Like Ricky Martin in the late 90’s, there are many home automation integrators that are “living the crazy life” in Miami, some good, and some not so good. Here are 5 tips to choosing a reputable AV integrator for your luxury home or client’s luxury home project.
1. Ask to See Completed Jobs
When you buy a house, you look at every room, closet, cabinet, and appliance to ensure the quality of work. The same is true when it comes to your home automation system. Take the action to go and look at an integrators completed work.
2. Programming
This is what separates the boys from the men when it comes to luxury automation. Crestron is hands down the most reliable system on the market, but they are strictly a hardware company. They do not do software what so ever. They rely on Crestron dealers to write all the code and program it to fit their client’s needs. So, when you are visiting a completed job, it is of utmost importance to interact with the keypads and touch panels in each room. Make sure the system is intuitive and functions properly. A bad Crestron system is usually the result of a bad integration job.
3. Wiring and Rack Room
Take a peak under the hood of the system. What does the back of the rack look like? Are all wires neat, labeled, and professionally placed, or is it like a tangled spiderweb of wires? You might be surprised of what you may find.
4. Ask About Costumer Service
How long has the company been around? The only thing worse then having a state of the art system not working properly is having the person who built it not available to maintain and fix it because either they went out of business or don’t care. This practice gives the AV industry a bad name, and more then that gives any contractor a bad reputation.
5. Ask the Integrator How Many Jobs They Complete Per Year
If it’s less then 5, I would keep looking at other integration company choices.
To sum things up, do your homework. Choose an integrator you feel comfortable with and you know will do the best job.