This article will examine how insurance adjusters approach the claims process and how you can watch out for their secret tactics to minimize payouts. We will briefly discuss the role of insurance adjusters in an insurance company and the company’s overall goal. We will then outline fourteen tactics that a home insurance claim adjuster may use to reduce the claim amount and maximize your out-of-pocket costs. Finally, we will end with some tips to ensure that you are not taken advantage of by your adjuster and receive a fair settlement.
Filing a home insurance claim is never something that a homeowner would choose to do. After a large or small accident occurs, the last thing that most homeowners would like to do is make multiple phone calls or show an insurance adjuster around the property. On top of the trauma or disappointment of the loss, home insurance claim adjusters rarely make the process easy, often undercutting the property damage or giving you a low settlement offer. However, the only way to get money from your insurance company and begin to repair the damage is to have an insurance claims adjuster come to your home and evaluate the cost.
The Role of Insurance Adjusters
Insurance adjusters are insurance company representatives who examine claims and evaluate where fault and financial responsibility lie. In most cases, they work directly for the insurance company and are paid by them. Occasionally, smaller insurance firms will use independent adjusters who work on contracts for several small firms to avoid needing to pay for their own claims adjuster. You may also encounter a public adjuster, who does the public hires an independent person to evaluate the claim and compare it to the insurance adjuster’s determination.
The main job of an insurance adjuster is to investigate an incident and determine the liability for a claim. They will often examine all the evidence, such as medical records and bills, police reports, statements from people involved, and pictures of the damage or incident. They will also examine your insurance policy to determine what is covered and how. At the end of the investigation, they will present you with the options based on the investigation and determination.
The Goal of Your Insurance Company
When considering what to be aware of when working on a home insurance claim, it is also important to remember the goal of your insurance company, which is to make money. For this reason, they will often look to pay you the least amount of money as a part of the claim process. Home insurance claim adjusters’ secret tactics often come from the top to minimize payouts and settle claims for the smallest possible amounts. Insurance policies rarely focus on fair compensation and encourage the claim adjusters to deny the claim altogether.
Tactics Used in the Insurance Claims Process
When contacting your insurance agent or company, you may encounter fourteen commonly used home insurance claim adjuster secret tactics. While this list is non-exhaustive, it does provide some valuable tools to help you approach a claims adjuster visit or meeting for the best possible outcome.
Pretending to Care
One of the biggest ways many homeowners feel duped by insurance agents is when the adjuster pretends to care about them and the claim. This can be as insidious as pretending to be interested as a homeowner lists off all the items lost in a house fire to as menial as pretending to be invested in the ice dam between your house and garage ruining a favorite pair of shoes. When it seems like they care, you may choose to open up more, and the adjuster may use that information out-of-context to deny the claim completely. It is also not uncommon for adjusters to be paid for low payments, so it is important to remember that you are, unfortunately, an opportunity rather than a friend.
Downplaying Loss
Another secret tactic is to downplay the loss the homeowner suffered. For example, an adjuster may act like a family heirloom is replaceable, so it is valued less than it is worth. This will severely undercut the homeowner’s claim and harm them further by devaluing the loss on top of the emotional harm of losing something important or large.
Exploiting Loopholes
You can be sure that the insurance adjusters have read your policy carefully many times to understand all of the loopholes baked in. The length of policies combined with the jargon and fluffy language is designed to make the policy difficult to read and understand. An adjuster may claim the damage is not covered based on a loophole. In many cases, this is either not true or only partially true. Your policy should cover most damage to the home, and they are only trying to avoid payout based on any issue they can find.
Getting You to Admit Fault
One of the first tactics an insurance adjuster may try and use is tricking you into admitting fault. The two most common ways that an adjuster may attempt are to either claim that you could have done something to prevent or mitigate the damage caused or that the damage was caused before the disaster. This tactic often asks you a simple question, such as whether you burn candles in the home, if there was a fire, or when the dent in the siding first showed up after a tornado. In either scenario, they could use this information to claim that you admitted to at least partial fault, and the claim would be reduced.
Assigning Blame to Someone Else
When an accident involves two or more people, each person will have their own insurance company, and these companies will be working against each other to assign blame and avoid paying for the damage. If an insurance company can find anyone else to be at partial fault, they can avoid paying for part of the claim because that person or their insurance will need to pay. This can often place the claim in a years-long court battle over who is liable for the claim. While there needs to be accountability if someone else did cause the damage, this does reduce or eliminate the payout based on the fault of the other.
Delay Tactics
An insurance adjuster often uses a delay tactic to drag out the process and delay the appropriate payout. People often get tired of trying if the process takes a long time, and the longer the process takes, the more likely you will accept an offer far under what is deserved. A delay tactic can be frustrating because there is little to be done while your insurance company is dragging its feet. However, understanding that this is one of the many secret tactics can help you acknowledge that it is happening and remain persistent with your insurance claims.
Over-Promise and Under-Deliver
Another secret tactic is to over-promise and under-deliver when it comes to your insurance claim. An insurance adjuster may use this tactic in conjunction with pretending to care. They may seem very invested and act like your claim is easy to cover at the full price while they meet with you or assess the damage. However, when they process the claims, they will return much lower than the claim adjuster promised. Legally, they cannot do this in bad faith to make you spend a lot of money on contractors only not to have the work covered, but they may get away with it to some degree.
Encouraging No Lawyers
It is also common for an insurance adjuster to encourage you to avoid getting a lawyer involved. They will often state that lawyers make the process move slowly and do not have the best interests of you and your claim in mind. The insurance claim adjuster may also remind you that lawyers are expensive and that you will not get the full claim. However, you will likely be able to get a free consultation with an attorney if you think you may need one, and the lawyer will ensure that you receive the proper payout and which option is in your best interest.
Request Additional Documentation Again
There is often a need to review documents for an insurance claim adjuster to determine how much should be paid during the claim process. These documents can include medical bills if someone was injured or tax documents to value certain property. However, they may begin to try and ask you for documents that do not apply to the current situation. This is one of the ways they force a delay in processing your claim and is one of the many secret tactics used to wear you down and get you to take a low settlement offer.
Nonexistent Deadlines
A common tactic in any negotiation is using false deadlines to make the other side feel pressure to accept a settlement offer without fully evaluating and thinking through the options. An insurance claim adjuster may use this tactic to get you to accept an offer. They may come to assess the property damage, give you an offer, and then say that they will hand the information off to their attorney or boss, and then the offer will go away. This creates a false sense of urgency and makes you react quickly. It is one of the most common secret tactics that you may encounter.
Low Balling
Another of the adjuster’s secret tactics is to create an incredibly lowball offer for the first option to make you feel like your claim is worthless. This is often associated with claims that ordinary wear and tear on the building caused property damage and that you should cover more of the cost. This can be deflating for people and is often in bad faith; it can make many homeowners abandon their claims and even lead to admitting fault when they played no part. This is an insidious tactic to watch for.
Denying Negotiations
You can negotiate with the insurance company to have your claims paid out, but they will not make it easy. They may state that they do not have authority or that there is no room to negotiate with the information they have. This is often not the case, and you may want to retain an attorney to find the best settlement for your property damage.
Best and Final Offers
You may also encounter the phrase “best and final offer” from an insurance company. They often frame an offer for settlement as the best they can do and will go no further. This often leads to a stalemate until one of the parties caves, most frequently the homeowner. Calling out the room that they have to negotiate further and pushing them to make another offer will often get them to move again.
Cheap Materials
Finally, you may encounter an adjuster demanding a lower settlement and forcing you to use builder-grade or cheap materials rather than the items you had or chose to use to rebuild your home after property damage. You can insist that the insurance company cover in-kind materials that match the rest of the home or the home before the damage.
Strategies to Get the Best Settlement Offer
Now that we’ve discussed the various tactics the adjusters may use to get you to settle for a lower claim, we can also discuss strategies for working around these tactics and ensuring you receive the best payout available.
Getting a Second Opinion
It is always good to request a second opinion if your claim is not being processed fairly. You can hire a public adjuster to examine the claim and see if the company is missing something or choosing to withhold information. They can also help if you feel bullied into admitting fault by helping you assess and determine how the damage happened. If you feel you are not being treated fairly, another opinion may be the way to go.
Maintaining Communication
Another way to ensure you receive the best payout is to communicate openly with the adjuster and other insurance company representatives. You do not want to keep the information necessary to process the claim; you only want to share what is requested or needed. However, when you are quick to respond and on top of reaching out, you will likely be seen as an easy person to work with and persistent about the claim.
Conclusion
When you have property damage at your home, the last people you will likely want to deal with are insurance adjusters. This disdain is likely only amplified by the secret tactics many use to get you to take the lowest amount possible for your claims. However, armed with the knowledge in this article, you will be ready to address the adjusters and make decisions regardless of their tactics.
Contact ADR Times to learn more about home insurance claim adjuster secret tactics, negotiation tactics, communication skills, and more!
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