Your roof is arguably the most important and expensive part of your home. When the time comes to repair or replace it is is imperative you hire someone you can trust to do the job right and according to manufacturers specs to ensure your warranty stays valid. With the advent of the internet, finding that roofing contractor is easier than ever! Most reputable companies have websites and are listed in various directories around the web. These website’s typically allow consumers to provide feedback on listed contractors allowing you to perform better research into how the company operates and how actual customers feel about them.
When researching a roofing contractor consider the following:
Do they have a website?
Today, a website is a must for any serious company to compete, if the contractor you are investigating doesn’t have a website or if the website looks “slapped together” or cheaply made this could indicate financial problems or a “fly-by-night” part time operation. Companies that take the time to hire a professional and include lots of information for consumers announce to the world that they are in business for the long haul and are serious about competing for your business. One should ask themselves, if they don’t care about their company enough to get a decent website, what makes me think they will care about my roof?
Do they advertise on sites that allow actual customers to provide reviews outside of their direct control?
It’s easy to cherry pick the reviews you want and paste them to your website, when the contractor controls what is published you can’t really tell if they are being upfront and publishing just the good ones or not. That is why it is important to check local third-party directories and websites such as Kudzu.com, SuperPages, Google, and Angie’s list where the contractor has no control over what their customers say. If a roofing contractor is honest and does excellent work, they will have no fear of these sites. If you can not find the contractor you are investigating on these sites (and check several) be wary, it could indicate they are very new or their work is sub-par and they simply do not want people to know what their customers are saying.
How many reviews do they have and what do most customers say
A company with two or three reviews won’t give you a good picture of how the company performs, if they have a small amount of reviews, take the percentage of bad reviews to good reviews, if a company has only 5 reviews and 2 of them are bad, you may want to reconsider using them. On the other hand, if they have hundreds of reviews on multiple sites and only a small (or none) number of less-than-stellar or even bad reviews, even the larger contractors aren’t perfect, consider the percentage of bad to good. 100 great reviews vs 5 bad ones and you can pretty much guess that the company is trustworthy. Of course any company with a 50% or worse ratio of bad to good reviews should be avoided, don’t dismiss a contractor based on just one or two “bad apples” but look at the overall picture.
Awards & Rankings
If the company has several verifiable awards and high rankings with entities such as the BBB, this is a strong indicator of quality and service. Atlanta Roofing for example has an A+ BBB rating, Angies List Super Service Award, Home Reports Best Pick and other awards. Check complaint and consumer affair sites, see how many has complained and if the issues are resolved. Be leery of companies not registered with the BBB and has no Awards or certifications, this may not indicate it’s a bad company, but can indicate that the company may not be stable or has performed so poorly they simple do not wish to be considered.