Other vendors have hurt our industry indirectly by upselling unnecessary items to mark up the invoices heavily.
At Mr. Rekey Locksmith, there is no incentive to engage in such immoral practices. 95% of our clients are repeat customers. It is our promise to our valued customers that we will not install/ repair something that is not needed.
Pre-Approved Maintenance Limit
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Each time we must contact the Landlord/ PM for approval, it increases our back-office labor and oversight costs.
Which affects our ability to keep our low, competitive prices.
For more than 27 years, we’ve prided ourselves on bringing great, professional value at the lowest price possible.
The Maintenance limit
- give us the freedom to do our job in one visit. It ensures that the job gets done on time as The Texas property code requires bringing a property up to code within seven days of the tenants moving in.
- It cuts down on the number of calls we make to our landlords/ PMs.
- Prevent unnecessary trip charges.
- Provide us the ability to give your tenants better service and not have to reschedule with us for a second visit in case we could not get a hold of a property manager for approvals.
The bottom line, there is no benefit whatsoever to keeping the limit below the adequate amount to cover the expenses of bringing a property up to code.
We have no benefit in breaking the trust entitled by our repeat clients by expending money beyond what’s needed to bring a property up to the Texas Property Code.
In many cities, they are legal codes/requirements that landlords must comply for rental properties. Such as Smoke Alarms, Carbon Monoxide Detectots, etc.
In addition, our Rekey Special covers up to 6 keyholes; which is sufficient for 90% of most rental properties. However, the “bigger homes” may have extra keyholes, and for those, there is an additional charge.
We recommend a minimum of $200 pre-approved maintenance limit.
Upon completion, a detailed, comprehensive report is created to break down each charge.
Our technicians have a schedule assigned daily; therefore, delays in getting a hold of the landlord/ property manager may require the technician to reschedule with the tenant.
This results in the tenant becoming unhappy and an additional trip charge fee that wasn’t necessary if we had a maintenance limit pre-approved.
When a phone call is required for approvals, the landlord/PM can refuse to pay for work done, even if the property needs it. Unfortunately, it has happened to us many times, creating a loss situation for our company and our technicians.
Although many other vendors may even provide free estimates, we cannot do that at Mr. Rekey Locksmith. Our margin is small. At a standard Rekey, the trip fee is the bulk of the invoice.
Each rental differs; however, they are certain situations to keep in mind:
- Is this a newly acquired rental property that has never been brought up to the require rental code?(Legal rental requirements vary by state/city).
- How old are the smoke alarms? (The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) recommends every smoke alarm be replaced after ten years)
- Are we replacing the smoke alarm batteries during our visit? Smoke alarm battery life is not evaluated during our tests. Batteries that fail after our visit are not considered a warranted item.
- City laws can adopt new regulations, such as installing carbon monoxide detectors in every rental property.
- Additional Keyholes outside our Rekey Special.
- Remember that hardware does not last forever; we often are required to replace strike plates, old locks, etc.
Trust is the KEY to any customer service business. We have thousands of long-time landlords/PMs who know our high ethical values and entrust us with pre-approved maintenance limits that allow us to do our job more efficiently and cost-effective for both them and us as a company.