Pool Inspections Exposed - Dennis Boyd with Natalie Hood

Pool Inspections, Liability, Codes & the Dangerous Assumptions That Cost Thousands. Part 2 of this 2 part episode.

With Host Natalie Hood of The Grit Game and Special Guest Dennis Boyd of Watershape University

In the conclusion of this powerful two-part episode of Myth Busting Wednesdays, Natalie Hood sits down with Dennis Boyd for a brutally honest conversation about the realities of swimming pool inspections, code compliance, safety standards, liability, and the myths that continue to plague the pool industry. 

This episode digs deep into one of the biggest misconceptions in the swimming pool industry: just because a pool is open, built, or passed inspection once does not mean it is safe, compliant, or properly constructed today. Dennis explains how pool inspectors must constantly continue learning, especially in areas like electrical safety, bonding, lighting systems, hydraulics, structural integrity, and evolving code requirements. 

Natalie and Dennis break down the dangerous assumption that “if the contractor built it, it must be compliant,” sharing real-world examples of improperly built pools, exposed rebar hidden beneath unfinished shotcrete, disconnected bonding systems, improperly grounded electrical components, and construction shortcuts that could have led to catastrophic failures or lawsuits. 

The conversation also explores the confusion surrounding municipal inspections and building codes. Dennis explains how different jurisdictions may adopt completely different combinations of the International Building Code (IBC), International Swimming Pool & Spa Code (ISPSC), and local amendments, creating inconsistencies throughout the country. The result? Pools can sometimes receive occupancy approval while still containing serious safety hazards. 

Natalie and Dennis also tackle:

•  Why home inspectors often lack meaningful aquatic training 
•  The critical difference between general liability insurance and Errors & Omissions (E&O) coverage for pool inspectors 
•  Why written inspection reports become legal disclosure documents during real estate transactions 
•  The growing need for specialized aquatic inspection professionals 
•  Why pool builders, service technicians, and inspectors often operate with completely different knowledge bases 
•  The shocking pool code requirements most professionals have never heard of — including residential safety rope requirements under ISPSC Chapter 8. 

Dennis also shares how Watershape University training has helped professionals better understand slides, diving envelopes, gate safety, coefficient of friction standards, and the hidden hazards that most homeowners — and many contractors — completely overlook. 

Natalie closes the episode with a powerful reminder:

Pools don’t fail because of bad luck. They fail because of bad assumptions.

This is an episode every pool builder, service professional, inspector, real estate agent, and pool owner needs to hear.

Topics Covered

•  Pool inspection myths 
•  Electrical and bonding safety 
•  Pool code compliance 
•  Residential pool inspections 
•  Watershape University training 
•  Pool builder liability 
•  E&O insurance for inspectors 
•  ISPSC and IBC code discussions 
•  Real estate disclosure and pool inspections 
•  Pool construction defects 
•  Safety standards for residential pools 
•  Why continuing education matters in aquatics 

Listen & Follow

🎧 Talking Pools Podcast

#SwimmingPool #PoolInspection #PoolService #PoolBuilder #WatershapeUniversity #TalkingPoolsPodcast #PoolSafety #PoolIndustry

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back, Myth Busting Wednesdays, with your host Natalie Hood, The Grit Game, and the exciting conclusion to this two-part episode on conducting pool inspections with special guest Dennis Boyd of Water Shapes University. We join the conversation in progress.

SPEAKER_02 0:20

Well, let me ask this. Do you believe that, you know, so doing pool inspections in and out, you're constantly learning? What about this? Do you think that you need to have knowledge of electrical and lighting safety as an inspector?

SPEAKER_01 0:33

Yes, but it doesn't mean you're an electrician at the end of the day.

SPEAKER_02 0:39

Explain that.

SPEAKER_01 0:41

The depth of electrical and lighting is one component of the pool industry. Can you know enough to give somebody an informed opinion about the pool? You can. And if you don't know enough about it, one of the things that we teach as uh the inspection class goes, we say that if this is an area of deficiency for you as an inspector, then one of the things to kind of cover yourself and your company is that you need to recommend a industry licensed expert in this area to inspect this component of the pool. All right. So electrical and lighting, we do see that that's one of the big issues. We don't test bonding right now as a number one uh thing for us. And these are areas of expertise that someone should get trained in if they're not just like the home inspectors. When home inspectors are trained in their 90 credit hour, if you want to know the truth and and talking of like how the training is similar. And in Ashie, I used to be a member of the educational standards team for Ashie, and they were they were using me to help them write a curriculum on pool inspecting, and they decided not to do it after a bunch of lawyer talk and and writing the the test. They had a big huge number thrown at them for writing the certification exam. So they decided not to do it. But and their training of 90 credit hours to be a home inspector, two hours are developed are are dedicated to water vessel training. Like two hours in the class of 90 credit hours. So if you imagine, you know, them as being experts in the field, they're not experts in one particular thing. So they're they're experts at an overall genre of general information, you know, and where they lack in that, they recommend other professionals when they see something that is not correct per industry standards. And that's what we do as inspectors as well. We call out things and we will re recommend if we see an issue about bonding, you know, we will say things like we recommend a bonding testing be done in in this particular water vessel by a licensed electrician um just to find out and more safety, confirm the safety protocol of the pool. Did that remotely closely answer that?

SPEAKER_02 2:51

Yes, it does. This one kind of like makes my skin crawl a little bit, but because I it actually it it's a myth, but it's truly believed by a lot of people. And it's if the pool is open, it must have passed inspection. Hey, pull pro, what if your pool pump knew the perfect speed to run? Beat Nautis VSF, the first adaptive flow pump with EcoFlow technology. It adjusts to real-time conditions to maintain constant flow, cut energy costs, and extend equipment life. No guesswork, just a smarter pool with Nautilus VSF from H2FLO. If the pool is open, it must have passed inspection.

SPEAKER_01 3:41

That's a good one. And it's a headache. Um you have some areas of the country that have no codes. There's there's no inspectors. Yes. And you have just uh, you know, uh, you know, Uncle Joe and you know, cousin Eddie, you know, they got a bobcat and they're going for it as pool builders, you know. Formal training, no whatsoever, you know, no construction training whatsoever. It looks real easy, so let's build one, you know, let's build one from the neighborhood. And and some people have built their pool companies that way, which more power to them. Yeah. But as the industry changes, training is so paramount that it's uh we're seeing that codes, even in the state of Tennessee, you know, state of Tennessee has where city municipalities have adopted codes, county municipalities have adopted other codes. You know, we have federal codes, and a lot of times it'll be, well, you know, what code are you talking about? Sometimes, because you'll have the IBC, the International Building Code, you'll have the ISPSC, which is international swimming pool and spa code, have the ICC, which is an accumulation of all the codes, international fire codes, and you've got all these components on a swimming pool that have their codes rooted in different practices that have specialties. And so, you know, you can you can walk up to a swimming pool, and I'll just give you one for instance here. You walk up to a swimming pool, and if you if you approach the gate and you open the gate and you have to walk backwards downstairs in order to open the gate that leads to the water vessel area, well, that's actually a code in the International Building Code that says that's a safety hazard. You know, that's not in the ISPSC, which is where we find a lot of our pool codes. All right. When you start talking about these pools, must be okay because, you know, they were built and somebody bought it. You know, yeah, there's some truth to that. They they can't have an occupancy permit without some type of regulation. But it just depends on where you're talking about. Where is this water vessel located? Are there regulations in this area? I know that we have seen in the state of Tennessee here, especially where I live here in Nashville, we have some counties that have adopted standards that have minimalistic standards. They may have set their own standards that they pulled from different compliances as a city or as a county, or you know, even some places and just incorporated. We had we had several years ago here, I got called out because I serviced the pool for a local um airport hotel. And they had the local codes inspector coming in saying uh things that they needed to close the pool down. They were saying things that I'd never heard of, and I knew codes. At least the codes that they were talking about, I'd I was pretty much versed in like fences and things like that. And so this codes inspector for the city or the mini the municipal inspector was saying they wanted to shut the pool down based on their understanding of the codes. And when we got to looking into their training, it also may not mean that the pool hasn't been worked on, meaning that if it passed originally, it may not pass now because you may have bonding disconnected. You may have had somebody that's run a bonding wire up into the electrical panel. You may have somebody that's connected the bond wire to a ground rod. You know, these are all no-nos for the industry. Remember that conversation we had a little while back about bonding, you know? All right. That's paramount in what we're dealing with as when we go out. We're we're given a fresh set of eyes from today's standard, looking at today's pool. You know, does it look right today?

SPEAKER_02 7:26

Well, I'll tell you this. I will give you uh five stars and then ten stars to to rule out their one star because I agree with you. I just don't think they're they're ever. What are they saying? It takes it takes ten reviews to out to outdo like a one bad review. And you know, it it just it clearly shows the uneducation and it it is what it is. It's it's unfortunate.

SPEAKER_01 7:50

But it's like you said, it's just you know, it's it it's yeah, it's a weird thing. It's just where people go to, you know, which is why I really like this one commercial that they're they're posting in Britain of this uh this company that has set themselves up as uh what's it called? They are uh they are uh people who go to people's houses and they knock on the door, they go, Are you, you know, are you a big talker, you know, 401 at you know, such and such? And then they're like, Were you the one that said, you know, old uh boxing champ took one, folded like a cheap suit. That would never happen to me. You know, he's and the the guy at the door says, Yeah, I made that. I'm I made that post. Then they go, Okay, hey, come out of the truck. World champ, come over here. And the world champ of boxing gets out of the truck and comes over, punches him in the stomach. He goes, Oh I had a do you want to take that tweet back? And he's like on the floor going, Yeah, I'll take it back.

SPEAKER_02 8:47

I'll take it back. I didn't know it hurt that bad. Is this what I'm gonna see in the next of the coming weeks?

SPEAKER_01 8:52

I'm gonna see that in you and the I wish I could rent a company. Well, okay, one star review. Hey, company that deals with one-star reviews, please go after this person for me.

SPEAKER_02 9:03

Well, you know what? Actually, the what was it? The grit game, they did a uh they did an ad. I think this was API, and they were like, oh, you know, they were talking about grit game and um using API, and Lacey went to like open the back door of their car, and like Johnny was in the back, like tied up. Like, we don't care what sales rep or like rep coop you use, just as long as you use the right products and like Johnny's in the back tied up and it was hilarious. And then like she closes it the back door. It was it was hilarious. But so here's here's a good one. Um, we're kind of getting close. We've got like about two more minutes. Um, but here's a good one. You know what time it is?

SPEAKER_04 9:39

Wednesday vibes on the fucking pool's podcast, and I'm gonna do it.

SPEAKER_05 10:31

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SPEAKER_02 10:48

Check out redufapparel.com. Go for the full pro if the contractor built it, it must be compliant.

SPEAKER_01 10:55

That's kind of similar to the uh the other question. But no, that's not true. Uh we we have contractors that build pools out of compliance all the time here in Nashville, and I think nationwide, or else Shape University and other, you know, other training organizations wouldn't exist because that would mean it wouldn't matter how you built it. Um it would be compliant no matter what. But no, compliance and I can give you a scenario like a lot of times with pool building, pool building has so many nuances and so many players a lot of times. You you you'll oftentimes find a pool build put together by multiple people where the whole the whole pool is not built by one company. It's built by a uh pool builder who's supposed to be monitoring the jobs. And I'll give you, for instance, even about concrete. So you'll have concrete being blown in the backyard, shot crete being shot, whatever the case, and you'll have a guy that's a not a certified nozzleman, and they don't know that there's too much, you know, water in the mix. Just just one nuance of the pool. I I'm not even gonna talk about plaster, I'm not even gonna talk about, you know, is the pool wired correctly? Is it plumbed right? Does it meet hydraulic standards? You know, so just because the contractor had a license or has a license, or the pool builder is there, does he have a license? You know, is he using his brother-in-law's license? We actually had a lawsuit that that was the case. We we had we do all of our due diligence on the for the front end of the lawsuit before it ever goes to trial. And one of the particular areas that we look at right away is we pulled the contractor's license at the city to see, you know, are they even licensed? And we had one lawsuit recently where they weren't even licensed. And so we took it to uh, you know, we took all of our information in, you know, said, here you go, and and they folded right away because they realized they had been that's the area where you're talking about caught. You know, it's more that side. And we have that in our industry. And unfortunately we have it here in Nashville where pool builders are so busy that people who are buying houses with or who own houses with pools and want to build a pool, they're not waiting for the pool builders. They will hire the home builder to build it. And so we as inspectors go in and find bad pool builds by home builders, you know, not all the time, but but a big deal of the time. But we do have uh pool builders who will outsource things like that. And we had uh we had recently had a pool that they put the plaster, I'm sorry, they put the concrete over the rebar. They they shot the shot creep, and during the process, they left the scene and said, We're done. And the home the homeowner said, Well, no, because I can still I said they called us and said, I don't think this look right, this looks right, can you come see it? And so we showed up on the job site and the shock creek was uh done according to the pool builder, and we told the homeowner it wasn't done because we could still see exposed rebar all around the pool. And that's not that's not supposed to be the case. If you ever take a concrete class on pool building, you're not supposed to be able to see the rebar on the finished guy.

SPEAKER_02 14:05

I mean that's kind of a given, but yeah, right.

SPEAKER_01 14:08

Well, you would think, but we saw it, and the pool builder kept saying, Um, I don't I don't believe what you're saying because I've used this concrete guy before and he's really good. And uh then we called him and said, Hey, Mr. Pool Builder, the client has hired our services. You know, they are going to take this to a lawsuit. And he immediately said, I'll be out there tomorrow. And he looked at the pool and he said, This is ridiculous. And he looked at us and he said, They don't need y'all anymore. So this is not going to trial. He said, I'm gonna rip this all out. This is on us. He said, We are completely sorry, apologetic. And we just said, Well, you know, we did our due diligence here just saying, hey, this is not right, and we just want to bring your attention to it. You know, we've seen that time and time again.

SPEAKER_02 14:49

Absolutely. I I think there's I mean, there's a lot of education on commercial, but there's there's really not that much on residential. So I think what you guys are doing here is great. Now, there is one other thing I wanted to touch on, and that's the insurance part. I think there are a lot of people that are confused or um possibly uncomfortable kind of getting into this because of insurance. So I kind of wanted to put that on, bring that over to your table and kind of let you talk about that a little bit more. So, what what would you say to people that were uncomfortable kind of exploring this avenue because of the insurance?

SPEAKER_01 15:22

Well, insurance is definitely a a requirement as an inspector because of what we're doing. When you're in the pool business, pool building, pool service, you often have insurance that you'll carry called a general liability, call a geopolicy for short. But in the world of inspecting, you are not using tools and tearing things apart and uh have run the risk of breaking things. What you do is you offer a professional opinion. So it's really like malpractice if you have some bad advice. And so therefore, you want to have the type of insurance that would cover that. And that type of insurance coverage is called EO insurance or errors and emissions. It's actually what we had to have as medical professionals in the hospital, you know, not so much of hurting somebody with a needle, but actually recommending the drug.

SPEAKER_00 16:10

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_01 16:13

So just recommending the drug that we would recommend is a it's a practice of professionalism that is garnered by training, you know, and hopefully that you, you know, you wouldn't be allowed into the hospital if you didn't have licensure or some type of certification to be there. And then if you go outside of your parameter, then you better be covered by the hospital or by your own personal insurance. And that's why as inspectors in the pool industry, we get ENO insurance. And you may think that that sounds outrageously expensive, but it's not. As a practitioner myself, our insurance is, I think for about $300,000 of coverage, um, it's about $1,200 a year. So the problem is, not extremely bad. Now, it doesn't cover you if you do start getting out, you know, tools and things like that. But the good news about ours is that on our policies at our office as inspectors is we send out disclaimers to all of our customers when they call us and ask us to do a pool inspection. So we'll send a disclaimer that has an electronic signature on it, and that disclaimer is basically listing here's the things that we're gonna do, and it's all visual. The good news about that is that our ENO insurance carrier wrote our disclaimer for us, meaning that they took our they took our disclaimer from our office and said, let us see it. And they did, and they sent it back to us. Their team of lawyers said, You don't have this, this, and this on your claims. And if you ever want us to cover a claim, it better be in your disclaimer, you know, so that when somebody says something about you, we will actually cover you, and that's what you want. So my disclaimer document that I send out to people was written by my insurance company. Oh yeah, it's very, very cool. I find it like bulletproof, you know. Whereas if I go up, I feel very confident, you know. I'm very I feel backed by people that you know that have my back on this and they're like, Yeah, we recognize what you're doing, very necessary, yeah, very important what you guys are offering. Need more of them out there. And so ENO insurance, errors and omissions is what an inspector will need. And now, if you just start swinging hammers, um, you probably better have a good GL policy. And and my company actually uh couples my GL and my EO in one policy. So I pay twelve hundred dollars a year for ENO and general liability insurance. So if you think about it, I mean if I mess up three hundred thousand dollars worth of mess up, you know, that's a pretty nice pool.

SPEAKER_02 18:38

That is a pretty nice pool. Let's not mess up, but that's a pretty nice pool.

SPEAKER_01 18:42

So we're we're kind of that's that's where the areas of coverage that we we do. Now, you know, we previously had just GL, but we make sure now that if we're going to make recommendations of you should do this or this is okay, we you know, we have some backing to that, you know, that verbal professional comment that we put away. And see if we if we're just going out there telling people and just talking in the backyard, you know, you wouldn't need an email insurance because it would be a he said, she said, and then you know, it had to be proven. Whenever you do a pool inspection, you have to write your report and it needs to be an an official report, and you're giving it to someone who's making the decision about a real estate transaction, so it becomes what's called disclosure. Disclosure is a legal term, meaning that it stays with the the property until the sale. Okay, so it's it's now general knowledge of the property.

SPEAKER_02 19:34

Right, right. Well, and when I mean when you spend that much money, I would hope so.

SPEAKER_01 19:39

Well, you definitely want to know what you're buying. Or before we existed, I mean, people the real estate agents, and I know this for a fact because I I did my own training as a real estate agent. We didn't have any kind of training on water vessels as part of our training.

SPEAKER_02 19:55

When somebody would I don't know if I did either actually then. I don't know. I don't think it even is of now.

SPEAKER_01 20:02

I mean, I hadn't checked into every agency's training, but it was like 04 304. We're now members of TREC here in Nashville, and we are we are considered educational agents that they use, and we wrote two classes for the real estate industry that real estate agents can take with us if they want to become more knowledgeable. Uh and so we did pool school for real estate agents is one class, and we did what to expect from a pool inspection and how to stay out of liability. Um that was the second class.

SPEAKER_02 20:31

Oh, very cool. That's awesome. Very cool. Well, let me ask this one last thing. If if someone was interested in possibly looking, you know, they're getting into the aquatics industry, what advice would you give them if they wanted to become an inspector?

SPEAKER_01 20:46

Oh my goodness. Um definitely do training. You need to know you you want to always know what the other side of the industry is doing. We constantly, when I was just a service guy, we constantly had no idea what pool builders went through. And I think every pool builder that I knew had no idea what I did as a pool service person. Like, like water chemistry, saturation index formula, anything like that, maintenance needs, hydraulics, you know, you name it, uh, turnover rates, all that kind of stuff that you're looking at. You would think they would know total dynamic head pressure, but I have I've had pool builders that look at me and have no idea what I'm talking about. And I'm like, where are your engineered drawings on this pool? And they would hold up like a napkin. And they're like, We drew this at the bar, you know, and we wanted this to go here and that to go over there, you know. And that was considered their their technical drawing. And so just just things like that that you learn as a pool inspector are very, just very paramount. If you're going to get into the aquatic, if you think the avenue you want to be as an inspector, I would say first things first, I would work with a pool service company or a pool building company if you want to get your feet wet, no pun intended, in the industry, those would be good places. To start, it's hard to start at just being an inspector because there's no working knowledge that you're pulling from. It it would be like me being a home inspector just because I own a house. You know, that's the same equivalent. Or or I should be a mechanic because I own a car. You know, you don't you don't know what pistons and you know flywheels are, you know, let alone what they do. That's kind of uh that's kind of my my experience as being an inspector. I have 25 years in the industry of just, you know, being cro cross-trained over from service to building to remodeling. Watershape university has classes on remodeling, even. Like I would say Watershape University is a great place to start. You know, you're looking at their training. I I know I'm an advocate for Watershape, but I just feel like that they do so much good training. And once you get out of one of their classes, you just go, man, I never knew that. I've been in the industry 20 years, you know. I have that all the time. I have people that when I do an inspection now, because I'm so honed in that world and I'm just I'm so focused that when I when even in our classes, when students take our classes, they they go, Man, I didn't know gates had codes. You know, like what do you like? And then they go home and they go, Man, I'm I'm testing all the gates and fences systems now a lot differently. I'm not just walking into the backyard, just things like that. Even in slides, you know, we we look at slides a lot differently from even the codes requirements. When we look at the slide and go, you know, where's this slide at? Does it cross over the diving envelope, diving board envelope? You know, is it in the shallow end? Does it have water on the slide? And slides are required to have what's called the coefficient of friction. Um, because they've had studies on it now that says if you don't have that, people can get hurt. You know, to the slide, and just things like that that are that are paramount. I I teach the students uh code 811, which is the very last code in the permanent in-ground residential pools chapter, which is chapter eight of ISPSC. And the very last code 811 says all residential pools are required to have safety ropes. And every one of the students go, What? Like, I don't have any pool that has a safety rope. And I'm like, I didn't write the code. I'm just here to tell you, as inspectors, when you're looking at a pool, this is part of our code training. It just blows everybody's mind. And it blew my mind the first time I read it. And then I went, like, well, I think I gotta put this into my training curriculum. I think they need to know.

SPEAKER_02 24:29

Good to know.

SPEAKER_01 24:30

Yeah, it is.

SPEAKER_02 24:31

Yeah. Well, I mean, I I will say I've definitely learned a few things. I every time I I I do an interview, I always learn something new. So I certainly appreciate the the information. And like you said, you know, just because you've you've taken a course on something, it doesn't mean you're an expert. You have to continuously learn. And I love that you have that same passion for learning, for education. And I can't thank you enough for you know the education that you're bringing on the residential side. And I want to give a huge thank you to you, Dennis, for again, bringing the kind of clarity, honesty, and real-world experience this industry desperately needs. And, you know, if you take nothing else away from this conversation, take this. Pools don't fail because of bad luck. They fail because of bad assumptions. You know, I think the myths that we covered today from, you know, home inspector can't inspect a pool, money only matters during construction, that, you know, assumptions they they really they lead to injuries, lawsuits, and really some of those could be six-figure repairs. And they can be prevented with proper training and proper oversight. So whether you're a homeowner, a builder, service pro, someone stepping into this industry for the first time, remember inspections, they're not optional. Documentation, it's not optional. Code compliance, it's not optional. And training isn't optional. All of these are absolute, you need to do them because when we treat pulls like afterthoughts, people get hurt. So again, thank you, Dennis, for reminding us what professionalism looks like. And until next time, folks, I'm Natalie Hood. Stay safe, stay sharp, and stay gritty.