📨 Contractor’s Digest – Daily Rundown (March 20, 2025)

📅 Thursday, March 20, 2025
🛠 Helping Residential Contractors & Subs Build Smarter, Work Safer, and Grow Faster

🔹 How to Adjust Your Bids & Contracts When Material Costs Fluctuate
🔹 The Smartest Way to Handle Warranty Claims Without Losing Money
🔹 Tool Spotlight: Best Cordless Circular Saw for 2025

📉 What’s Happening?
With lumber, steel, concrete, and roofing materials rising unpredictably, contractors who fail to adjust their contracts risk losing thousands in profit when costs increase after locking in a bid.

📌 Why It Matters for Contractors:

📌 How to Protect Your Bottom Line:
✅ Use price escalation clauses to adjust pricing if materials increase by 5% or more after contract signing.
✅ Add a contingency line item (5-10%) to cover cost swings, with unused funds credited back to clients.
✅ Lock in supplier pricing before quoting to ensure your material costs won’t change.

🚀 Pro Tip: Monitor material costs weekly—a profitable bid today might turn into a loss if prices surge.

Warranties are meant to protect both you and the client, ensuring your work is high quality while preventing unnecessary callbacks. However, if you don’t have clear terms, warranties can quickly turn into a money pit—where you’re spending time and resources fixing issues you didn’t cause.

Some clients assume a warranty is a blanket guarantee that covers any problem, even when it’s caused by wear and tear, homeowner neglect, or third-party damage. Without a structured approach, you’ll end up covering repairs that should be the client’s responsibility.

Here’s how to set clear expectations, avoid unnecessary callbacks, and keep warranty claims from eating into your profits.

🚩 Vague Warranty Terms
💡 Problem: If your contract doesn’t clearly state what’s covered and what’s not, clients will assume you’re responsible for anything that goes wrong.

🚩 No Process for Handling Claims
💡 Problem: If there’s no formal process for filing a claim, clients may call, text, or show up at your job site expecting an immediate fix.

🚩 Fixing Problems That Aren’t Your Fault
💡 Problem: If a client damages something or neglects maintenance, you shouldn’t be on the hook for repairs.

🚩 Not Charging for Non-Warranty Work
💡 Problem: If a client calls you for an issue outside the warranty, are you still fixing it for free?

🚩 No Documentation of Work
💡 Problem: If you don’t have photos, signed approvals, or maintenance instructions, clients may claim “it was always like this”—even when it wasn’t.

📌 What’s Covered?
✔️ Workmanship defects for X months/years.
✔️ Manufacturer defects in materials (but you don’t cover the manufacturer’s delays or policies).

📌 What’s NOT Covered?
❌ Normal wear and tear.
❌ Damage from homeowner neglect or improper use.
❌ Work done by other contractors after your project.
❌ Issues caused by acts of nature (flooding, storms, earthquakes).

📌 How Long Does Coverage Last?
✔️ Most contractors offer a 1-year workmanship warranty, but set a clear expiration date.

🚀 Pro Tip: Have clients sign a warranty acknowledgment at project completion so there’s no confusion later.

📌 Why? Some clients will call for any issue, expecting you to fix it for free. Charging a diagnostic fee helps filter out unnecessary claims and compensates you for your time.

💡 How to Implement It:
✔️ Add this to your contract:
"A $XX service fee applies to all warranty calls. If the issue is covered, the fee will be refunded. If not, the fee covers inspection and labor."

🚀 Pro Tip: Most clients won’t abuse the warranty when they know there’s a cost for non-covered repairs.

📌 Why? If a client claims “it was always like this,” you need proof of how the job looked at completion.

💡 How to Implement It:
✔️ Take before, during, and after photos of your work.
✔️ Have clients sign off on job completion & warranty terms.
✔️ Provide a homeowner maintenance guide to show their responsibilities.

🚀 Pro Tip: Store all job records digitally in a CRM or cloud storage—it can protect you from liability years later.

🔹 If a client pushes back, remind them:
📌 "Our warranty covers defects in workmanship, not regular maintenance or misuse."

🔹 If a client asks for a repair that isn’t covered, say:
📌 "We’d be happy to take care of that! Since it falls outside the warranty, we can schedule it at our standard service rate."

Setting clear boundaries protects your business, keeps clients happy, and prevents warranty abuse.

✔️ Update your contract’s warranty section to clearly define coverage.
✔️ Implement a service call fee for non-warranty claims.
✔️ Start documenting your work to protect against false claims.

Would you like a warranty agreement template to use in your contracts? 📑🔨

📌 Business Tip: The Smartest Way to Handle Warranty Claims Without Losing Money
📉 Problem: Some clients think warranties cover everything, leading to costly callbacks on issues unrelated to your work.
✅ Solution:
✔️ Define clear warranty terms in your contract.
✔️ Charge a service fee for non-covered issues (e.g., wear & tear, homeowner damage).
✔️ Document all work with photos to protect yourself if disputes arise.

🚀 Pro Tip: If clients push back, remind them: "A warranty covers defects in workmanship, not regular maintenance or misuse."

🔹 Milwaukee M18 FUEL 2732-20 – Lightweight, powerful, and best-in-class battery life—ideal for framing and finish work.

😂 Contractor Humor: "Why did the contractor bring a tape measure to the bar? He heard the drinks were on the house!"

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👷‍♂️ Stay safe, keep building smarter!
— Benjamin Patton