The Other Side of the Desk

I’m at the other end of the country in February when my wife calls to say there’s water all over our living room floor. The condominium staff vacuumed it up. Apart from the floor being dirty, there appears to be no real damage.

Over the next two days, the floor goes from being dirty to “crunchy” (my wife’s term), to looking like the luge run at the Vancouver 2010 Olympics.

I call my insurer on Saturday morning when I get home. I’m immediately struck by the friendly, empathetic and knowledgeable person who answers the phone. To this point, I don’t think I was ever totally convinced by the strident exhortations around customer focus. I change my mind. I am reassured that things are going to turn out well.

Lesson #1: That first call is vital and builds an expectation.

The independent adjuster (not from my company) called shortly afterwards. Within a couple of hours, he was in the apartment commiserating with my wife. As an adjuster myself, I know my way around claims. As for my wife, I was under no illusion she could be described as anything other than a first-time consumer. The adjuster was friendly and reassuring. He took the time to explain the process and set her mind at rest.

Lesson #2: The first site visit is also key to establishing a positive expectation and good future working relationship.

So far so good, the next step was figuring out the damage. By now, the apartment was starting to smell like a wet dog. I began to worry about mould. Would there be a thorough investigation and resolution, or would the damage lurk behind the walls to be discovered long after my insurer had departed?

During my adjusting career, I have lost count of the number of times I have praised the insurer’s preferred contractor lists and pointed out they stand behind their workmanship. I know the contactors on my insurer’s list by reputation. I was reasonably certain they would do a competent job, but I was not totally persuaded. I found myself wanting someone I knew. I had recently spent a large sum of money on bathroom renovations; thus, getting a contractor who would do the repairs correctly and to the highest standards was weighing on my mind, even if my insurer was footing the bill.

Eventually I decide to ask a restoration contractor I had known for 30 years, but not on my insurer’s list, to jointly scope the loss with my insurance company’s contractor.

Lesson #3: Trust is essential. Just because a contractor is on someone’s list doesn’t itself build trust. Perhaps photographs of completed jobs or testimonials would have helped me decide.

The next issue is timing. My wife, an archetypal Type-A personality, wants this done by the end of the week if not sooner, no excuses. I share with her my knowledge of project management principles and dependences. No dice. Wet dog odours, doors that won’t open and jagged floor edges eventually get to both of us. By the time the estimates finally arrive, about 10 days have elapsed from the first report to my insurer.

Lesson #4: Elapsed time is frustrating. It tends to cause irascibility over the smallest things.

After adjusting for some dissimilarities, it turns out the estimates between my preferred contractor and the insurance company’s contractor are very close. The advantage goes to my contractor.

More days elapse after my adjuster is asked to confirm what property the corporation is responsible for insuring and to determine the amount of their policy deductible. It turns out to be a moot point: everything damaged is an improvement.

That gets sorted out. Following reassurances from my adjuster, I instruct my contractor to go ahead and rip out the smelly, heaved floor. But even that can’t begin until the contents are packed and moved out. I have visions of chipped furniture, paintings with holes poked in them and heirlooms lost forever in some gloomy, dank warehouse. My contractor assures me that our moving company, A M J Campbell, has aVIP division that will carefully protect our contents. Sure enough, they turn out to live up to advance billing.

Lesson #5: Packing up and moving out is expensive, and our lives are connected with our stuff. We need reassurance.

By the time the first workmen are standing in our living room, wrecking bars in hand, we are into our third week. I have given up trying to explain to my wife why all of this takes so long.

Then, an unforeseen delay; this time, it’s of our own making. Although we are spending $30,000 of our insurer’s money, it occurs to us that it doesn’t make sense to replace everything exactly as it was without thinking if we should update the finishes or add a few improvements.

Unfortunately my wife doesn’t agree with my thinking on this matter (which is not, in itself, unexpected). “What sort of floor do we want?” I ask. She wants what we had. I like hardwood. Should we add some crown moulding? How about larger baseboards? And concealing all those cables running along the floor? How about a new kitchen? (Now we are getting carried away.) Running around to flooring showrooms and building centres is eating away what little free time I have. Domestic harmony is becoming but a distant memory.

Divorce is narrowly averted in the form of an interior designer who, in an inspired move, comes up with an entirely different solution to our floor conundrum. In addition, the designer sorts through the various costs and practicality of the other contemplated improvements. In a couple of days, we choose from the samples provided; everything is back on track.

Lesson # 6: Perhaps some innovative insurer could offer, for an additional premium, a lump sum towards design services. Or perhaps restoration contractors could add it to their services?

Lesson #7 is communication. There is not enough of it.

My adjuster is very busy and is not able to get back to me as quickly as I would like. My own contractor does not always respond to my e-mails. I end up connecting people and confirming arrangements.

The flooring sub-contractor is an exception. He calls every morning to check in. He’s always a cell phone call away. Very reassuring. An adjuster’s fees are often scaled back if he or she does not ‘move the file forward,’ but as a consumer I want those additional touch points.

It occurs to me that increased communication reduces my stress and makes it easier to deal with me. This in turn helps to resolve the claim more quickly and at a reduced cost. For example, in my case, I felt well treated. As a result, I overlooked minor items of the claim that I might have pursued had I felt poorly treated.

Nearly three months later, everything is repaired and the furniture returned without a scratch. Admittedly, our travel obligations added to the time required to resolve the problem, but it was still a long and tiresome business.

What have I learned? Probably more than anything, I now have a full appreciation of the amount of stress a claim can create. In addition, I learned ongoing communication with my adjuster and others involved in resolving the claim can go a long way in reducing a claimant’s high stress levels. Selecting the right contractor, employing good, reliable sub-contractors and ensuring coordination of these trades is also essential.

I’m also thankful I went with a well-known, reputable insurer and picked their top-of-the-line product.

Overall, my own experience was good. But it doesn’t hurt the industry to consider the lessons learned from my experience to improve the experience for future claimants.