Any Guarantee You Want
Marketing at Its Finest
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Contractors who deal in a myriad of “industry exclusive guarantees” are a lot like the corner hustler. You want it? His loaded coat has got it. Except, instead of dealing with street thugs peddling hot merchandise, you’re dealing with sales thugs peddling psychology. As long as you’ll sign the contract, they’ll give you just about any guarantee you want.
One of their most seductive guarantees goes something like this: “If you’re not happy with your new heating and air conditioning system, just say so! We’ll gladly yank it out and refund your money!” The theory is that, just like returning a widget to Amazon, if you don’t like your new HVAC system you can return that too. You can, but you probably won’t.
Most “return if you don’t like it guarantees” are riddled with provisions designed to frustrate you. In most cases you have to tell the contractor what you don’t like about your new HVAC system. Then they get a year or two to address your complaints one by one. That’s more than enough time to wear you down. The last thing you’ll want to do after two years is invoke the guarantee and go through that process all over again.
There’s a thousand whizbang guarantees just like that. No matter what the guarantee is, the marketing department who writes it isn’t concerned about honoring it. They’ll fill the guarantee with so much fine print that they won’t have to. Rather, their only concern is to create a good hook and a false assurance. The guarantee’s actual benefit to you doesn’t matter to them as long as it convinces you to sign the contract.
Getting quality work in the first place is far more valuable than a paper promise. The best way to get quality work is to learn how to identify quality contractors. The Truth About… pages, the Trade Secrets page, and the Buyers Guide were all written to help you achieve that goal. If you’ll take the time to educate yourself about this trade, you’ll be better equipped to separate the quality contractors from the corner conmen.