Avoid These Mistakes When Dealing With Water Damaged Carpets
Water damage is a health concern given the risks that it exposes the persons in the household to, and it can also permanently damage your carpet. Lots of issues come into play here, with the main ones being the source of the water – how clean or dirty it is, the drying processes used, and the carpet cleaning that follows. If the water damage is from a clean source – perhaps it’s a plumbing incident in your home where you’re dealing with a broken pipe, or there is a leakage in the roof that caused the downpour to get to the carpet, there are high chances of salvaging the carpet if it is attended to fast. For cases of flooding – especially where the dirty water is mixed with content from sewer lines, the carpet usually needs to be replaced. Getting in touch with a carpet cleaning professional to assess the condition of the carpet as soon as possible will enable you to determine the appropriate action to take. Here are mistakes that are usually made during the process.
Common mistakes
- Failing to account for the source of water damage
Not all wet carpets are equal. You need to track down the source of the water that has been soaked up by the carpet. Whether it’s from broken pipes or water seeping up for the underfloor, the source needs to be identified and dealt with. Some will be immediately obvious, like the clogged toilet or bathtub overflow that sends water all over the house, or cases of flooding. The source of the water will also be the determinant of whether it can be restored with a thorough carpet cleaning and drying, or you’re better off just tossing it away and getting yourself a new one.
- Waiting too long before you act
With the wet carpet, you’re on the clock. The longer you wait, the more extensive the damage, and the more time and resources will be required to restore the unit. The carpet needs to be dried. High-powered machinery is needed to get to the moisture that is at the bottom of the fibres and in the padding. This is to prevent mould and mildew growing within the fibres – but it doesn’t stop there. An in-depth carpet cleaning will need to follow to remove the grime and residue that will have built up in the unit.
This simply makes a bad situation worse. Your carpet’s structural integrity, and the health of the household members are already on the line. You don’t want things getting worse because of hiring a rookie carpet cleaning firm that simply wants to make a quick buck from your situation, and ends up cutting corners which waste both your time and resources. Get it right from the word go by hiring an expert firm, a carpet cleaning company with the track record, high powered machinery, and qualified team to deal with the situation.
After the water damage incidence has been dealt with, it is recommended that you regularly check on it to ensure that it is in good condition. You can examine it every week, that way you will quickly note in case there is an issue cropping up, and have it dealt with before it becomes an extensive problem.
Key Considerations When Hiring A Carpet Cleaning Company
This is an intricate balancing act. You don’t want services that are so cheap that it’s basically a scam, you get below par results, or it turns out to be a bait and switch tactic that forces you to dig deeper into your wallet. On the other hand, you don’t want to punch a hole through your pocket in a bid to get the carpet cleaning done. A cheap company may have not invested in adequate equipment and skilled personnel to provide the services, and there are expensive services out there that underdeliver on their promise. Having a high price tag does not automatically mean that the carpet cleaning company has the best workers and resources. To estimate what the cost should be, get quotations from different carpet cleaning companies in your locality, and compare the rates. This will give you a range to work with, and you can proceed to sift through the rest of the providers with the factors we’ll look at next.
You want to be sure that you’re dealing with a company that is legally recognised, and that has been approved to provide the carpet cleaning services. They should be licensed and come with have a solid insurance plan. This is to provide you with protection in case of an accident that results in damage to your property which occurs during the carpet cleaning.
From dry and wet carpet cleaning, to those using eco-friendly methods for working on the carpet, cases where you have particularly stubborn spots to be dealt with – like pet urine stains, or the type of carpet is delicate – like with the natural fibre variations, they will be key determinants in the kind of carpet cleaning methods that will be used.
Here, you want to be sure that the carpet cleaning crew are well adept at what they are doing., and they should in fact be asking questions about your carpet before they proceed with the task, for them to determine the appropriate approach to take when working on your unit. The cleaners need to know the exact type of service you require, the type of stains being dealt with, the specific causes of the stains, presence or lack of pets, the kinds of allergies affecting the household members, how long it has been since the last time the carpet cleaning was carried out – they all need to be considered. Preferably, an in-person visit is recommended, where a representative of the carpet cleaning company comes to your residence to assess the state of the carpet, the kind of soiling being dealt with, and similar issues in order to provide you with detailed carpet cleaning options that you can then choose from. They should also be keen to answer any questions that you have about the process, so that you will also be well-informed about the operations.
Avoid These Mistakes When Dealing With Water Damaged Carpets
