What to Look for when Choosing a Pool Service

Expectations

The sanitation and hygiene of your swimming pool is a priority; therefore, sometimes finding a pool service can be challenging task with respect keeping your pool clean on a regular basis. Before you canvas the yellow pages looking for a company then, take some time to decide what you expect from a pool service before investing any hard-earned money in the maintenance of your pool.

Service Plans

A pool service typically offers a number of service plans which involve cleaning the pool once or twice a week. Maintenance offerings also entail inspections, one-time cleaning, replacement of filter cartridges, vacation cleaning, chemical delivery, new pool start-up services, repairing automatic pool cleaners and the sales of pool supplies. Most pool service technicians clean pools ranging from approximately 5,000 to around 250,000 gallons in size.

Trained and Certified

Therefore, look for a pool service that has employees who are certified to clean pools and can supply you with several references with respect to their service. Don’t hire a pool service whose employees work as subcontractors. Make certain they’re certified and direct employees of the company.

Pool Service Offerings

Also, make sure the company has a variety of offerings with respect to maintenance. In other words, they should be able to offer you one of the following services:

–Weekly chemical and filter service and cleaning;

–Weekly full service and maintenance for any type of pool;

–Bi-weekly service and maintenance for any type of pool; and

–Delivery and supply of pool equipment

Other Criteria to Consider when Choosing a Company

In addition, a pool service should be licensed and insured to cover both residential and commercial accounts. It’s preferable too to choose one where there are no initial fees or contracts to sign and that offers billing on a monthly basis. If you can find one who will undertake a detailed analysis of the condition of your pool’s water, then that is good too as it will help you determine the best maintenance plan to select with respect to caring for your pool on a regular basis.

Making an Assessment of your Pool’s Water

Analyzing the pool’s water for pH, calcium hardness, metals, phosphates, dissolved solids and determining the saturation index will better assist in facilitating a service plan that will maintain the cleanliness and overall condition of your pool’s system. Therefore, testing the components in the water first can save time and reduce total maintenance costs while keeping the water in premium condition.

Summation

The pool service you select  should be a reliable and established company in your community. It should be a company that can inspect and analyze your above ground swimming pool’s water and make the appropriate recommendations with regards to cleaning and treatment. Make sure you obtain references from other customers who have used the company and that the employees are certified technicians. Keeping this information in mind as you shop for a pool service can reap successful results in the care of your swimming pool and help keep it in pristine shape for many years to come.

photo credit: St.A.

Swimming Pool Chemicals

Once you’ve gotten your above ground swimming pool picked out, another important thing to think about is the swimming pool chemicals that you are going to use to keep your pool clean and safe to use. And there are many choices to make about what kind of cleaning system you should use.

One of the first things to think about is who is going to be using the pool on a regular basis. Do they have sensitive skin or other health issues to consider with regard to your pool cleaning system. Many people are sensitive to the old style chloride and bromide chemicals. These days there are tons of alternatives. You can use products that replace those swimming pool chemicals completely such as an Ionizer or Ozonator system. Or you can combine a cholrine system with a mineral purifyier such as Nature2.

The old style pool chemicals work by inhibiting bacterial growth in the pool. The chlorine is used up in the process of neutralizing these bacteria. This is why it is important to recharge the chemicals on a regular basis. But as everyone knows who has gone to a pool, these chemicals tend to dry out the skin and hair, and irritate the eyes and nose of swimmers.

The newer methods such as the Ionizer and the Ozonator are a great way to reduce the need for chlorine pool chemicals. Ionizers release silver and/or copper into the water. These two metals typically don’t cause any irritation to people, but are very tough on bacteria. Ozonators usually create ozone by using UV light, or Corona discharge. Ozone is very reactive and bacteria are not able to withstand coming into contact with the Ozone. With both of these methods, you will still likely want to continue to use chlorine as part of your pool cleaner system. However, you will be able to greatly reduce the amount. And this will allow your sensitive pool users to be much more comfortable.

All these methods mentioned require one final step to complete the process. This is the process of adding pool shock to your pool. When your swimming pool chemical has done its duty and reacted with some bacteria, the resulting material is still in the pool. The pool shock removes the spent chemicals from the pool. And these pool cleaners have both a chlorine and chlorine free option to them as well.
Hopefully, this information will help you to make the right decisions about what kind of swimming pool chemicals to use to help you maximize the enjoyment for all your pool users. (And remember to keep the ducks out of the pool.)

photo credit: TheTruthAbout…