Casualty Losses
Casualty adjusting lies right within the heart of what we do. Senior personnel have a history of dealing with third party liability claims. This is from when we have worked with an insurer underwriting a County Council to dealing with third party claims for and one MGA claims handling a utility company and another carrying out similar work for omnibus operators and car dealerships.
The County Council work involved dealing with claims emanating from amongst others the Highways Department, Social Services, Police and the Fire Service.
In addition to active claims, we received incident notifications via the County Treasurer’s office. These had to be scrutinised so that events likely to result in claims could be investigated proactively.
Frequently, the County Council only became aware of legal action when they were cited in litigation as an additional third party in for instance, an RTA matter, where it was alleged the highways department had an exposure.
Claims against the utility often involved multi claimant incidents; for instance, a complete housing estate affected. We attended on site immediately to record the circumstances, parties involved and nature and extent of damage which enabled us to effectively deal the subrogated claims presented often months (or even years) after the event. One assignment involved a full airport car park with water a metre deep.
Nick Croan sits on the Chartered Institute of Loss Adjusters Liability Special Interest Group. He has provided presentations on product liability and economic loss and drawn up study and examination material.
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We are skilled in statement taking, securing evidence and have close relationships with law firms specialising in insurance law and Queen’s Counsel. Our investigations are always carried out with the possibility of future litigation in mind. In the past we have taken possession of evidence on day one to prevent it being disposed of or stolen. On one occasion there had been a catastrophic escape of water in high-end dwelling in Aberdeenshire. To enable the house to be habitable again that day (the policy holder did not wish to move out) emergency repairs were required to the plumbing including the failed joint. We remained on site until an emergency plumber attended and carried out the works and our adjuster then took the unit with him for examination by forensic scientists at their laboratory the following day.
On another occasion, following interview of the landlord and tenant regarding the circumstances of kitchen fire on realising the likely cause; we recovered a severely damaged (and abandoned to the garden) tumble dryer which subsequent examination revealed had been the source of the fire. We had been instructed by the building’s insurers and the tenants (who owned the tumble dryer and who had no contents cover) latterly joined the recovery action against the manufacturer and recouped their uninsured losses of £15,000.
