Things to Know When Hiring Contractors for Your Next Project 

Regardless of whether you are looking for a domestic contractor to do some work on your property, or if you are a business looking to hire contractors to complete some large-scale works on your site, there are plenty of factors to consider and think about when hiring contractors.

Research The Contractors You Plan To Hire

Here are a few things that you must do, or at least look into before working with any contractor and employing their services. You should consider these points, especially if you plan on hiring them for long-term, complex, or large projects.

Licenses

For many types of work that need to be completed there are licenses and insurance that come with this. Make sure that the contractors that you plan on hiring have all the relevant documentation and that it is up to date. If you fail to check this then it could land you and them in hot water later down the line, especially if something goes wrong.

Qualifications

To avoid hiring complete cowboys, or contractors who have little to no regard or respect for their trade, a good check is to ask for and look at what qualifications they hold. However, this is not always an indicator that you should swear by, as there are plenty of unqualified yet highly skilled people with vast experience in the trade industry. But checking qualifications along with some good intuition about the person, or persons will help you greatly in determining whether or not to hire them.

Review Their Portfolio

Often contractors will have a portfolio of recent works in which they have participated or completed. Asking to see this along with any pictures they may have taken of their previous projects will also give you a great indication of their workmanship. You can also gain a lot of other information through this such as, who they have previously done work for and what the outcome of the final works looked like. If they are a well-established company such as The Survey House, then they are likely to be able to send an extensive portfolio full of examples.

Assess Their Communication Skills

You can start assessing a person or company upon first contact with them. Generally, you will get a good reading on a person or company just by how they are communicating with you. Not only do you want to work alongside someone who has good communication skills, but you want to be sure that you are confident in their work and their promises. If you feel that the conversation is hard work, or that they do not understand or sound confident in what they are saying, then this is a good indication that you should try again with another contractor or company.

Trial And Assess Their Work On a Smaller Scale

This is only really applicable if you are planning on hiring contractors on a long-term basis, or if you have a lot of work to be done in several stages and is not always relevant or even possible to do. However, if you are working with contractors that you have not used before, a great way to sus them out is to employ them to do a smaller job and assess their workmanship and customer service throughout the project before re-hiring them on a long-term basis.

Before Any Work Commences

Before any work takes place you and your contractors should at the bare minimum have these things in place, to protect the project and yourselves.

Both Parties Are In Agreement And Understanding Of The Works

Miscommunications are easy to come up against, but in the same instance they are also easy to avoid. Something to know about when working with contractors is that they will do (in most cases) exactly what has been instructed. So, if you want to make sure that they have understood what you have asked, a great way to avoid any miscommunication is to ask them to either give you a document detailing the work to be carried out as per your instructions, or a simple verbal communication explaining what they will carry out.

Signed Contracts

To cover yourself and the contractors, just like in any work situation contracts should be looked into. This will help protect both parties throughout the project, regardless of any issues or not.

Choosing a reputable company with good reviews, high standards, and great customer service is fairly easy to do in this day and age, especially with all the help of online information and social media. Just be sure to consider these pointers when looking into and selecting contractors to work with on your next project.