Posted On: January 16, 2007, 2:53 pm CST

Posted By: Back in the day

30 years ago, before my transition to agency, I worked the CATS for one of the big three companies, now being hammered by Katrina litigation. I wrote millions of $$ in claim checks to hurricane/storm surge victims. (yes flood/tidal etc was exclude then also). It's not all that complicated this wind/water thing.
Back in the days of common sense, we inspected every site 14/7, and recorded the height of the closest high water mark, usually a tree or a utility pole. We leveled that mark to where the home was. The percentage of home above the mark was the percentage we paid of the policy limits, even for contents and living expenses. We moved on, not wasting time nickel & diming. If there was a flood policy, the flood people paid for the percentage below the mark. This was the starting point for settlement, not the end point. All claims were left open for about a year. If more $$ were requested, then more documentation was needed and the local claims staff handled the supplemental. Everyone usually had a check on this settlement basis within 60 days. Very common sense and straightforward, when no one could ever determine what peril caused what damage, at what time. We all knew that something was owed on the policy claim. It was fair and understood by 99.99% of the victims.(and adjusters)

Now we have companies spending a godzillion $$ advertising "On Your Side", 'Good Hands People", Good Neighbor" etc, and what do they actually do? Spend millions of dollars to engineers to prove the unprovable, deny coastal claims wholesale without inspections, and arrogantly assume that only one non covered peril caused all or most of the damage at the same instant in time.
These types of upper management decisions have historically only breed more attorneys. And since more than one company, but not all, took the same settlement approach, the Fed politicos will probably look into the collusion aspect, resulting in more regulatory oversite. Just what we need.

The sad part is that the management folks that made these brilliant decisions will likely be promoted (they can't fire them or it looks like mistakes were made therby damaging thier legal defenses)thereby assuring the profitability of future generations of attorneys.

Stop blaming the attorneys, the companies created them. "we have met the enemy, and they is us" Pogo