Avoid Liability on Your Pool Start-Ups

Brand new plaster looks perfect for about five minutes, then reality hits: dust, rising pH, builder timelines, and a homeowner who expects the finish to stay flawless forever. We walk through how we approach a new plaster pool startup using a traditional startup method that is easier to execute, easier to explain, and far easier to defend if anyone tries to pin plaster defects on the startup tech later.

We point you to practical resources from the National Plasterers Council, including the NPC startup card and the option to take a startup technician certification course. Then we get into the day-one mindset that keeps you out of trouble: show up as close to fill day as possible, never let the water stop mid-fill, and document everything before you touch the pool. We talk about what “normal” plaster variation can look like, why lighting changes your inspection, and how photos plus written notes protect you when discoloration or mottling becomes a warranty argument.

From there we dig into the core water chemistry fundamentals for new plaster pools: tracking pH, total alkalinity, calcium hardness, metals, and keeping an eye on LSI during the first 28 days. We cover why fresh plaster creates heavy acid demand, how to think about alkalinity targets, and how brushing twice daily with a nylon brush helps manage plaster dust. We also flag common early mistakes like wheeled vacuums, stainless steel brushing, auto cleaners, and adding salt too soon.

If you want more startup wins with fewer headaches, subscribe, share this with a pool pro who does startups, and leave a review with your best day-one documentation tip.

We break down how to do a new plaster pool startup with fewer surprises and less liability by sticking to a traditional, step-by-step method. We also explain why documentation, photos, and consistent chemistry logs are the difference between getting blamed and being protected when plaster issues show up later.
• why many pool pros avoid startups and where the risk really comes from
• using National Plasterers Council resources, the NPC startup card, and certification training
• traditional startup vs acid or hot startup and why traditional is easier to defend
• documenting plaster appearance, lighting effects, and pre-existing conditions
• logging pH, alkalinity, calcium hardness, metals, and every chemical addition
• keeping alkalinity in a safe range and managing pH rise from fresh plaster
• dealing with plaster dust and when additives or sequestrants can help
• fill day rules like never stopping the water mid-fill
• brushing twice daily and avoiding wheeled vacuums, stainless brushes, auto cleaners, and salt early
• how disputes usually play out and why records matter even years later
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If you want this, I can send this to you. Just email me at David at Swimmingpoollearning.com.

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Transcript

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Why Pool Startups Feel Risky

SPEAKER_00 1:05

Welcome to the Pool Bay Podcast Show. A lot of pool pros shy away from doing pool startups because, of course, there's some liability issues possible. There's also maybe a lack of knowledge of how to do startups. I'm going to cover a couple of these points here today for you so you have a clearer picture of how to do a startup correctly. Are you a pool service pro looking to take your business to the next level? Join the pool

NPC Resources And Startup Methods

SPEAKER_00 1:31

guy coaching program. Get expert advice, business tips, exclusive content, and get direct support. From me, I'm a 35-year veteran in the industry. Whether you're starting out or scaling up, I've got the tools to help you succeed. Learn more at swimmingpoollearning.com. Probably your best resource for starting up a pool correctly is the National Plasters Council website. So that would be you can just Google National Plaster Council and you'll get the URL for you. But you can also go to npco mpc, I should say, online.org. So npconline.org is the URL. And so on here they have, of course, a lot of good information about plaster startups and a lot of articles on here about startups. They haven't really changed their startup method beyond the traditional startup. Now, back in the past, a lot of the startups were acid startups or what they call hot startups. And I did a podcast with some of the members. We talked about the heart hot startup when you put the acid in the pool, turn everything off, and lower the pH and alkalinity down to zero, or the alkalinity down to zero, and the pH below, you know, in the sixes. And this would remove a lot of the plaster dust. But a lot of the startups now are more traditional because the acid startup takes some technical skill. And there's of course debate about how much plaster or if there's any plaster damage being done with the acid startup or the hot startup. So the traditional startup is what they are recommending that you do. And they used to have an article that they posted on here with their startup method, you know, pretty much set here. They do have a if you go on their homepage, they do have an NPC startup card. So on their homepage, you can download this card and basically gives you, you know, you have to sign in, of course, and you'll get some information on the startup. But they said post it on the site, but they do have a training program now, a startup training program. So I think a lot of their material is kind of hidden in the background now because they want you to take the course. And uh for non-members, it's uh $325 for the startup technician certification class. So it may be worth your effort or your while to take the startup course, and you'll get all the information you need to do a startup correctly. So I highly recommend taking this, you know, a course of some kind, and this one is offered here on their site, so you can do it online. And again, it's 325 for non-members and 225

Traditional Startup And Liability Control

SPEAKER_00 4:19

for members. And again, you can just find it through AI and you can type in traditional startup method, and it'll give you all the details. But if you really want to be certified, you can go to the NPC startup course. Now, the one reason why you would want to do a traditional startup is because it limits your liability versus a hot startup or no startup at all. A lot of times I've gone to pools where they call me and it's been a week already, and the pool has is full of water and it's just been running

Document The Surface Before You Touch It

SPEAKER_00 4:52

and no one has done any kind of startup. The thing with the startup to reduce liability, especially if you get to a pool when it's already full of water and you know who knows how many days it's been full, you would want to document everything. So, documentation is the key to avoiding liability. What I mean by document documenting everything is that you initially will look at the plaster and notice anything that you will consider a defect, or maybe some discoloration or modeling going on. There's really a lot of crossover in what looks like a defect and what is just naturally part of the plaster. If you are at a gray plaster pool, you're going to see a lot of different coloration, different patterns in that pool. You're going to see some you know etching, you're going to see some scratching, you're going to see some modeling. And just make notes of everything that you're seeing in the plaster when you first get there. It's pretty rare to get to a plaster pool and for it to be perfectly uniformed. If you look at it at a certain time of day, it looks different as well. So if it's cloudy, you're going to see more discoloration or different patterns in the plaster rather than when the sun's hitting it. So you want to go maybe in the early morning or the evening where you can really see the plaster itself without the sun hitting it directly from above. But you definitely want to document how it looks to you. And then you want to log your chemistry. Everything you're doing should be logged. So if you have a Lamont Spin Touch or if you have the color cue 2x Pro 9 or Pro 7, you can actually create the log of the chemistry that you're doing there. So for example, on the first day of the startup, you can log the chemistry, pH 8.0, alkalinity 80, you know, the calcium hardness 200. These numbers are important, and you would want to get in range of where they should be for a new plaster. Now everyone kind of has their own ideas of where these numbers should be, but I've always found that it's safe to have the alkalinity above 80. When it gets low, I find that at the very beginning, when the pool is freshly plastered, when the alkalinity is really low, it increases the amount of modeling and does collaboration with the low alkalinity. So I don't like it to go too low. So if you want to keep it at 100, it's pretty a pretty safe range for the alkalinity. The pH, of course, the new plaster is going to have a pretty

Chemistry Targets And Plaster Dust Tools

SPEAKER_00 7:45

large acid demand on you, so you're going to have to keep that plaster at you're going to have to keep adding muratic acid to keep the pH from uh rising to a level that will cause scaling. There's also the plaster dust issue in the pool. You can get something like the Puratic product super startup. It's really great with plaster dust. Your supplier should carry it. It's it's called super startup, and it does a great job with any kind of plaster dust in the pool. So it's a pretty good additive. There's other additives that people like to add, you know, metal sequestering agents, jack magic, anything that will help from preventing metal stains in the pool, you can add that as well when you do the startup. So I have the NPC National Master Council startup card in front of me here on my computer. And if you want this, I can send this to you. Just email me at David at Summingpoollearning.com. Again, that's Davidassumingpoollearning.com. And I can email you the startup card. And of course, you want to make sure you follow this traditional startup, you know, to the exact. That way you reduce liability. And it does include the LSI for you here as well. And basically how to how to balance that in the first 28 days is critical. I also caution you that I've been at pools where the pool was filled and equipment wasn't running yet. This could sabotage the startup process, of course. Or if they call you four days after the pool's full, that could be a problem as well. So document the time you're at the pool. If it's four days after it's filled, make sure you note that in your documentation, you know, the pool was finished on September 1st and filled, and they didn't call you until September 6th. So you want to make sure you document that.

Fill Day Rules And Brushing Routine

SPEAKER_00 10:08

If they fill it in the morning, usually that's the case, unless they're doing more than one plaster job that day. You want to be there and you want to be there when it's maybe halfway filled to kind of get an idea how the pool looks and that it's filling properly. You never want to stop the water, and the customer should know this as well. So let them know, let it fill up. If they have to get up at two in the morning to turn off the water, that's that's set an alarm or something, but never stop the water because it'll leave a line or a stain around the pool perimeter wherever the water had stopped. So that's really important. So I like to get there the day it's filling, so I can tell the customer don't turn the water off in case someone forgot to tell them that, and to get an idea of how the overall plaster looks that first day before it's full. So the clock is ticking. The first day is the first day after it's filled. So you want to make sure you go there in the morning, and you want to test the chemistry. So it's really vital to follow these steps, and it's highlighted in red on the chart. So you want to test the fill water for the peach, alkalinium and calcium hardness, and metals and record these test results. It's really important. If you have a spin touch or color cue 2x Pro 7 or 9, you can send those readings directly to the customer to yourself. You want to keep the alkalinity between 80 and 100. I try to keep it right about a hundred, anything below 80. You want to raise it with uh baking soda to get it up there. So you don't want to really have the alkalinity fall below 80 or get above 100. You want to brush the pool twice daily. I like leaving a nylon brush with the customer, and that way they can brush the pool as well. The more they brush the pool, the better. So just have them continuously brush that pool, and you brush you you would want to go in the morning, in the afternoon, so you can brush the pool twice per day. And then, of course, you can move on to day two. You're testing the chemults again, you're doing everything again except step six on day one, which was adding a sequestering agent or a startup chemical like the Puritic Product Super Startup. And then you also are going to make sure that the pH is adjusted. Third day, you're doing steps one through five again, and you're not adding any salt, of course, for 28 days. You're also not adding, you're not vacuuming with a with a wheel cleaner. You're also not using your leaf rake on the bottom on the first two days, you're just brushing the pool. That's all you're doing. No automatic cleaners, no wheeled vacuums. Believe me, if you've been doing this as long as I have, you've seen brand new pools with wheel marks and someone vacuuming too early, or you've seen marks on the walls or steps where they're using a stainless steel brush rather than a nylon brush. So all of this is something to keep in mind. And they 4228 is listed here again. I can send this over to you. It would be great to have this if you're doing startups. You could take their course as well. But this startup card is really good. It also has the LSI for you on here. So the basic thing is to follow the

Handling Defects And Protecting Yourself

SPEAKER_00 13:06

traditional startup method here and make sure that you document, document, document everything so that you're not blamed for any defects of the plaster. Now, there are some defects that will present themselves. You may see them right away. You know, you may see trial marks, you may see some you know, there are certain things that are obvious that you know you have to let the customer know that oh, I see a lot of modeling in the plaster, discoloration. That's normal for this plaster. It won't be totally uniform in actually different times of days, you're gonna see the plaster look differently in the morning without the sun hitting it. You may see more of the discoloration and modeling. When the sun's hitting it, it may look pure white, or if it's a gray plaster pool, more pure gray, or a blue plaster pool, whatever, whatever color it is, you're going to see different things in it. If you keep this chemical chart and you follow this method and you record your chemistry, it's really hard if it goes all the way to a court case, which rarely will it ever go to a court case before a judge. It's one of those things where it's always going to be settled by the builder. They may try to blame the startup person. You're going to just point everything back to the plaster company and builder so that you're not holding the bag basically because technically you are when you when you take over a new startup, whatever goes, whatever seems like is a defect is going to be blamed on you because you're the one doing the startup. But there are a lot of things that happen during a plaster that could cause problems. And you know, you can take the course at the National Plaster Council site, and I'll go over some of those things for you. There's a lot of articles on there too about different things to be aware of. Of course, they're the National Plaster Council, so they're going to be more or less on the plaster builder side of things, not necessarily the pool tech or the pool tech side. So just understand that as well. So if you follow this procedure, you follow the LSI here, and everything goes well, but then there's something that comes up later, you're pretty protected here with the startup. As long as you were there day one and you followed this procedure, you can show this to whoever wants to see it, show them the car startup card, and you follow this exactly. There's not much they can say at that point. And when things do turn south, they get ugly. You know, sometimes a homeowner will be on your side, and you and a homeowner will be fighting the plaster company to warranty something or fix a defect. That's probably the best way to handle it with the customer not blaming you, but you're an ally with the customer. And also you want to remember that these things rarely get before a judge. And if it does get before a judge, and I I know a case where it did, I had a I had a I know a case where it went all the way to court. The judge looked at the evidence, the judge looked at the photos, and he's he said basically, I mean the pool looks fine to me. I don't see a problem here because a judge is going to just use whatever evidence is before him, and he's gonna make his decision basically. And he looked at these photos of the pool where the homeowner was saying that there were these streaks in the deep end and the plastic looked terrible. He looked at the photos and he was like, it looks fine. I mean, I have a pool and everything it looks normal in case dismissed. So one of those things where if it gets that far, it's hard for anyone to say whose fault it is or if this doesn't look normal. So it probably won't get that far. And that's the only one I've ever heard of that went that far. You're gonna just have to kind of deal with it, and it's not really a big issue. And doing startups, if you follow this traditional method and document everything, there's really not a lot of liability, and you can get a lot of new accounts by doing startups, you can team up with a builder, it's a win-win in most cases, and there'll be an anomaly here and there that happens. I I've had one or two of these over the years. It was one was a great plaster pool, and this is one where the equipment was not operational the first day, it was not great, it wasn't operational the second day. That was not great either. Actually, it wasn't operational for the entire week. There wasn't much I could do, and I just I knew right away that this was going to be a problem later, and sure enough, about six months down the road, the plaster started developing a lot of scale on there, was really rough to the touch, and this had a lot to do with the initial failure of the startup, not by me, but by whoever filled the pool up without the equipment running. So I documented everything, of course. I documented the day I was there, the readings which were way off the first day that I got there, and I knew that this would have an effect later. So a lot of these things don't come up until much later. You know, you're not gonna see like calcium nodules until two or three years later when the pool's plastered. So a lot of these are not your fault. So keep these records, of course, so that two or three years later, when calcium nodules appear in the pool, you know, you can tell the customer, well, that's just because there's air pockets in the plaster. Here's what I did when I start it up, even if it's like a new owner, maybe the house is sold. You keep all your records and show them that you follow this startup card exactly. And you know, whatever kind of defect is just something that naturally occurs later, but it's not your fault. Again, devoid liability, document everything, follow these steps exactly how they're written, so that you can say, I follow the National Plaster Council startup card procedure, and so anything that happened is really not something that I did. Again, just keep turning everything back to the builder and plaster and away from you because really you want to avoid any liability, being blamed for anything. And if you follow this procedure, if you're there on day one, there's really nothing they can say at that point. If you're looking for other podcasts, you can find those by going to my website, swingprolearning.com. On the banner, click on the podcast icon. There'll be a drop the menu at over 2,000 podcasts for you there. If you're interested in the coaching program that I offer, you

More Training And Where To Follow

SPEAKER_00 19:05

can learn more at poolguycoaching.com. Thanks for listening to this podcast. Have the rest of your week and God bless.