Regardless of whether you have a gas or wood fireplace, you have to clean it. You can hire a chimney cleaning services provider or do the cleaning by yourself. Failing to clean the chimney comes with plenty of risks: the chimney can clog up, a fire might break out, among many other things.
When is the best time to clean the chimney?
While you can clean your chimney anytime, the best time to clean it is in spring. Spring isn’t a busy season for chimney companies, so when you contact them, they will show up at the agreed time. You are also more likely to get them on weekends instead of trying to squeeze in time during a workday.
Since the chimney contractors aren’t busy at this time, they will charge you a lower fee which sees you saving a lot of money.
When the contractors do the cleaning in spring, they to do a thorough job as the weather is great. The contractors do thorough chimney inspection hence ensuring that the chimney is completely ready for the heating season.
While this is the case, you should not wake up one day and contact the chimney experts and expect them to show up at your door the next minute. Since there might be other homeowners that want their chimneys cleaned in spring, you should contact the service providers weeks before winter and agree on the right time to do the cleaning.
Can I have the chimney cleaned in the fall or winter?
As I mentioned above, you can clean your chimney anytime you want so yes you can clean your chimney in winter or fall. While this is the case, you should note that these are the chimney sweeps’ busy months so you might have to wait a month or more before the chimney technicians are available to clean your chimney.
As you might guess, since the contractors are in high demand, they will charge you a high fee.
The tough winter weather means that the chimney sweeps won’t be able to undertake full chimney inspection. This leaves you with worry as you don’t know whether your chimney will develop problems down the road.
What should you look out for when hiring the chimney sweep?
Even if it’s easy to find a chimney sweep in spring, it doesn’t mean you should hire any contractor you come across. Take time to find a reputable contractor. Some of the things you should look out for include:
Certification: To have peace of mind that the contractor you are hiring understands and follows the best chimney cleaning and inspection practices, ensure that the professional has CSIA certification.
Experience: You don’t want an inexperienced technician messing up with your chimney so you should ensure the contractor you are looking to hire is experienced enough. Ask the contractor references to the people they have worked with before.
Contact the people and ask them about the experience with the contractor. Of course, you should only consider working with an experienced technician with a stellar record.
Schedule: Just because a chimney technician is certified and experienced doesn’t mean they are available. Ask about their schedule and if they are available during the spring season, go ahead and book an appointment.
Conclusion
The best time to clean the chimney is in spring. For optimal results, hire an experienced and certified chimney sweep services Columbia MD provider. Unless due to unavoidable circumstances, have your chimney cleaned only in spring. This is to make it easy for you to get the cleaning professional of your desires and at the same time, spend less cleaning your chimney.
