Tips on Hiring a Tree Service

When hiring a tree service, property owners should look for more than a yellow page ad. Much more needs to be considered such as:

• Tree Service Experience
• Length of Time in the Tree Service Industry
• The amount of liability insurance the tree service carries
• The Equipment that the tree service Owns and Operates

Lets start with the experience. Why is that important? The tree service industry is a very dangerous line of work. Many people think that if they have a chain saw and a ladder...their in business. That couldn't be further from the truth. Experience and education is very important. Often times, an experienced tree service operator is a certified arborist. This means that that individual has completed a series of courses that educates them on the species of trees and how to prune and trim each kind of tree. Climbing schools and other occupational schooling is very beneficial in an arborists past educational level.

Second, the length of time in the tree service industry is important. Do you trust a newly experienced arborist to take down a tree that is hanging over your house? One small mistake could cost the homeowners the inconviences of a hole in their roof. Experience is so valuable for being able to judge how a tree limb might fall or roll to the ground.

Third is liability insurance. Do you want a tree service that doesn't have the ability to repair the damages that might happen? Often times, tree services have insurance but not enough. The cost of insurance has sky-rocketed and becomes too expensive for some tree services to carry. This too will tell you the lack of experience and education of individual tree service companies that you are looking to hire. It is very simple to ask the tree service company to have their insurance company mail you a certificate of insurance with your name printed on the certificate.

Lastly, the equipment that the tree company is using will show you a lot of things about their company. Is it newer equipment? Do they have sufficient groundsman that can handle all the falling limbs and possible problems that might occur? The tree service equipment that is vital to look for is proper climbing gear, a boom truck with sufficient height, skid loader for hauling logs and a chipper for the limbs to chipped up and hauled away. A stump grinder is used to grind out the stumps, sometimes a stump grinding job is subcontracted out to another company. If a tree services shows up to complete a job without a chipper, you know that you are dealing with a small time company that more then likely isn't carrying insurance.

Once your specifc tree service has been hired, sit back and enjoy the show. Taking down a large tree is an impressive job.