Make sure the carpenter that you hire has a verifiable work history. To do this, you can take a few different routes. You can ask if they have any local references that you can contact for an honest appraisal of the carpenter's work. If the carpenter has a decent history in the area, you could also just ask for photographs of completed projects.

Have a very clear definition of what constitutes damage to your cabinets or other aspects of your home. During the process of refinishing, there is a possibility for your cabinets to sustain minor cosmetic damage. What a carpenter sees as a minor ding, you may see as real damage. It is important for your standards to be made clear to any carpenter that does your cabinet refinishing.

Find out what protocol the carpenter uses if damage is done to the cabinets during refinishing. Due to the nature of refinishing projects, cabinets can be damaged from over-sanding and many other processes. This creates a need for you to have a very clear process laid out for what to do when cabinets are damaged.