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The roof quote you sign should already hold the photos that justify each line. A price without a picture of the open ridge is a number you cannot check when the job is done. Roof Revival Melbourne attaches the photos to the scope before anyone talks about a start date. If the pictures and the inclusions disagree, do not sign yet.
A roof is awkward to re-inspect once the scaffold is down and the coating is on. The photos taken before you sign are the record of what was broken, what was powdery, and what was being left alone. The scope is the list of what will change. Together they stop the argument that starts with “we thought that was included”. Apart, they are a brochure and a guess.
This matters most on restores, because the word restoration gets stretched. One company means ridges, tile swaps, prep, and a specified coat. Another means colour. The photos make the first meaning visible. You can see the bed that will be cut out. You can see the tiles that will be swapped. You can see the valley that is, or is not, on the list.
Ask for pictures of each ridge and hip, not a single glamour shot from the street. Ask for the valleys, the chimney or flue flashing, any skylight, and a close view of the tile or sheet in the field. If there is a ceiling stain, ask for the roof space above it. If solar is on the roof, ask for the bays under the rails, or a written line that those bays were not sighted. A gallery of clean caps and blue sky does not document a fault.
The photos should be dated by the inspection, and they should be yours to keep. You will want them when a second quote describes a different roof, and you will want them at handover when the new pointing makes the old failure hard to remember. Memory is a poor specification. A ridge photo is a good one.
We take those photos as part of quoting roof restoration in Melbourne. The same habit applies to a repair. A single cracked tile still deserves a picture, because “cracked tile” without a location becomes a search party on the day.
Read the inclusions as if you will have to explain them to someone who was not at the house. Re-bed and repoint: which ridges and hips. Tile allowance: how many, or how a variation is priced if the count rises once the bed is off. Valleys: replace, or leave. Flashings: which ones. Prep: what is removed before any coating goes on. Coating: the system, not the word “paint”. Gutters: included, or excluded on purpose. Access: scaffold, and on which elevations. Solar: off and on, or working around an array that stays.
Exclusions are as useful as inclusions. A scope that says the valley iron is tired and not included is an honest scope. You can add it or you can accept the leak it will keep. A scope that never mentions the valley, on a roof where the valley is visible in the photos, is a gap. The piece on cheap quotes and missing lines walks through how those gaps are manufactured. The cure is the same. If it is not written, it is not priced.
Some owners sign because the crew can “start Thursday” and the other quote is two weeks away. Speed is real in a wet week. It is still cheaper to wait two days for pictures than to discover on day three that the ridges were never in the number. A deposit taken before the scope is stable is a deposit on a conversation. Ask for the revised page when the inspection changes the job. Sign that page.
Variations will still happen. Tiles hidden under a hip can be worse than the face. Sarking can be wetter than the ceiling showed. A variation is a new line, with a photo and a price, agreed before the extra work is done. It is not a shrug at handover. If the original scope said “replace tiles as required” with no count and no rate, you have already agreed to an argument. Put the rate in before you sign.
Colour choices can wait a day. The mechanical scope should not. Picking a monument or a surfmist shade does not document the bed. Do the bed first in the paperwork, then the swatch.
At the end you should see the same places again. New bedding where the powder was. New iron where the rust was. A coating on a face that was prepped, not on moss. If a bay was excluded, the handover photo should show it was left, so nobody claims it was quietly done. This is how a defect call stays factual. You are comparing two sets of pictures, not two memories.
Keep the file with the contract. Contract, scope, before photos, after photos. If a ridge opens in the first winter, you can show what “done” was supposed to mean. Without that, the company can say the ridge was never in the job, and you will be standing in the yard trying to remember a verbal aside.
Send suburb, storeys and two roof photos. Roof Revival Melbourne — 0426 516 883 · info@roofrevivalmelbourne.com.au
