Repairs - who pays when home warranty not used?

[Donna Dekker]

In my lease I specified that my tenants should cover repairs that cost less than $100 and that there is a home warranty that can be used to cover repairs.  My tenants called a plumber with whom they'd done business previously for a garbage disposal problem which turned into a replacement to the tune of four hundred dollars.  Had they called me first I would have had the home warranty people out to fix it the next day, for a $75 service fee.  They notified me after the fact that the work had been done and that they would pay $100 and take the rest out of their rent for next month.  They are otherwise good tenants that I don't want to alienate, but I'm sort of annoyed about this.