Central A/C Maintenence Contract - Keep it?

[Raymond Fries]

We just had our A/C serviced for the last time under the warranty; the warranty just expired. This service contract was required to keep the warranty. We are just wondering if we should keep up the annual maintenence. Is it a good idea to get it checked every spring or is it not necessary. Do the technicians perform any preventative care to avoid problems? Or, is it better to just wait till a problem surfaces?

Thanks for any recommendations.

[Lee Schierer]

Are you well enough informed and capable to perform the annual maintenance yourself? Are you wiling to do this required service work? If you are then what value does the service contract add that you can't do for yourself. Most systems will run for many years with no problems providing you keep them clean per the service recommendations.

[Peter J Lee]

Do you know what they did when they did their annual service? For myself and the li'l woman, we dealt with 2 successful and well regarded companies and neither really did much when they did their "check up."

I hesitate to start rambling on the topic, but it really depends on a lot, mostly the quality of the company that you'd contract.

I knew very little about HVAC and was forced to find out more by... cold air.

[Raymond Fries]

I know nothing about what is necessary and not sure if I would have the tools to perform any required service. The service ticket could net be easily read because of poor writing. All I could make out was something was tightened and several things were checked.

Guess maybe it is worth the $45 to let the pro check it out as I really do not want to learn HVAC.

Thanks