What would you do? Old WDR

[Desk Jockey]

A guy calls last week for a WDR estimate. Appliance store delivered a new washer and it malfunctioned and flooded from a top floor down through ceiling and on to hardwood.

Bad loss 5-6K but the homeowner didn't want it done until he was sure the installers (third party) insurance would pay. A week has gone by now and he calls wanting to start something.

We go take a look and its pretty much a gut and dry job. Homeowner is shocked that we can't save anything now. He wants to wait until the adjuster calls us.

Would you do it with so many parties involved? Cut it all?

 

[Mark Saiger]

How bad do you want to work for free?

Here's one of my more of less Freebies....

http://mikeysboard.com/forum/index.php?threads/so-you-had-another-water-loss-did-you.276649/

 

[dealtimeman]

When it comes time to get in and start job, have john go down there document everything and get all paperwork signed letting the homeowner know that he is ultimately responsible for payment and If he signs off go to town, demo all that needs to come out and dry the rest down.

Unless you don't like money.

 

[Desk Jockey]

We told him $1000.00 and he would be responsible. I doubt we will hear back.

 

[Desk Jockey]

Never heard back and to be honest I hope are don't. We are pushing to the max and more work would just make matters worse.

 

[Mark Saiger]

Just posted on my post....But DANG....

You ain't going to believe this....

I GOT ANOTHER $500 CHECK IN THE MAIL TODAY FROM THIS GUY!

http://mikeysboard.com/forum/index.php?threads/so-you-had-another-water-loss-did-you.276649/

 

[dealtimeman]

You see water damage is just good stuff that never stops giving!

 

[Mark Saiger]

You see water damage is just good stuff that never stops giving!

To quote Chavez from one of my other posts....

"A Christmas Miracle"

But I haven't been to the bank yet.....

 

[Desk Jockey]

Buy your wife something nice for Christmas, that's "found money". Because its certainly appeared to be "lost" for awhile!

 

[tmdry]

I came on here because I heard the word "demo"

 

[Greg Cole]

We try NOT to work for free. However, our standard policy is to "Spike" the job. Couple of Dehu's and an air scrubber. "Free for the first 3 days if loss isn't covered" until adjuster shows and makes determination.
If no approval or contact from adjuster, we pull the equipment. Customer signs a discontinuation of service document and we only $30-$50 in fuel and a couple of hours setup and take down.
Small price to pay to potentially LOCKDOWN the job. Likewise we have gotten a ton of SELFPAYS as a result....

 

[Greg Cole]

Also, what you are describing is a covered loss under his homeowners insurance. Have him file a claim on his insurance and explain what happneed. They will cover it and then go after the appliance stores insurance to settle it.

 

[Desk Jockey]

That might have helped some, but we would have probably still lost the hardwood and drywall.

As of Tuesday when he called a full week had past. We could have saved that hardwood had we got on it.

We dried a much larger hardwood floor last week, but we were on it the same day.

This guy should have filed a claim with his insurance company and then they would subrogate the installer insurance. He didn't want to, to him it was a matter of principal and he had just moved into a new home and didn't want to file a claim that he didn't cause.

Now someone is going to have to gut all affected areas including removal of the hardwood. My guess is nothing has still been done, he's waiting for the installers adjuster to come out and see the damage.

 

[tmdry]

I had a loss similar to this last year, the homeowner didn't want to file a claim under her insurance and wanted to check w/ the HVAC company, the HVAC company contacted their "water guy", than their insurance, yadda yadda yadda.

I told the client that I will not play that game, either she signed with me and paid for the mitigation herself or file the claim under her insurance and pay us the deductible. We did just the mitigation on that one, but she wanted me to follow w/ the other 5 different companies for the rebuild and I told them that was not in our scope.

 

[Greg Cole]

That might have helped some, but we would have probably still lost the hardwood and drywall.

As of Tuesday when he called a full week had past. We could have saved that hardwood had we got on it.

We dried a much larger hardwood floor last week, but we were on it the same day.

This guy should have filed a claim with his insurance company and then they would subrogate the installer insurance. He didn't want to, to him it was a matter of principal and he had just moved into a new home and didn't want to file a claim that he didn't cause.

Now someone is going to have to gut all affected areas including removal of the hardwood. My guess is nothing has still been done, he's waiting for the installers adjuster to come out and see the damage.

We also do recon- so we actually make a ton more if the floors have to go. Either way, you still get the equipment rental once covered...

 

[Desk Jockey]

We only do mitigation, if its recon we're out.

We told him it was a demo job now and that's when he choked on the news. We would be glad to do the demo and dry down but we would need to setup critical barriers and run air scrubbers during and after the demo.

 

[Greg Cole]

lol. sometimes the look on their face when they realize they screwed themselves is priceless.... lol