Question:
Hi Ken,
I have been reading you article and find them to be very informative. I have
one question myself. If you have a existing subscriber and they want
additional work and you already have them on a signed contract. You type up
another contract for the additional work but you fax it to them. They sign
and fax back to you, is that a legal document, if you need it for a case
later on? Please advise.
Evelyn
Burglar Alarm Technicians, Inc
Fort Lauderdale, FL
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Answer:
You don't indicate if your transaction is a sale or lease. I will
address both.
I will assume you are using the standard contracts that I provide [
Alarm Contracts]. Let's start with a sales transaction. You start with a
sales contract which covers the installation of the equipment. You may have a
monitoring contract, if you are providing monitoring service, and you may have
a service contract if you intend to provide any service beyond warranty work.
After the contract is signed [and it doesn't matter if the work started
, is in progress or is completed] your subscriber requests additional
equipment. That additional equipment has to be covered by a contract. You can
amend the existing contract by separate rider, by making changes to the
contract and initialling the changes, or by signing a new contract that covers
the additional equipment. If the service contract or monitoring contracts will
be affected by the additional equipment [for instance if you are adding radio]
then you can sign a new monitoring or service contract, or amend the original.
With a lease transaction, you have a single Lease that covers
installation, service and monitoring. Your subscriber requests additional
equipment or service. When you purchased the Lease I provided a Supplemental
Agreement form. This form is used for changes to the Lease for additional
equipment or service, and also in the (unlikely) event your subscriber wants to
increase the limitation of liability clause.
You are definitely right to be concerned about doing additional work,
labor or material, without having that specific work covered by contract. In
the event of a loss your contracts won't cover the additional work and service
unless you have the amendment, rider, Supplemental Agreement or new contract.
This problem comes up frequently when alarm companies do service work
outside of the warranty coverage. You need a service contract. My standard
Service Contract is designed with a check off for Pay Per Call or periodic
payments for labor and material.
Kenneth Kirschenbaum, Esq