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By Dan Suiter
University of Georgia
Termites cost Americans more than $1 billion each year to repair
the damage they cause and hire termite control companies to treat
infested structures.
They’re in nearly every region of the United States. But they’re
most abundant, and thus cause the most damage, in the Southeast.
Here, in any yard in a suburban neighborhood, a resident
population of termites will likely be found feeding on wooden
fence posts, garden stakes, railroad or landscape ties, tree
stumps, fallen limbs, firewood, etc.
To learn more about termites’ biology, see the University of
Georgia Extension Bulletin No. 1209, “Biology of Subterranean
Termites of the Eastern United States” (www.ces.uga.edu).
Contract types
Professional termite control firms offer homeowners two types of
contracts. They generally state that companies will either:
- Treat a new or recurring termite infestation (the
re-treat-only contract). - Treat a new or recurring infestation and repair new
structural termite damage (the re-treat-and-repair contract).
Terms
The terms and conditions of termite control contracts vary
greatly among companies. It’s best to study and understand each
contract type before selecting one.
Usually, termite control contracts are renewable annually for a
set number of years. Many companies offer a 5-year annually
renewable contract. Some provide shorter and longer terms.
The term for many termite bait contracts has no maturity date. It
may remain open-ended for as long as you keep paying the yearly
renewal fee.
The cost of the first treatment typically covers the contract for
a year. At the beginning of the second year and each year after
that until the contract expires, you have to pay a renewal fee.
Each year, the contract is considered renewed and its active
status continued only when the company gets the renewal fee. Most
companies may cancel the contract if the fee isn’t paid by its
due date.
Retreatment
Retreatment contracts generally require that the company return
and treat part or all of the home to get rid of a new or
recurring infestation at no extra expense, as long as the terms
of the contract are met.
Under a retreat-only contract, the company holds no
responsibility for damage, old or new, from a termite
infestation. Under this contract type, repairing the damage is
the sole responsibility of the property owner.
With the retreat-and-repair contract, the company pays to repair
new structural termite damage, as long as the terms of the
contract are met.
Define ‘new’
“New” means the damage can be documented to have happened since
the first treatment, or the contract’s effective date.
But you can’t tell from the damage when it happened. Termites
commonly infest, feed on and then leave food resources in wood.
They leave only the evidence (damaged wood, soil in wood) that
they were there at some point.
So, when you make a claim against a repair contract, you usually
have to show that you found live termites at the site of the
damage.
If you find live termites, a photo or video often helps provide
proof of activity. Termite control companies may also have to
verify the presence of live termites.
(Dan Suiter is an Extension Service entomologist with the
University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental
Sciences.)
