Flood

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Note: This guest post is by David A. Thompson, CPCU, AAI, API, CRIS.

Did you know that flooding, not hurricanes, is the most frequent and costly natural disaster? One report stated that almost 90 percent of natural disasters involve flooding, and since 2000 flooding has cost U.S. taxpayers $850 billion. A vast majority of flood events are uninsured. Over 75 percent of flood damage from Hurricanes Irma and Harvey in 2017 was uninsured. Hurricane Ian in 2022 came ashore in the Lee County (Ft. Myers) area. Data supplied by FEMA showed that only 30 percent of the properties in that county had flood insurance, and amazingly only 50.4 percent of structures in high risk flood zones were protected by flood insurance through the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP).…

Continue Reading Everyone Lives in a Flood Zone!

National Flood Insurance adjustments can be extraordinarily maddening for people trying to get a fair adjustment. For example, the Superstorm Sandy flood adjustment fiasco led to a Congressional investigation and thousands of flood claims being re-opened and eventually paid years late because those overseeing the program and its attorneys nitpicked and refused to pay claims for the stupidest wrongful reasons.
Continue Reading National Flood Insurance Adjustment Disputes—Where the Rubber Meets the Road

Only the United States government could come up with the craziest scheme of national flood insurance. I keep trying to explain how the first-floor flood of an elevated building has only limited coverage—why do freezers get paid for but not refrigerators? It makes no sense, but God Love The USA!
Continue Reading Flood Coverage Questions? What is Covered? Learn From the Babe Ruth of Hurricane Claims

The National Flood Insurance program is hosting an adjuster briefing today at 4 pm EST. While I have a number of criticisms of the program, I commend them for providing their claims manuals online and having public disclosures explaining how they intend to adjust flood claims.

Here is the link:

https://fema.connectsolutions.com/hurricaneianbriefing/

Thought For The Day…

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is a lawyer. He correctly noted at a Hurricane Ian press conference that there will be insurance claims disputes. He explained that the flood carrier will try to argue the damage was caused by the hurricane winds, and the wind insurer will do the opposite. He then went too far and tried to explain to the press how to distinguish one from the other.
Continue Reading Do I Make A Wind Damage Or Flood Damage Claim? Public Adjusters Are Trained To Adjust Both Claims At The Same Time

Commercial insurance policies may provide private flood coverage. These are not common, but policies should be fully read, and flood coverage is usually found in an endorsement or a Difference in Conditions policy. One question is, “how much flood coverage is available?” A recent case found that the endorsement did not provide a dollar limit to the business income and extra expense claim.1…
Continue Reading No Business Income and Extra Expense Coverage Limit to Flood Endorsement

When it comes to claims, the National Flood Insurance Program is in need of major legal reform that only Congress can address. The claims system is form over substance. When it comes to the stupid reasons insurance benefits can legally be disallowed, the National Flood Insurance Program is in a league by itself. The most recent example of how an entire flood claim for all damages can be denied is an innocuous letter denying part of the contents claim because photographs of some content items were not provided.1…
Continue Reading All National Flood Insurance Letters Are Important—Technical Denials of Only a Part of a Claim Start the One-Year Time to File Suit

Although there are many factors that may affect coverage for flood claims under the Standard Flood Insurance Policy (“SFIP”) forms, coverage issues typically fall into two categories: 1) is the property for which a claim is being made considered “covered property” under the policy; and 2) has there been “direct physical loss by or from flood.
Continue Reading Flood Claims – Understanding What Constitutes a Covered Loss in a Standard Flood Insurance Policy