When termites come back and a homeowner files a claim, the response is often a denial dressed up in technical-sounding language. Many of those denials collapse the moment you compare them to the actual bond and to the law. Here are nineteen of the most common excuses, grouped by theme, and why they frequently fail.
Key takeaways
- Most denial excuses fall into a few families: "the bond doesn't cover it," "you did something wrong," "it's not really termites," and "it's not our problem."
- Whether an excuse holds up depends on your specific bond language and the facts — not on how confident the company sounds.
- Some excuses are not just wrong; they can be evidence of fraud or suppression under Alabama law.
- Do not let a company recharacterize new termite damage as "old water damage" without documenting the evidence yourself first.
A quick caution before the list: some denials are legitimate. If your bond is genuinely retreat-only and you are demanding repairs it never promised, the company may be right. The point of this article is not that every denial is bogus. It is that many are, and you should not take a denial at face value.
Family one: "The bond doesn't cover this"
1. "Your bond is retreat-only — we don't do repairs." Sometimes true. But homeowners are frequently told their bond is retreat-only when the actual document says otherwise, or when a separate repair guarantee exists. Read the contract before you accept this.
2. "There's a dollar cap and you've hit it." Repair bonds often cap payouts, but companies sometimes apply a cap that is not in your contract, or apply it to items the cap does not reach. Verify the cap against the signed bond.
3. "That area was inaccessible, so it's excluded." Many bonds disclaim concealed or inaccessible areas. The question is whether the area truly was inaccessible on inspection day and whether the company reasonably should have accessed it. A company cannot always hide behind "inaccessible" when its own inspector chose not to look.
4. "This is pre-existing damage from before your bond." This is one of the most abused excuses. Recharacterizing new damage as old is a recurring source of disputes, and it can cross the line into fraud (more on that below).
5. "Our bond's release language protects us." Bonds sometimes contain releases or limitation-of-liability clauses. Such language is not automatically enforceable. Courts examine whether it is unconscionable, whether it was fairly disclosed, and whether it leaves any meaningful remedy. A release printed on a form does not end the analysis by itself.
Family two: "You did something wrong"
6. "Your bond lapsed — you didn't renew." A genuinely expired bond can defeat a claim. But companies sometimes claim lapse when renewals were current, or when the company itself failed to send renewal notices or perform the inspections it charged for. Keep every renewal receipt.
7. "You didn't let us do the annual inspections." Cooperation duties run both ways. If the company never scheduled or performed the inspections it was paid to do, it cannot fairly blame you for the results.
8. "You created moisture conditions, so the treatment couldn't work." Moisture is real biology, and some bonds require you to correct conducive conditions. But "there was moisture" is not a magic denial. The company still has to show that a moisture condition — not its own inadequate treatment — actually caused the failure, and that the bond conditioned coverage on the point.
9. "You disturbed the treated soil." Occasionally valid, but often invoked reflexively. The company should be able to explain specifically what you did and how it defeated a proper treatment.
Family three: "It's not really covered termites"
10. "There are no live termites, so there's no claim." Absence of live insects at the moment of inspection does not erase months of prior activity or the damage it caused. Termites are cryptic; they are not always visibly present when damage is discovered.
11. "The chemicals just wore off — that's normal." This one deserves special attention. Modern soil termiticides are held to a demanding federal standard. Under EPA registration policy (PRN 96-7), a soil termiticide must demonstrate complete termite control for at least five years in standardized federal field testing before it can be registered and sold. So when termites return within a few years of treatment, "the chemicals wore off" is usually the wrong explanation. The far more likely cause is misapplication or a missed retreatment — which points back at the company, not the product. (See our article "The EPA Five-Year Standard.")
12. "We only cover subterranean termites, and these are Formosan." Formosan termites are a species of subterranean termite. A bond that covers "subterranean termites" generally cannot exclude Formosans on the theory that they are some different category. This excuse frequently fails on the biology alone. (See our article "Formosan 'Super Termites' and the 'We Only Cover Subterranean Termites' Excuse.")
13. "That's carpenter ant (or other pest) damage, not termites." Sometimes companies attribute termite damage to carpenter ants, beetles, or "just old wood." Proper identification matters, and a homeowner is entitled to an honest assessment rather than a convenient reclassification.
14. "That's water damage, not termite damage." Closely related to the pre-existing-damage excuse and equally prone to abuse. Recharacterizing termite damage as water damage has been at the center of major Alabama termite-fraud litigation, discussed below.
Family four: "It's not our problem"
15. "Our insurer won't pay, so we can't." This is a non-answer. The company's obligation runs to you, the homeowner, under your contract — regardless of what the company's own insurer decides to do. Whether the company can collect from its insurer is between the company and its carrier. It does not shrink what the company owes you.
16. "We already retreated, so we're done." On a retreat-and-repair bond, retreating does not discharge a repair obligation. Doing half of what the bond requires is not full performance.
17. "You signed a release when we did the work." See excuse five. A signature on a release does not automatically end your rights; the enforceability of such language is a legal question, not a foregone conclusion.
18. "You waited too long to complain." Deadlines are real, and you should never sit on a claim. But companies sometimes assert time bars that do not apply, especially where fraud was involved. Under Alabama law, a fraud claim generally accrues on discovery, and you then have two years to sue. See Ala. Code § 6-2-3 and Ala. Code § 6-2-38(l). Don't assume the deadline has passed until an attorney confirms it.
19. "You have to arbitrate, so there's nothing a court can do." Many bonds contain arbitration clauses, and courts often enforce them. But an arbitration clause only reaches the contract it lives in. A fraud claim based on a termite letter that contains no arbitration clause can sometimes proceed in court. See Orkin Exterminating Co. v. Larkin, 857 So. 2d 97 (Ala. 2003). "You must arbitrate" is a claim to be tested, not automatically accepted.
When an excuse becomes evidence of fraud
Several of these excuses are not merely wrong — repeated often enough, and applied dishonestly, they can be evidence that the company misrepresented or concealed material facts. Alabama recognizes both legal fraud and suppression as actionable. See Ala. Code § 6-5-101 (misrepresentation of a material fact — actionable whether willful, reckless, or even innocent) and Ala. Code § 6-5-102 (suppression of a material fact one is obligated to communicate).
The most notorious tactic — recharacterizing damage to avoid a bond obligation — was at the center of Orkin Exterminating Co. v. Jeter, 832 So. 2d 25 (Ala. 2001). There, inspectors documented heavy termite damage but, per company policy, did not disclose it; the original damage "graph" was later lost, and the damage was mischaracterized as water damage to avoid the company's bond obligations. The jury returned a large verdict; the trial court remitted the punitive award to $4,000,000, and the Alabama Supreme Court addressed the excessiveness of the remitted award. Jeter is the marquee "graphing" and suppressed-damage termite-fraud case, and it is a vivid illustration that some denial "excuses" are really evidence of wrongdoing.
Whether any particular denial amounts to fraud is fact-specific and requires proof. But when you see a company graphing or documenting damage and then hiding it, losing records, or converting termite damage into "water damage" to dodge a claim, those are the fingerprints that fraud and suppression law was written to address. (See our companion articles "Signs Your Pest Control Company Committed Fraud" and "Fraud and Suppression in Termite Inspections.")
What to do when you get a denial
- Get the denial in writing. Ask the company to state, in writing, the exact bond provision or exclusion it is relying on. A written denial pins the company down.
- Compare the denial to your actual bond. Line up the stated reason against the signed contract. Mismatches — "retreat-only" when it isn't, a cap that isn't there — are your strongest evidence.
- Document everything before you repair. Photograph and video the damage. Keep samples of damaged wood. If the company says it's "old" or "water damage," your contemporaneous evidence may prove otherwise. Do not let anyone remove or repair the evidence before it is recorded.
- Preserve the paper trail. Save renewal receipts, inspection reports, termite letters, and all correspondence. In graphing cases, the disappearance of the company's own records has been powerful evidence.
- Don't accept "you must arbitrate" or "our insurer said no" as the end. Both are legal questions, and both are frequently overstated.
- Mind the clock. Fraud and negligence deadlines are real. Talk to a termite litigation attorney before assuming a claim is too old.
Closing
A confident-sounding denial is not the same as a correct one. Most of the excuses on this list depend on either the fine print of your bond or on facts the company controls — and both can be tested. If a company has denied your claim with one of these explanations, it is worth having the bond and the denial reviewed by counsel who handles termite cases, because the difference between an honest coverage limit and an improper denial is often the difference between paying for the repairs yourself and holding the company to its word.
Talk to Yates Anderson
If a pest-control company has denied a termite claim, buried damage, or filed an inspection you believe was wrong, the analysis above only goes so far. Request a case evaluation and a Yates Anderson attorney will respond within one business day.
Informational only. Not legal advice. No attorney-client relationship is created by reading this post. Consult a licensed attorney in your jurisdiction.