Guarantees

6 Months Ended

Mar. 31, 2019

Product Warranties Disclosures [Abstract]

Guarantees

Guarantees

We routinely grant limited warranties on our products with respect to defects in material and workmanship. The terms of these warranties are generally one year, however, certain components and products have substantially longer warranty periods. We recognize a reserve with respect to these obligations at the time of product sale, with subsequent warranty claims recorded directly against the reserve. The amount of the warranty reserve is determined based on historical trend experience for the covered products. For more significant warranty-related matters which might require a broad-based correction, separate reserves are established when such events are identified and the cost of correction can be reasonably estimated.

A rollforward of changes in the warranty reserve for the periods covered in this report is as follows:

	Quarter Ended March 31						Year to Date Ended March 31
	2019			2018			2019			2018
Balance as of beginning of period	$	24.9		$	25.3		$	20.5		$	25.5
Provision for warranties in the period	4.1			4.0			9.2			7.5
Warranty reserves assumed1	—			—			2.8			—
Warranty claims in the period	(4.5		)	(4.3		)	(8.0		)	(8.0		)
Balance as of end of period	$	24.5		$	25.0		$	24.5		$	25.0

¹As a result of the asset acquisition discussed in Note 4.

In the normal course of business, we enter into various other guarantees and indemnities in our relationships with suppliers, service providers, customers, business partners and others. Examples of these arrangements would include guarantees of product performance, indemnifications to service providers and indemnifications of our actions to business partners. These guarantees and indemnifications have not historically had a material impact on our financial condition or results of operations, nor do we expect them to, although indemnifications associated with our actions generally have no dollar limitations.

In conjunction with our acquisition and divestiture activities, we have entered into select guarantees and indemnifications of performance with respect to the fulfillment of commitments under applicable purchase and sale agreements. The arrangements generally indemnify the buyer or seller for damages associated with breach of contract, inaccuracies in representations and warranties surviving the closing date and satisfaction of liabilities and commitments retained under the applicable contract. With respect to sale transactions, we also routinely enter into non-competition agreements for varying periods of time. Guarantees and indemnifications with respect to acquisition and divestiture activities, if triggered, could have a materially adverse impact on our financial condition and results of operations.