What a maintenance bond is
A maintenance bond, also called a warranty bond, guarantees your finished work is free of defects in materials and workmanship for a set period, often one or two years. Sometimes it's built into the performance bond; sometimes the owner wants it separately.
In Arizona
Arizona's two public-works bonding statutes—A.R.S. § 34-222 (Little Miller Act, covering county/city/town public construction) and A.R.S. § 41-2574 (State Procurement Code)—require only performance and payment bonds; neither mandates a separate maintenance or warranty bond by name. No other Arizona statute was found that requires a standalone maintenance bond. Public agencies and private project owners may impose one through contract terms, typically covering one to two years of defect liability after project completion.
- Some surety-company marketing pages incorrectly cite A.R.S. § 32-1158 as the governing maintenance-bond statute; the actual text of § 32-1158 concerns only written contract documentation requirements (contractor name, license number, completion date, price), not bonding.
- The ADOT 2021 Standard Specifications for Road and Bridge Construction may contain warranty provisions, but the document was not accessible for direct review; treat ADOT-contract warranty obligations as contract-level, not statutory.
You need this bond if you're
- A contractor finishing public works with a warranty period
- A site contractor handing improvements over to a city or county
- Paving, concrete, roofing and landscaping contractors
- A developer whose subdivision bond is being released
What the surety looks at
Your business, credit and the finished project. Often handled together with the performance bond.