By Emma Peterson. 

How to know when you have a commercial roofing emergency and what to do about it. 

In a new episode of the AskARoofer™ podcast, Lauren White sat down for a conversation with the roofing experts from Raincoat Roofing: Eric Suess, president of maintenance, and Sarah Sutton-Shouse, director of service operations. They discussed what building owners need to know when a commercial roofing issue becomes an emergency.  

Identifying an emergency 

The first thing that Sarah and Eric covered was how to tell when your commercial property has a roofing emergency. For Eric, what constitutes an emergency is dependent on the building owner. He shard, “Emergencies are defined by what the customer's level of pain is.” Sarah added, “There are different levels of emergency; the big differentiator is between a blow-off/life-threatening emergency versus just a roof leak. But at the end of the day, the customer is really what defines a roofing emergency.” 

Emergency response 

So, you have a roof emergency. What comes next? The first and foremost thing you should do is get in contact with your roofer. Sarah explained: 

Contact your roofer and don’t stop after just one phone call. I’ve seen a lot of people leave a voicemail with one person and just assume that that person is going to call them back. If you have a company that you use, call the main line, call the emergency line, call your rep so that as many people know that you have an issue with. 

This persistence might feel imposing or uncomfortable, but getting someone out to look at your roof can be the difference between a repair and a full replacement. Eric explained, “We want to know what’s going on as soon as possible because then we can bring things to the site that make the building watertight and avoid more damages. And that’s not always just a tarp; we just had an instance two weeks ago where we had an emergency that needed us to put a temp on the roof.” The sooner your roofer knows about the issue, the more time they have to prepare a solution (even a temporary one) and the less extensive the damage will be to your property. 

Long term response 

Once the emergency is over, the next thing most building owners think about is how they can avoid this ever happening again. Sarah and Eric both agreed that the best long-term solution for roof emergencies is proactive maintenance. Sarah explained:  

Think about it like a car. When you buy a new car, you have to do scheduled maintenance to maintain your warranty. Things like oil changes, tire rotations, etc. It’s the same on the roof. You buy a new roof, you have to maintain it. You have to address anything that could potentially cause defects and wear and tear to that roof through a maintenance program. By doing that, you will maintain the value of your roof and get the most longevity out of it. 

Eric echoed her point, sharing, “The most important thing with maintenance is to do something. Do something proactively. Get somebody on your roof on an annual basis at the very least.  Yes, it costs money. Yes, it's overhead. Put it in your budget. Because if you don’t do that, small issues will pile up until they become an expensive and stressful emergency.”  

Listen to the whole episode to learn more about handling commercial roof emergencies.