Thursday, March 5, 2015
Insurance Fraud Pervades Federally Monitored Storm Recovery Program
Whenever you are filing an insurance claim after your home suffers storm damage, it is imperative that you hire a professional, experienced, knowledgeable, and licensed contractor to assess and restore your home. If you do not have professional help, insurance companies can take advantage of you by minimizing the nature or cause of damage to your home. Even if the federal government is involved, you can be taken advantage of and not get the insurance payout to which you are entitled.
It has recently come to light that many hard working Americans have recently suffered from insurance fraud in a federally funded storm recovery program. Sadly, many of these claims have been processed so getting deserved relief will not require difficult and costly litigation. One way to try to prevent the problem of insurance fraud is to hire an expert early in the process.
The professional roofers and exterior remodelers at Valley Boys Roofing can help assess the damage to your Omaha home or business after a storm. Their experts can provide you with valuable guidance while you are undergoing the insurance claim process in order to monitor whether or not you are getting the insurance service you deserve.
Recent Insurance Fraud by Insurance Companies
In 2012, Hurricane Sandy hit the eastern seaboard of the United States. This storm caused an estimated $60 billion of damage, which is second in amount behind Hurricane Katrina. Hundreds of thousands of property owners were severely affected by this storm.
Unfortunately, there are reports that many property owners that had insurance have been deceived by their insurance companies. In these instances, there is a common pattern. After storm damage occurred, the property owners attempted to file insurance claims. The insurance companies sent people to assess the nature of the damage to the customers’ properties.
These assessors often reported that substantial structural damage occurred as a result of the hurricane. As such, the insured property owners believed that they would be compensated up to the value of their insurance plans. Instead, the insurance company sent a letter to these owners stating that either the structure of their property was not damaged or that the source of the damage was not the hurricane.
In the context of flood insurance, structural damage is the most costly type of insured damage. By either stating no structural damage occurred or that the structural damage resulted from some other cause, the insurance companies limited the amount of claims greatly, in some instances by more than 60%.
The findings of the insurance company were in complete contradiction to the property assessors’ assessments, which did state that structural damage occurred as a direct result of the storm. These problems were appealed to FEMA, the federal agency in charge of monitoring this claims process. This federal oversight has not helped these cheated property owners.
Hire a Professional Contractor
By hiring a professional roofing contractor after your Omaha home suffers storm damage, you put yourself in the best position to avoid being cheated by your insurance company. Your contractor can provide expert opinion about the nature and cause of the damage to your home. They can also inform you when they believe that your insurance company is attempting to take advantage of you.
