5 Questions to Ask When Choosing an HVAC Company

Choosing an HVAC company if you don’t have much knowledge or expertise yourself could seem like a daunting task. Nevertheless, you want to be sure that the team of service techs working in your Hillsborough, NC, home is competent. To help you out, here are five questions you should ask an HVAC company before entering into any business arrangement:

Are You Licensed and Insured?

This question checks the basic legitimacy of the business you’re considering to perform service for you, as no HVAC company can legally operate in the state of North Carolina without the appropriate license. You’ll want to also make sure the HVAC company has liability insurance. This type of insurance means that no one will hold you financially liable if any sort of accident should happen at your home due to the company’s service techs doing their work.

Seeing an HVAC license and an insurance policy document from the company won’t tell you if the company has sufficiently skilled workers, but it’s at least a sign that you’re looking at a legitimate outfit. Concerning the liability insurance policy, we encourage asking as many follow-up questions as you can about the size of the company’s coverage, the specific things covered and so on.

What Do You Think Is Wrong With My System?

This may seem like a risky and unhelpful question to ask those who have no HVAC knowledge, but you can learn a lot if you know what to listen for. A competent HVAC contractor should ask you several follow-up questions in response to this question. They should seek to gather as much detailed knowledge about your system as possible.

The reason for this is that it’s simply impossible to correctly diagnose HVAC problems without detailed knowledge of the relevant system’s state and behaviors. No HVAC contractor, no matter how skilled or experienced, can come up with a correct answer to this question out of nowhere. Thus, the more follow-up questions you receive, the more confidence you can have that the contractor knows what they’re doing.

Do You Offer Maintenance Plans?

Even if you don’t need HVAC maintenance at this specific moment, this is always a good question to ask. HVAC professionals consistently recommend that everyone schedule maintenance on their systems at least once per year, and the benefits of such maintenance are considerable. Sooner or later, your system will need maintenance, and it’s good to know that the company you’re dealing with can provide that.

Routine maintenance doesn’t just help keep your system working efficiently, either. Most manufacturer warranties require owners to invest in professional maintenance to keep the warranty valid. Without maintenance, you risk losing out on your warranty benefits even if the manufacturer would otherwise cover an issue.

Do You Perform Manual J Load Calculations?

This question is appropriate if you’re in the market for a new HVAC system. HVAC professionals use Manual J load calculations to ascertain the heating/cooling requirements of your home.

If the company installing your system either won’t perform this calculation or performs it incorrectly, the size of your home and your system won’t match. This can lead to many problems later. Therefore, this question is a good way to ascertain whether you’re truly dealing with professionals.

What Kinds of Brands Do You Service?

Though many aspects of HVAC systems are the same across brands, differences nevertheless exist from one brand to another. If an HVAC company performs services on a wide variety of different brands, you have good reason to believe that their service techs are quite skilled.

Even if you don’t know much about the technical aspects of HVAC work, it’s still possible to select an HVAC company reliably and with confidence. You just need to know what questions to ask and what sorts of responses to listen for. Call Warren-Hay Mechanical for the best HVAC services in the Hillsborough, NC, area.

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