On April 24th, 2011 Okeechobee Florida had a hail storm that caused many Hail Damage Claims.
We had the pleasure of working with a very sweet couple that lived in a mobile home park that was in the unfortunate path of this severe storm system. They were out of town at the time of the loss but a caring neighbor took care of fixing a broken window and further explained to them the damages that they saw at the home. The homeowner then did what most would do and called their insurance company to report their hail damage claim.
Not long after filing the claim they received a letter showing that the claim was only for $90 which was below their deductible so there would be no payment being made. The homeowner then called and asked if another adjuster could come by as they believed there was more damage than that, the answer they were given very much shocked me, they told him that they did not have an adjuster available in the area.
On November 10th, 2011 we received a call asking for our assistance. Upon inspecting the property and hearing his story we were more than happy to get involved as he was clearly not being treated fairly. Soon thereafter we met with an adjuster and after we presented the missed items to the adjuster received a check for just over $5,200. This was not a proper payment in our opinion and after voicing this we received an additional check for just over $1600. This is still not nearly enough for the loss, the justification and repair recommendations were not acceptable to us and we proceeded to request Mediation through the Department of Financial Services. In mediation we were able to recover an additional $9600.00.
This hail damage claim that originally was accessed at $90 was now over $16,000.00. Needless to say, this insured was impressed an disappointed at the same time. The lesson to be learned from a case like this is that a second opinion is always a good idea. When we where first retained he was really only looking for a couple thousand dollars, he simply did not realize the extent of the damages and if you are not familiar with what to look for it could be very easily missed.
