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An insurance company’s response to hurricane

4 min read
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Sitting in my office on Saturday morning watching it rain. Hurricane Ian made landfall in Florida on Wednesday afternoon. The governor of Florida described it as biblical event. The news claims it was a once in 500 years storm. Dozens have been found dead, mostly from drowning.

I thought it might be interesting to explain what one insurance company has been doing and will do to provide comfort and care for the millions of people affected by Ian.

Somewhere in Bloomington, Ill., a group of storm trackers are watching the beginning of every weather event that will affect the 50 states that makes up the United States. Their job is to track the event’s path and try to determine the strength (devastation) of the event. They will use computer programs that can analyze the number of homes, rental units, vehicles and businesses the insurance company has insured in the path of the weather event. They will be constantly sharing their findings with teams dedicated to handling disasters.

These teams began organizing their responses as soon as Ian was identified as a potential threat to life and property. Thousands of claim adjusters were put on alert to prepare themselves to go to Florida. Support teams were getting hundreds of trucks and mobile offices ready to respond. Logistics teams were in contact with local claims’ and agents’ offices trying to determine which, if any, are still functional. At the same time the safety of employees and agents directly effected by the hurricane needs to be determined. Contact with local government officials needs to be made to determine when the insurance company responders may enter the affected area. Arrangements with local property owners needs to be made to locate new field offices.

Teams solely responsible for taking claim reports from the millions of people affected will be expanded to handle the increased volume of claims. People will need to change job responsibilities to help respond. Independent adjusters will be hired because of the volume. The computer programs that identified the clients in the path of the storm will now provide phone numbers and email addresses so these teams can reach out to the company’s insured to help with the claims experience.

Once contact is made and a claim reported, cash advances to the people affected needs to be made. Remember these people lost everything. Temporary housing needs to be found. That is why field offices are so important. They don’t have mailboxes and need funds now.

A financial team is determining how and when to move money from different accounts so benefits can be paid. Billions of dollars will be transferred.

Once access to the affected area is granted, adjusters will be assigned to look at the damage. Tools such as drones will be used to get to areas not accessible by adjusters. Drones are great tools in looking at roof damage.

Thousands of cars will be totaled; they will need to be collected and transported to salvage sites. Ownership issues will need to be addressed, lien holders determined, as paperwork such as titles have been destroyed. Those vehicles not totaled will need repairs and temporary transportation will need to be arranged.

Unfortunately in times of disaster some people think it’s time to commit fraud. They may hope in the confusion of such a large event they may gain. This only adds to the complexity of handling a catastrophe.

It will take years to restore Florida to its pre-Ian condition. Some claims responders will be working on this catastrophe for years.

Bob Hollick is a State Farm Insurance agent based in Washington. His column appears every other Friday in the Observer-Reporter.

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