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Product Warranty Costs and Service Returns
 9 Months Ended
Sep. 29, 2012
Standard Product Warranty Disclosure [Abstract]  
Product Warranty Costs and Service Returns
Product Warranty Costs and Service Returns
Consistent with industry practice, the Company provides to homeowners limited warranties on certain products, primarily related to window and siding product categories. Warranties are of varying lengths of time from the date of purchase up to and including lifetime. Warranties cover product failures such as seal failures for windows and fading and peeling for siding products, as well as manufacturing defects. The Company has various options for remedying product warranty claims including repair, refinishing or replacement and directly incurs the cost of these remedies. Warranties also become reduced under certain conditions of time and change in home ownership. Certain metal coating suppliers provide warranties on materials sold to the Company that mitigate the costs incurred by the Company. Reserves for future warranty costs are provided based on management’s estimates utilizing an actuarial calculation performed by an independent actuary which projects future remedy costs using historical data trends of claims incurred, claim payments, sales history of products to which such costs relate and other factors.
A reconciliation of the warranty reserve activity is as follows (in thousands):
 
Quarters Ended
 
Nine Months Ended
 
September 29,
2012
 
October 1,
2011
 
September 29,
2012
 
October 1,
2011
Balance at the beginning of the period
$
102,522

 
$
96,465

 
$
101,163

 
$
94,712

Provision for warranties issued and changes in estimates for pre-existing warranties
3,035

 
3,032

 
8,269

 
6,057

Claims paid
(2,297
)
 
(3,248
)
 
(6,225
)
 
(5,089
)
Foreign currency translation
499

 
(1,322
)
 
552

 
(753
)
Balance at the end of the period
$
103,759

 
$
94,927

 
$
103,759

 
$
94,927