TERMS OF SERVICE

Nature of the Work

We specialize in detecting leaks on:

• Residential water service lines

• Commercial water mains and services

• Strata water mains and services

• Municipal and Industrial water services and mains

• Swimming pools 

Our Guarantee

• If the leak is not found within a 4' radius of our mark, Pacific Leak Locators will return and re-locate the same leak at no additional cost to you.

• Certain conditions may impact the accuracy of leak detection services. We will notify you if any of the following will impact our detection process, and whether or not the guarantee will be impacted as a result. 

  1. 1. The presence of underground features, i.e. rocks, storage tanks, etc

     2. The presence of heavy traffic, electrical hums, or vibrations

     3. Environmental factors such as rivers, waterfalls, snow, rain and wind

• If a leak was not found in the marked location, please contact us while the excavator/plumber is on site. We will make every attempt to return immediately to complete additional testing. 

• Pacific Leak Locators cannot guarantee the ability to find all leaks due to all the limitations that can occur on a site (e.g., plastic pipes (undetectable pipes), unknown lines that branch out from the main line, pipe depth, slopes, path of least resistance, landscape cloth, vapor barriers, length of pipe (pipes over 200’ in length may need valves installed), size of pipe, size of the leak, soil the pipe is buried in, access to the utility, obstacles, backflow preventers, check valves, frost free hose bibs, noise in the work area, surface type, in-ability to drill test holes, property owner not being on site to let us test for the leak inside or to hook up our equipment, etc.

Access to Site/Parking

Please ensure that access to the property is arranged in advance. The most common examples of when this can go wrong are listed here:

• Shared water supplies – we will usually need access to all properties on the shared supply

• When the booking involves multiple parties (e.g. Landlord, Managing Agents, and tenants)

• When the water supply goes across someone else’s property

• Houses of multiple occupancy where individual rooms are locked

• Townhomes – we may need access to the above/below/adjacent home

Our technicians equipment is heavy so we also ask you to ensure there is adequate parking within reasonable distance of the property. Please be advised that any parking charges (in the form of metered parking, permits, or penalties incurred if there is no allocated parking) will be added to the final invoice. Any jobs which have to be aborted on the day due to lack of access and/or available parking will still be chargeable.

Suitability of our Services to your Problem

When an inquiry is made over the telephone or via email, we will attempt to establish the suitability of our services to your problem. We will advise you if we do not think our services are suited to your problem. We cannot  be held responsible for misdiagnosed or misrepresented problems. 

Accuracy of Information Provided

When an inquiry is made over the telephone or via email, we will attempt to obtain relevant information about the suspected problem, and/or certain site-specific details. This is in order to ensure that the job is quoted accurately, and the right number technicians are allocated to the job. You may be asked to provide information such as the approximate length and size of the water service line, the water pressure, the number of properties a water service line is serving, whether the site is domestic/commercial/industrial. It is important that you answer these questions as accurately as possible and to the best of your knowledge. If a leak is not found because we are misinformed about any of these details, and consequently underprepared for the investigation the appointment will be chargeable.

Requirements & Preparation for your Leak Detection- External Pipework

In order to carry out effective pressure testing of pipework, our technicians will require access to all rooms and/or parts of the building associated with the pipework being tested and all existing relevant isolation points. These areas will need to be cleared as much as reasonably possible. Testing will also require all relevant valves and points of isolation to be fully operational. We cannot be held responsible for faulty isolation valves. If testing cannot be carried out successfully due to inaccessibility or failed isolation points, the appointment will still be chargeable.

Equipment

All technicians arrive on site to a leak detection appointment with the following equipment:

• Hydrogen/Nitrogen tracer gas and detector

• Acoustic Listening Device

• Electronic tracing equipment

• Pipeline and thermal cameras

• Hand tools 

Different methods/equipment are suited to different problems.  The technician will determine which of the above methods and equipment are best suited to the problem.

Appointments

There is no specific finish time of your appointment, we will keep you regularly updated of our progress.  

Estimated prices for Leak Detection 

Estimates for Leak Detection vary depending on whether the inquiry is domestic/commercial, the size of the problem and the location of the property in question. Complex jobs may be quoted a fixed price.

We will do our utmost to localize a leak to the closest degree of accuracy that is physically possible. Most leaks are found within a 1 foot radius of our mark, however, to accurately confirm the location of a leak there is no substitute for physically exposing the leak area. In some cases we may be able to hand expose the leak for visual confirmation. We will endeavor to repair the leak if possible, however we are not obligated to.

Limitations of the non-invasive method

Upon receiving your inquiry we may ask you a series of questions which serve to establish the ‘findability’ of your leak (ground conditions, rate of movement on the water meter etc.) or in other words, to find out if your leaks meets certain size requirements to be found non-invasively. If a leak is known to fall short of these requirements we will advise you before an appointment is made. We will always inform you if the information you provide causes us to believe the leak is too small to be found non-invasively. 

Secondary/Multiple Leaks

If you have multiple leaks, our technicians will attempt to locate all of them. In most cases the largest leak must be repaired first before being able to locate secondary leaks. However, this is not always possible and we may have to provide you with an estimate to have the works completed on a different day. Unless our technicians are informed about the possibility of the presence of multiple leaks, they will focus their attention on locating and rectifying the main suspect leak only. Please be advised that carrying out a repair to pipework that is already in poor condition may cause leaks to appear at other weak spots along the pipe run.  We accept no liability for additional leaks that arise following a leak detection and any further works required to rectify any additional leaks will be chargeable.

Surface Plumbing Disclaimer

Please be advised that any surface plumbing or leaks and/or faults identified during testing will need to be rectified as discovered in order to continue testing for an underground/hidden leak. Our technicians will endeavor to rectify these on the day in order to continue testing. Surface plumbing repairs which are carried out to enable testing to continue come with no guarantee. Please also be advised that pressure testing on pipework can sometimes bring to light existing plumbing faults which we cannot be held responsible for.

Payment Terms

Unless an alternative agreement has been discussed with you, fees for leak detection are due upon receipt of the invoice. Payment via E-transfer to office@leaklocators.ca is preferred. Payment via credit card carries a 5% additional fee. We accept cheques made out to Pacific Leak Locators Inc 

Cancellations and Aborted Jobs

Should you wish to cancel an appointment, we require 48 hours notice by direct telephone call to Pacific Leak Locators 778 678 9751. Appointments cancelled after these specified time frames will be fully chargeable. The same applies to jobs which have to be aborted or are cancelled on the same day that they are due to take place, (for example due to lack of access to property/parking, uninformed tenants etc.).

Multiple Parties Involved in the Booking

Where bookings are made on behalf of other individuals/businesses, or involve multiple individuals/businesses (e.g. landlords, tenants, managing agents, plumbers, other contractors, rental agents, builders etc.) it is the responsibility of the person making the booking to ensure that all other parties involved are informed of the arrangements and the requirements for the appointment on the day. We will not be held responsible for any claims by any party of being uninformed or misinformed about our services and requirements for the appointment to take place.

Damage, liability and complaints

We accept no liability for the following:

• Costs incurred from investigations which prove there is no leak – these are fully chargeable at the price you were quoted for leak detection. 

• Damage to property or other services created during any essential activity required to detect, access and/or repair a leak.

• Damage caused by any leaks which we were not able to detect.

• Damage caused by any other parties in attempt to access a leak, access/invasive works are carried out entirely at your own risk.

• Shut offs/valves/points of isolation which are already deteriorating and fail to function properly following the leak detection.

• Leaks which spring up elsewhere on the pipework following a repair. When repairs are carried out to pipework which is already deteriorating/weak/corroding, it is possible for additional leaks to ‘spring up’ at other weak spots along the pipe run. We will not be held responsible for these additional leaks, as this is an intrinsic risk involved with repairing a leak then putting the weak pipework back under normal operating pressure.