A full maintenance contract is written to allow an elevator service company to take total responsibility for the elevator equipment identified in the maintenance agreement. This contract acts like an insurance policy and allows the manager to budget total yearly costs and eliminate concerns relating to elevator liability and exposure to claims in the event of accidents or injuries. Liability is limited because the maintenance contractor assumes all responsibility and determines the amount of service visits required to keep the elevator system operating safely. Some full maintenance contracts will include after hour charges for trouble calls. There tends to be many variations of this type of contract and they are all referred to as full maintenance contracts, but the elevator owner needs to read the entire contract to see what is excluded.