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Warranty
Where do you draw the line when it comes to replacing plants that a client has destroyed? We have a client, a lawyer, for whom we did a small design and install last year. Four or five of the plants- Ilex, Rhody, Pieris- in a group are in really bad shape. Dead branches, die-back, etc. They clearly either drowned or dried out and since we had one of the warmest, dryest winters in history here I can say pretty confidently that they did not drown. Problem is that as far as I know there is no test to prove that something died from lack of water so if the lawyer decides to be unreasonable....?
So for all of you is there a dollar value below which you will appease a client and above which you tell them to go to hell and take your chances with a lawsuit? And how do you protect yourself from this kind of thing. Our warranty and the things that negate it are pretty well spelled out and I'm careful to tell people they need to water right into winter if it's dry, especially with plants like those. But if they say they did I can't prove that they're lying. It's not that big a deal...probably $4-500 including labor to replace...but it's not cheap either and I don't like losing.
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