When you sign a contract with us, there is a check box just below where you sign that acknowledges that you read this page of the website.

Checking that box and signing the contract means you agree to this Hold Harmless Agreement as it applies to you, your project, your property, and during the dates set forth in the contract you are signing.

Hold Harmless Agreement

This Hold Harmless Agreement ("Agreement") is made and entered into as of the day you sign your contract, by and between YOU (and any other owners named on the County records for the property address on your contract) and Custom Deckworks (and its parent company: Thirteen Pine LLC).

1. Purpose.

The purpose of this Agreement is to indemnify and hold harmless the Indemnified Party from any and all claims, actions, damages, liabilities, and expenses arising out of or relating to any work, service, repair, construction, moving of any items or materials that YOU have hired Custom Deckworks to do under the terms of your contract.

2. Hold Harmless.

The Indemnifying Party agrees to indemnify, defend, and hold harmless the Indemnified Party from and against any and all claims, losses, damages, liabilities, costs, and expenses (including reasonable attorney's fees) arising out of or resulting from any work or service YOU have hired Custom Deckworks and it's agents to perform under your contract. By signing the contract, Custom Deckworks (Indemnified Party) warrants there will be NO gross negligence or willful misconduct on its part while performing duties on your property. Furthermore, Indemnifying Party will hold Harmless the Indemnified Party for ANY damages caused to ANY part of the property whether the damage resulted from actions being taken under specific details of the contract or not. Indemnified Party may have to touch or move something owned by the Indemnifying Party that is not mentioned in the contract, but has to do with the Indemnified Party's ability to do their contracted work, and Indemnified Party is held harmless for any damage to such items. These items can include grass, trees, driveways, landscaping, grills, furniture, hot tubs, swimming pools, equipment, pets, buried or unburied wires or pipes or anything on the property.

3. Duration.

This Agreement shall be effective as of 6:00am Central Time on the date written as the start date on your contract and remain in effect until such time as the contract is fulfilled (whatever day that may be regardless of what Completion Date the contract says) and final payment is received by Indemnified Party and after Indemnified Party has exited off of the property for the final time in the course of his contracted duties.

4. Governing Law.

This Agreement shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of Arkansas.

5. Entire Agreement.

This Agreement constitutes the entire agreement between the parties with respect to the subject matter and supersedes all prior agreements, whether written or oral.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, the parties hereto have executed this Hold Harmless Agreement as of the date on their signed contract. The Indemnifying Party is welcome to print this agreement out from this website, or request a written copy be provided to them, to keep with and as a part of their contract. Furthermore, checking the box below your signature on the contract indicating you have read and agree with this agreement is sufficient and in place of signing this agreement separately. This agreement lives digitally at https://www.customdeckworks.com/contract and therefore could be modified at any time. So it is the responsibility of the Indemnifying Party to screenshot, print, or request a printed copy be attached to their contract at the time of signing or else Indemnifying Party forfeits their right to ever challenge the version that is published on the website at any given time. Indemnifying Party also warrants they are of mature age and of sound mind with more than sufficient reading comprehension and agreement understanding skills and that by signing their contract and checking the Hold Harmless box they represent that they fully understand everything they are agreeing to in that document and this one.
-End.

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Ok, to give some context and clarity to this page, the agreement, and WHY we need you to sign off on such a thing:

Over the years (3 decades) we have worked for a very small handful of people that have treated us so badly in one way or another that it prompted the need for us to add things to our contract. As you, new client, read the contract it will be obvious to you what those things are because they will seem sort of outlandish to you and you'll know they don't apply to you at all. You are free to ignore them if they don't apply to you. But, thanks to those other people that just had to make life so difficult for us all, you do have to sign a contract wherein you are agreeing not to do whatever outlandish thing it is. I apologize. 99.9% of you are Amazing and treat us so well it's what makes us get up every day and keep doing it!

Scroll to the bottom for the Short Version if you like. I won't blame you.

There is also an entire page stapled to the back of your contract that you have to sign that lets you know what crazy behavior to expect out of the treated pine you are choosing to use on your deck. That page is thanks to the criminal Timber Industry after they purposely decided to grow pine trees faster (making them weaker) and allow the preservation chemicals they "treat" the pine with to be substandard and stop protecting the wood after only 3-6 years.

And now, as of June 2026, we have another person (yes, client of ours) that has caused us to add something. And that something is this whole entire Hold Harmless Agreement. This person attempted to scam us out of an entire hot tub. We offered to save them time & money and move the tub off the old deck and back on the new deck since the "Hot Tub Company" always pretends to be 6 weeks out, not to mention what they charge, for something that takes them 10 minutes.

We've done this tons of times for our clients and we've never cracked a hot tub. We didn't crack this one; the crack isn't even near where we touched it to move it and physics says it couldn't crack there based on what we did. But we pointed out the crack when we saw it and the client sadly pretended like WE must've done it. Their quote was "I don't remember it being there before." Well..... before what? Before the last 2 guys touched it before we showed up? And that's a great way to phrase it so you "technically" are't lying because you aren't saying YOU didn't do it, you're just implying some stuff and hoping we get scared and start buying you new stuff. This person says they drained the tub themselves, but then they pretended to not know where the drain plug was and sort of implied that WE could have kicked it onto the ground. So you know you're having a deck torn down and you leave a 1" cap sitting randomly on the deck floor where it can be kicked & lost during all the loud and furious demolition? If you don't remember where you put the drain cap then maybe you don't remember cracking the tub when you were draining it?? How about some accountability and not make the contractor the bad guy for EVERYTHING?

Speaking of accountability....
When YOU hire someone to do something don't leave stuff in their way. If there is stuff you're afraid they may damage, have it moved before they get there. If someone with a hot tub doesn't want to sign this Hold Harmless Agreement, then they will have to have their tub moved off the deck by someone else BEFORE our first day on the job, and they'll have to have it moved back onto the new deck by someone else AFTER we are finished and gone. And have them put it far enough away where we or our construction can't touch it. Becasue we will not be buying anyone a new hot tub or paying anyone "fair value", or any value, for their hot tub.

We are not in the stuff buying business or the conflict business. We build decks. And we treat people right. We have no interest in having ANY negative problems with you. Most of us, you - the client & I, don't need all these signed agreements to get along and have fun while we work together. Becasue most of you are awesome and recognize that we ARE the good guys in the contracting world and that our sights are set SOLELY on creating great things for you! And you guys can know who we are in advance because there is a 30 year public history of our behavior in people's backyards and with managing their project/money. But we don't know you until we know you. And sometimes we can sense a disturbance in the Force around you but we aren't sure until some full episode comes up. And that's usually after it's too late and we're in a contract with you. We just want to work and be friends; we don't want to have to battle you over anything.

Yes we have General Liability Insurance. Yes we have a Bond with the city if it's a permitted job in the city limits. But those things are NOT in place for you to scam us or or insurance company out of any money so you an get a new hot tub or outdoor sofa. Those things are in place to protect YOU or your HOME in the event a REAL accident or tragedy occurs! We are Big Boys and we will be saving our Big Boy Insurance for Big Boy problems. Please don't assume that we are just some small business that will roll over when threatened. We have seen all the scams and games before. We know when you're doing it. We aren't the ones that will roll over. Make no mistake, We are NOT an easy win! Save the games and the scams and the drama for someone else. One lady wrongfully withheld $5k from us at the end of a project so we got an inspector and two industry leading manufacturers to back us up and we put a lien on her property. Decks isn't all we know; we also know how to protect ourselves from the wolves.

When you have work done, things can happen. Grass can get messed up, driveways can get scratched, limbs can ge broken off shrubs you are making us work inside of, your dog can get out of the gate and run away (or worse). If we break a window we'll replace it. If we break a porch light we'll replace it. If the light was from France in the 1940's and it's irreplaceable, then no, we're not giving you "fair value" for it. We'll give you what it takes to buy a porch light at Lowe's. If anything is that valuable to you, then move it far out of the way where we can't come in contact with it.
Grass will grow back. Shrubs will recover. But we're not pouring you a new driveway because our trailer hitch scratched it after you told us we could back into the driveway. If you tell us to move the furniture off your deck and we pick up the glass-top coffee table, one guy on each end holding it level, and it just so happens that's when moving it from the sun to the shade made the temp drop and the glass shattered..... come on! If you tell us to move it and one of us drops it - well, that's why I move my own stuff. Things happen. We don't make enough money to be able to buy you new stuff because you wanted to take advantage of our kindness instead of hiring movers.

We won't be extorted. We will, however, do our very best to protect ALL of your stuff like we always do. Signing our agreement will not give us the comfort to just start throwing your stuff around, don't worry. We don't want to damage anything. But things happen - sometimes we may accidentally do something and when we do I'll let you know. And I'll offer to make it right. And sometimes we didn't do it but you don't know who did, and us pointing it out to you doesn't mean we are the default blame receivers.

Again, there's a 30 year history of me telling the truth to the people of Central Arkansas. I have no way to know if you tell the truth regularly or not. Just because you can afford what we build doesn't mean you are a truth teller. It also doesn't mean you aren't on medication that can affect how you behave or your memory. I met the best couple one time and we started building their deck. They said they'd be inside and to holler if we needed anything. And 2 hours into it I had a question and couldn't get anyone to come to the door. They said his office was just inside and that I could come in if I needed to get him, so I did. He wasn't in his office. So I sheepishly walked down the hall toward the kitchen saying "Helloooo!" the whole way. No response. But when I got to the kitchen there was the guy standing at the sink drinking dish liquid. Had the Dawn bottle turned up! So I called the wife and said I needed to see her in person when she had a minute. When she came out I told her what I saw in case she needed to know - to get him some help. And that's when she revealed to me that he was on new medication for something and they warned her that things like that, and worse, could happen as side effects. So I can't help it if you may do weird stuff due to medication (or lack thereof) and I don't know about it.
But I can go ahead and let you all know that I'm not on any medication of any kind. So if you don't like how I act, we can't blame it on medication.

Short Version:
If I can replace something WE damage, I will. I will not be using my insurance for things that are minor. If we didn't damage it I may actually offer to fix or replace it. But that is just an offer, and it is based on what I think a simple repair, etc., should be. Keep in mind - YOU DO NOT HAVE TO ACCEPT MY OFFER. Me making that offer does NOT mean I am admitting we damaged it. It means I am just trying to help out (if I can) and that sometimes I like to tithe by helping with real missions in real time instead of money in a plate - just like when I offer to haul a lot more of your junk to the landfill while I'm going with your old deck.... doesn't mean I caused you to have all that junk. If you decide you want the thing that we DIDN'T damage to be replaced or repaired for some big-money option, then by all means, go right ahead. But no need to tell me about it because I'm not pitching in for that on something I didn't cause.

Even if this Hold Harmless Agreement is signed, I'm still going to be the good guy and take care of things I should take care of (and more). But it's here to protect me from scammers or people's medication & memory issues. I apologize to the 99.9% of you that don't deserve it for making you go through any of this.

If you want to sign a contract with us, I'm going to need that box checked on the contract saying you read the agreement on this page or we won't be able to start work.