Project Description
The Abbey HOA, located in Cherry Creek area of Denver Colorado, is a premier community that consists of 20 large million-dollar plus attached townhomes with high influence clients.
Loss Details
All units in the Abbey HOA were hit by hail storms in 2013 and then again in 2014. In the middle of these hailstorms, there was also a large snow and ice event that caused building envelope openings that resulted in many of the units having interior water problems. This was exacerbated by some installation and design failures of the structure. This was the concurrent causation piece. Generally, there were (4) causes of loss that contributed to major damages to this property. There were also matching issues and repair protocol issues that came to light as a result of the covered perils on the windows and stucco.
Business Challenges
In addition to coordinating inspections, meeting with independent insurance adjusters, 3 different engineering firms, a third party administrator for the carrier (Lloyds of London) and documenting the insurance claim, the Abbey was struggling to understand their insurance policy benefits due to concurrent causation issues and coverage disagreements with the carrier.
On January 22nd, 2015, The Abbey hired C3 Group to act as their advocate during the insurance claim process.
Solutions
The main problems in this case surrounded the over-compartmentalization of the responsibilities of the carrier. They are tasked with resolving disputes in a timely and prompt manner. In no way was the carrier compliant with this duty. They hired an independent adjusting firm, 2 engineering firms, a construction consultant and an off-site third party administrator. The client not only hired C3, but also their own engineering firm, a coverage attorney and their own construction companies, leaving the parties with a very difficult procedure to settle the claim.
C3 Group assessed and negotiated the claim for a reasonable scope of damage settlement relatively quickly. Once the construction firm was chosen, there was over a year of negotiations in assessing the ‘resulting from’ issues on top of the direct physical loss claim. There were code issues identified by the contractor, installation issues, material quality issues and matching issues that needed to be resolved. C3 was able to coordinate and communicate with all parties to reach an amicable resolution on all issues, while avoiding litigation and arbitration, even though there were strong disagreements over coverage issues.
Results
The initial claim offer was in the vicinity of $30,000. The end result was a 7 figure settlement that allowed them to replace and redesign all roofs, stucco, windows and other portion of the building.
Key Takeaways
Navigating this claim was extremely time consuming, complex and tedious. It was a practice in bringing people together, cutting through red tape and tasking the carrier with finding creative solutions to major problems, while avoiding litigation. Persistence and patience by the client, the public adjuster and other experts made this win possible. Without the hard work of all parties, The Abbey would have been looking at a very large assessment to each community member to complete the work that was eventually completed in 2017.
