During all the Hurricaine stuff last weekend, we had a "tropical depression" up our way with some high winds and "rain surges" or whatever they called them.

Anyhow, Shreveport got hit with this mess. My son's house got damaged - shingles got blown off the roof, a tree got blown down, etc. He was having a birthday party during the storm - never lost electricity and we were outside in the neighbor's garage during most of it watching his shingles fly off and his fence blow down (chasing the dogs when the fence blew down). The kids were out playing in the "mud" puddles in between rain surges. In otherwords - it weren't that bad....

Now the problem is -- he called his insurance company to report the damage and they told him that he had a "hurricaine" deductible on his policy. He explained to them that the hurricaine was 200 miles away and they informed him that his policy stated that anything concerning the hurricaine went under that clause. This deductible is VERY high and he's a little upset (as I would be also and am).

I've been doing a little research on STATE FARM and it seems that they've been doing this to a lot of homeowners and are being sued as far back as Katrina (some are still not settled - including Trent Lott's house).

Buddy has finally lost his cool (knew there was some of his mother in him somewhere) and has called everyone from his congressman to the governor, but so far he's getting the run around from everyone. he even called FEMA and asked if they were going to help - they told him he made too much money for them to help -- he told them they were doing a fine job Brownie (along with a few other choice things!) Does anyone here know anything about this "hurricaine clause"? I just never heard of it and can't find anything on it. This was all wind damage.

Good Lord! I drove home (90 miles) after the party. Had to detour because of some fallen power lines and was held up while a crew cut up and removed a couple of trees out of the road and got home to high winds and no power - it was worse here than it was down there. We didn't have power or water (well pump likes electricity) all day Sunday. They never lost power or Direct TV.

If anyone knows anything about this let me know. I don't mind fighting an insurance company but like to have my ducks in a row before I go after them.

Hugs BD

Quote:

I don't mind fighting an insurance company

I am sorry to hear of this mess.

Fighting the insurance company is almost like fighting city hall. It will probably be more trouble than it is worth, and probably cost you mor than your claim amounts to.

This is one of those things that the evil insurance companies like to inflict on us. On some there is an "Act Of God" exception which of course they try to apply as often as possible hoping you'll just go away.  I've heard that you have to have hurricane insurance in most areas. However, if you don't call it hurricane, you might have chance. Not sure though. Maybe they'll settle with you for a something at least.
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Barb,
Did they say hurricane or wind damage?  I know that after katrina, our insurance raised our deductible on wind damage.

Buddy just needs to keep at it if they're claiming hurricane damage.  Here's a link to a post on a local forum that talks about this.

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Have him contact his state's insurance commissioner. If anything can be done, that will usually make it happen.

B

Carolyn,

That's interesting.... I printed it out and will get it to Buddy. I've had a couple of rows with State Farm in the past (got up to a VEEP a couple of times). Eventually they saw MY point and got tired of screwing with me.

Buddy's already written the governor and his congressman and I'm not sure who else, but he's madder than a wet hen right now.

He's coming up here over the weekend, so maybe I can calm him down before Monday. I told him not to call anyone else till then. Ya just can't deal with these people until ya calm down. Ya think a lot better when you are calm.  ;)

Hugs BD

PS Bill he did contact the insurance commission and they told him it was up to the insurance company. That didn't sound right either.

Barb,
Another good thing for Buddy to do, is to get a report from the NWS in Shreveport, stating the *type* of storm that passed through and verify wind speeds (pita, I know, but I won a case over lightening damage by doing by homework).

I started to say that calling the insurance commisioner in this state would be like calling *sooooeeee* in a cow pasture.