Watch Out For Insurance Scams and Red Flags!

Hurricane Sally blew through the Gulf Coast leaving a huge mess to clean up in her wake. Anyone who has lived through just one of these storms knows that there is an extreme timeliness to documenting damage and alerting insurance companies, but be mindful that with the storms often come the sharks hoping to take another bite out of your post storm misfortune. 

How Can You Protect Yourself?

The best way to protect yourself is to stay educated on the process, document everything and follow your gut. If something feels off, it probably is. Here are a few more suggestions to help you stay sharp during the stressful clean-up and repair process.

1. Alert your insurance carriers about damage immediately after storm.
2. Take photos and videos of EVERYTHING. The more documentation that you have, the better.
3. Make only absolutely necessary emergency repairs yourself and save the receipts for the materials used. Anything more than this could be excluded by the insurance company.
4. Correspondence should be in writing (email/text) whenever possible. This creates a dated trail of interactions. 
5. Take notes of verbal conversations including, dates, times, names, etc...
6. NEVER give anyone your original documents. Make copies that can be shared, snap a picture with your phone and share it or scan the document to a PDF to be shared. 
7. Use caution if asked to sign an “assignment of benefits” or AOB. This gives insurance rights to third-party vendors. 
8. Stay local when looking for repair quotes and contractors, and take the extra time to check their BBB rating read reviews. 
9. If it sounds to good to be true, chances are that it is!