As part of IPSSA's Techs-4-Techs Support, Sick Route Coverage is provided to help protect members from losing valuable weekly service accounts and revenue, in the event of a qualifying personal injury or illness. Members will band together to provide emergency coverage of all or a portion of a service route, helping to maintain the route and protect a fellow member’s livelihood. This coverage is (by necessity) limited in scope and is intended for use as a “safety net” only in the event of legitimate illness, injury or emergency. So, for a few dollars’ worth of chemicals, plus a small amount of time, IPSSA members get the most inexpensive income protection plan available.
For service techs looking to join an association that gives them this extremely valuable benefit, it’s important to understand how IPSSA's Sick Route Coverage works. To begin with, service techs must first join an IPSSA chapter. After six-months of membership, if an IPSSA member gets injured or sick, the chapter members will divide the sick/injured member's pool route among the group and will service all the pools on the route while the sick/injured member is recovering, at no charge! Conversely, if a chapter member gets injured or sick, other chapter members are required to service their pools in return. Some may think: “Why would I let strangers service my pools?” The answer is easy! All IPSSA members maintain liability insurance and are qualified by the association having passed a standardized water chemistry exam or approved pool/spa certification program. In addition, IPSSA provides ongoing education opportunities for all members at their monthly meetings to ensure all techs are aware of the latest problems, solutions and technologies available to solve pool and spa servicing needs.
IPSSA’s Sick Route Coverage provides a formalized plan from what originally came about as a service tech community response to helping fellow IPSSA members. IPSSA is an association that is very much a supportive community that helps one another. In fact, in some chapters have expanded the ways in which the IPSSA Sick Route Coverage Plan is used including providing support for members during maternity/ paternal leave, and special short vacation leaves like a honeymoon after a marriage. Service techs looking for a supportive community organization that will protect you from income loss, then joining IPSSA is the best association in our industry to join.
Contact your local IPSSA Chapter President to find out more information on how your chapter utilizes Sick Route Coverage.
For service techs looking to join an association that gives them this extremely valuable benefit, it’s important to understand how IPSSA's Sick Route Coverage works. To begin with, service techs must first join an IPSSA chapter. After six-months of membership, if an IPSSA member gets injured or sick, the chapter members will divide the sick/injured member's pool route among the group and will service all the pools on the route while the sick/injured member is recovering, at no charge! Conversely, if a chapter member gets injured or sick, other chapter members are required to service their pools in return. Some may think: “Why would I let strangers service my pools?” The answer is easy! All IPSSA members maintain liability insurance and are qualified by the association having passed a standardized water chemistry exam or approved pool/spa certification program. In addition, IPSSA provides ongoing education opportunities for all members at their monthly meetings to ensure all techs are aware of the latest problems, solutions and technologies available to solve pool and spa servicing needs.
IPSSA’s Sick Route Coverage provides a formalized plan from what originally came about as a service tech community response to helping fellow IPSSA members. IPSSA is an association that is very much a supportive community that helps one another. In fact, in some chapters have expanded the ways in which the IPSSA Sick Route Coverage Plan is used including providing support for members during maternity/ paternal leave, and special short vacation leaves like a honeymoon after a marriage. Service techs looking for a supportive community organization that will protect you from income loss, then joining IPSSA is the best association in our industry to join.
Contact your local IPSSA Chapter President to find out more information on how your chapter utilizes Sick Route Coverage.
There are many heart felt instances on how IPSSA's Sick Route Coverage
has helped IPSSA members over the years, here are just a few:
"I had the unfortunate need to use Sick Route last September (2021), due to contracting COVID. I’m a single-poler and was servicing about 80 pools at that time. I was out for about five weeks and my chapter, Capital Valley, came through. My clients were very supportive and appreciated the benefits that Sick Route provided. So much so that I didn’t lose a single client. When I contrast that to another pool service company that I know in the area (non-IPSSA member), he said he lost about 20% of his clients when he was out with COVID. What else can I say, the Sick Route benefit rocks."
Mike at River City Pool Care, Capital Valley IPSSA Chapter
"In early August 2018, I was hit out-of-the-blue by a stroke. My Chapter rallied around me and covered all my accounts. Actually, bless their hearts, they covered more accounts than our Sick Route Policy states they should have covered.
My brothers and sisters in the East Bay Chapter saved my business. It took me over 3 months to recover to the point where I could run my route again. And all that time I still had income coming in thanks to my Chapter members.
I would have lost everything I had worked for years to establish without the kindness and unselfishness of my fellow Chapter members. I was so grateful to be able to stand in front of them at our holiday party that year and thank them personally for what they did for me."
Bob Dundon, IPSSA East Bay Chapter
"On Friday July 26, 2019, I had a hemorrhagic stroke. I was in a coma for 12 days and spent about three months in the hospital and two weeks in rehab where I had to learn how to walk and do every day tasks again. The president of my chapter, Dennis Van Sloten, knocked on all my customers doors and explained what had happened and took control of organizing the coverage of my route and the billing of my customers. Everyone that covered my route was awesome. Seven months after my stroke I had to get brain surgery and had to go back to my chapter to ask for more time. The chapter met and told me to take as much time as I needed and they would cover my route until I was able to come back. I am so grateful for all of the help and support that my family received and appreciate everything that they did for me and my family to get us through difficult time in our lives."
Cliff Huebner, IPSSA Conejo Valley Chapter
Michael Denham, IPSSA Region 5 Director in Southern California, says that he never thought he would need to use the IPSSA Sick Route Coverage Plan, “…unfortunately I had a bad motorcycle accident and I was unable to service my route,” explains Denham. “But my Orange County chapter members stepped in and serviced my route the entire time I was out.”
Have a Sick Route Coverage Story to Share?
We'd love to hear how IPSSA's Sick Route Coverage Plan has helped you!
