint job’s durability has not met the predetermined period of time. Basically, it should not be up to you to repair or pay to have someone repair this problem if it occurred within the painting contractor’s time period of responsibility. A warranty is a feature that has not always been available for painting, especially when painting services were more commonly offered by informally structured companies. Painting contracting companies have more structure, and more aspects of a full-fledged company: accounting departments, customer service departments, marketing departments, etc. More full-service features and guarantees are available, and a paint job has become more of an official service. This has lead to the security a customer can get from having a warranty.
A painting warranty usually lasts for a couple of year’s; CertaPro’s is for two years. A warranty covers any peeling, chipping, blistering, fading, or other damage that the contractor and customer agree upon, that is the result of a flaw in the painting application. A wall painted one year ago should not begin to flake already, so that is to be considered a sort of mistake of the painter that is corrected and covered by the warranty.
There are usually a few conditions in which you can receive a warranty, such as you must pay the full contract price, you must have a copy of this full, original contract, you must have a copy of the canceled check or other proof of full payment, and you must be able to make the area of your home or business in question available for the repair. By nature, painting warranties tend to be limited as many variables in different buildings may simply prevent a paint job from lasting, such as a higher than normal build-up of moisture. As long as no conditions exist to free the painters of responsibility, the action is covered. You should make sure to read the warranty to see what is covered and what is not before the job begins.
A warranty program is also a great way to look into the painting contractor you are thinking of hiring, as the warranty stats are usually available on the company’s website, and these stats can say a lot. You want a painting contractor with a low number of warranty claims compared to the number of paint jobs covered by warranty. This means the majority of customers never had a problem, so chances are you won’t either! Between that knowledge and the security of a good warranty you’ve read up on, you should feel total security in your paint job.
