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Suddenly the man ...now hated me and called me a crook.

The following is a true story.
I am at this lady's house with her roof salesman, and the house to her immediate left and right had brand new roofs.

She was in a very fringe area of a smallish hail storm, and had zip damage, nothing on the shingles.
Little pea size pings on the soft metal.

The roofer wouldn't get on the 12/12 with me, and so the whole discussion was basically neighbor-itis.
After I exhausted my polite explanation, the lady was essentially ignoring my words as she wasn't hearing what she wanted to hear.   She went on to explain how the neighbors "didn't have to go through all this" and their Insurance simply paid for new roofs based on zip code and reported hail in the area.

My vendor had just printed up a new batch of business cards, and she looks at my card "Robery Harvey".
My legal name is "Robert Harvey" and there was a typo (Robery). She noticed it, then pointed it out to her contractor...
I looked at it and was kinda speechless - showed it to Tony (my 2-story assistant at the time) and he tried to stop laughing.

She was basically calling me a crook, and my business card kind of supported her argument.

This discussion has taken a few twists and turns but there are a couple of comments I would like to throw into the mix for the sake of discussion.

Assume for a moment you have the following scenario:

1. Late October hail storm in Ohio.
2. Assume you have a replacement policy with a 180 day limit for claiming the recoverable depreciation.
3. You have inspected the roof and it qualifies for a total replacement due to the extent of hail damage (hail stones penetrated the decking) and also the vinyl siding has 2 inch holes in it from hail hits so you are wrapping the house.
4. The insured gets a contractor to make the necessary repairs within the next week before the snow flies.

Based on some of the aforementioned engineer and roof manufacturer statements, the seal strips will not properly seal in cooler weather so it is necessary and in some instances required for the roofing contractor to add the dabs of sealant to "instantly" seal the tabs.

Does the insurance company owe the additional labor to add this sealant? If yes, why? and if no, why not? Keep in mind the siding needs replacement ASAP to prevent water intrusion from the snow and rain.

Where in any of the homeowner policies does it say that a FALLING OBJECT has to be driven by wind??

Jdacree,

It is absolutely possible that a wood shingle roof NOT sustain hail damage, keeping in mind there must be an associated split in the shingle from the hail hit, but the deck, paint and other items did sustain hail damage. A scuff without a split and removal of oxidation on wood shingles is not hail damage.









 

2. Assume you have a replacement policy with a 180 day limit for claiming the recoverable depreciation.

a typical HOMEOWNER policy will say something like "notify us of your intent (to make a claim for Replacement Cost Coverage) within 180 days after the date of loss" HO-3 2000 version.  They don't have to complete repair within 180 days, just notify of intent to claim RCV.

One of the larger carriers I work for has a "drop-dead" date of 2 years from the DOL in which to do the repairs (or submit a signed contract to do so).

I have seen short 180 day fuses on RCV time limits for some mobile home and tenant occupied policies.

In your example where the place needs to be "dried in" due to storm damage before the winter, and the solution = some added labor to seal the tabs, that is a judgment call that makes us earn our keep.

Every claim has some issues, and if they are within our local authority and make sense we make a decision and support our findings in the claim file.

Jim A, I don,t think I have ever given a new person wanting to get into insurance adjusting any bad or poor advice. Since this is your status, I sent you an email detailing my reasons for telling you to sit down and shut up until you have 5 or 6 good storms under your belt as a top 10% adjuster.

Posted by Ray Hall Nov 22:
...I sent you an email detailing my reasons for telling you to sit down and shut up until you have 5 or 6 good storms under your belt as a top 10% adjuster.

Why single him out?

Over 1/2 the members of this forum are newbies, many of them less polite than Mr. Acree.

At this point, I have more respect for the new guy than either of you 2 veterans.

He doesn't talk down to people, or believe he is "holier than thou".

...opining the proper way for aspiriants to join our ranks.

If it's "your way or the highway" you can KMA.
Your opine is your opine. Not everyone gets to the top of the hill following the same rut in the road.

Personally, I did travel the route you describe - but don't pass judgement on others.
It's the spirit of the person making the journey that counts, more than what path they take. 

Aahh, my friend, making judgements is at the very core of what we do. We are, in fact, the decision makers for the carriers, be it staff or independent. Did you not know that? It is the adjusters investigation, analysis, and decision that determines the disbursement of great quantities of the companies funds. That is why we operate in a high state of fiduciary capacity, High Trust With Other Peoples Money. We are trusted to make sound judgements on all kinds of property and people. To suggest one must not be judgemental is an alien concept for we adjusters.

As for your kind invitation for a social encounter, I must respectfully decline and suggest the offer be made to that part, of perhaps, your special interest group that favors such personal involvement. Thank you for the offer, tho.

Ol' Ghost

Posted By Ray Hall on 23 Nov 2009 05:22 PM 
... that he learned when he was a water sucker contractor by his own admission.

Where did you get that from??  I did take a year off after the first 15 years in claims, but I built Gazebo's.  It gave me an appreciation of what contractors have to deal with - but I was never a water-sucker.

I will say the same thing I said a couple years ago on that moisture meter thread. 
http://www.catadjuster.org/Forums/t...fault.aspx

and this one http://www.catadjuster.org/Forums/tabid/60/aff/28/aft/8987/afv/topic/afnp/9926/Default.aspx

Ray, if you haven't used a moisture meter in all these years then you have (to some extent, not 100%) been "blind" in terms of seeing if there is water in the stud wall cavity trapped in the insulation, under the cabinets, etc.  It's the shades of gray that I am talking about, not when the entire floor is 4" deep.

Our departed friend Dave Hood (katadj) posted about his choice of moisture meter - are you gonna find fault with him too?

Your passing judgment on me is just digging a deeper hole that you and Ghost seem to enjoy occupying.

Hey guys, what the hell does all this verbage have to do with unsealed shingles. Please respect the opinion of others.

I think your prinicipal (the insurance company) expects you to have good people skills, common knowledge, some knowledge of contraction, some knowledge of automobiles, some knowledge of medical terms and medical protocal in bodily injury and workers compensation claims, as much law as you can learn in college or by working in the tort law area each day for years, lots of contract experience etc.

I have been taking to task by my staff claims managers in the past for good reasons when I put "my expert opine" in reports and was reminded I did not have any experteise in structural engineering, electrical, or any of the opines I expressed. The only tools I needed for a competant adjuster was good reason ability and no "special tools". and not to use them in any form as they would be stuck where the sun does not shine if we had to go to court. Dave Hood and I have both done appraisals for the other side and we used some of these "special tools". I would consider a moisture meter and an infra-read camera in the hands of an adjuster with "superior knowledge" who used them in a routine practice on water claims as his principals agent-expert and must suffer all the consequences for "his/her test and reports.

Tom, I feel bad about my comments to Bob, but I have not waived from my practice of never trying to give only good information or advise to newer people. Jim Acree is one of my mentee,s and we are OK.

Ray et al, as a newer person here, but having a pretty good well-rounded background, I think (respectfully) Bob is on the money about moisture meters. I have read all posts on CADO back almost to the archives (+/-2007 and earlier?), and I have read your discussions and ongoing conflicts with Bob about this issue. I have to say that in his example where the water had migrated deeper under the tiles (or was it wood?), and the remediation company showed him that his scope was insufficient, he went out and bought a moisture meter. Thereafter, he used this as a basis of his scope.

I see this as someone incorporating good practices / technology rather than just winging it. I have talked this over with a few people, and they may not have bought a meter, but they request strong documentation from the remediation companies as part of scoping the damage. The remediation companies then use the meters for the required information. Frankly, if a doctor was not using an MRI to review a possible torn ACL, and instead was just manipulating someone's knee by hand before surgery, we would call that malpractice.

It seems to me that Bob is proactive about addressing the needs of the insured, and he is reducing the number of supplements for the carrier by using what appears to me to be a very good tool. How else would you figure out a good scope? Why be on the defensive against the remediation company since they have the gizmo? Why not lead from the front? Plus, I also recall that a staff adjuster went on the offensive to defend Bob's use of this technology. Now that should not mean that every adjuster should run out and spend $400 on a moisture meter, but I do see the value in incorporating that technology.

Finally, there appears to be a subtext about how to be successful in the adjusting world, and the best practice answer is to go the staff route for training. That's fine in theory, but because a CAT by definition requires a great many more active adjusters than have left the staff world, and because the carrier jobs are not as easy to get as discussed, the complete answer about how to excel in the industry has to be more broad than the typical narrow answer. This is an industry that has a peak demand problem - there are either too many or too few adjusters at any given time. Therefore, it seems to me that any training that gives one expertise in any given complimentary area will help a person in the long run.

What is the alternative? to collect unemployment, to work at Walmart or Home Depot, to drive a cab, etc.? I have read about all of these alternative careers in these posts to keep the cash flow rolling in during down times. Being a roof salesman seems to be offer pretty good experience that will transition to being a better adjuster in peak demand periods. The problem is that when there is a full-employment event, many adjusters do not even have this background.

I also agree that one has to focus on the realities / requirements of a given job at hand, but the point is that this training is still very good if a person wants to be a better adjuster. Maybe the staff position is not viable for any of a number of reasons? They do like younger people when looking for entry level people. One should do a "next best" thing and climb a few roofs or something else and try to make some money until one is able to do what one really wants to do. The harder a person works, the better they get at everything they do in my opinion. My commercial real estate appraisal business is better because I have a reasonable understanding of how insurance / insurance adjusting works. My background coming to adjusting is better because I have been climbing roofs for the past 25 years and I understand real estate (certainly the requirements of mortgagees). The point is that, in my opinion, adjusters who want to give advice to newer people should incorporate advice that not only has a best practices solution but a next best practices alternative. The advice should also be collegial and not pedantic. Isn't that the purpose of a board? Better to have more people contributing than scaring off people who may not have fit the true blue career path.