Disaster Restoration Services

Review: Way over priced work to be completed and permit.

Did not continue work, after receiving 41,915.84. Wanted 32,695.09 more to start.

This happened after Storm Sandy. Our house had about 18" of water. DRS charged us over 4,000 for permits, we went to the town hall and asked to see the permits, there was 1 for 87.50. And that was it.....The 32,695.09 was for mitigation services, they did first(tearing down the inside of the house). But after getting 41,915.84 as contract stated they did not start the work, they wanted the 32,695.09 also. Since the mit. was done first the 41 should have included that. Our insurance company said the mitigation should have been around 15,000.00. And we should NOT give DRS 74,610.93 before they even start repairing the house. Also, insurance said they did alot of ripping down walls and the ceiling which did NOT have to be done. 3 neighbors are discussed with them too.... My Dad is 94years old and does not need this, we fired them and the new contractors are the BEST! Price is 1/2 of what DRS wanted. DRS said we could not have hard wood floors, too expensive, our new com. is putting in hard wood floors..my sister, DRS, and [redacted] meet to go over the mitigation, they wanted a rundown of all costs connected with the mitigation, DRS never did that..Desired Settlement: we would like 1/2 the mitigation charge back, but really do not think that will happen. But we want others to really check out DRS's contracts and find out prices from other contractors so they do not get ripped off too.

Business

Response:

Business Response /* (1000, 6, 2013/04/10) */

On November 1, 2012 the claimant contacted DRS to provide restoration and mitigation services to her father's home in Old Saybrook. The home sustained severe damage from Storm Sandy. Prior to beginning the mitigation, DRS met with the homeowner and her insurance adjuster on site to agree to the scope of work. DRS made the homeowner aware that there were going to be some required services that were not going to be covered by insurance due to policy limitations. Such services were identified and stated to be the responsibility of the insured. The homeowner agreed to the scope of the mitigation, signed off on a work authorization, and DRS began the mitigation immediately.

On December 8, 2012 DRS met again with the homeowner and walked through the repair scope. We also reviewed the mitigation services performed. The homeowner displayed no signs of concern, she signed off on a certification of satisfaction, which stated that she was satisfied with the work performed and the completion of the mitigation services. We provided her with an invoice for the cost of the mitigation totaling $32, 695.09.

Also on December 8th, we provided the homeowner with the cost of the repairs, which totaled $90,000. DRS required a deposit of $41, 915.84 to begin the repair work. The homeowner approved and wanted us to begin the repairs. The homeowner signed the contract for the repairs. After signing the contract, she voiced concerns that she was not willing to put any additional money into the repairs of the home. She just waned to use the insurance check to pay for the repair. Understanding her financial concerns, DRS did not immediately move forward with the repair work. The insurance carrier's proposal was not enough to cover the full amount of the repair work. DRS contacted her insurance adjuster, and was in the process of negotiating more on the behalf of the homeowner. However DRS did not want to proceed with the repair work until it was going to be clear what was and was not going to be covered by the homeowner's insurance company.

On January 23, 2012 DRS met wit the claimant's insurance carrier and agent to come to an agreement on the amount the insurance carrier was going to cover on the repairs. The claimant did not attend this meeting. Instead she sent another family member in her place, who was not capable of making such legal decisions on the claimants behalf and was not up to date on the current status of the claim. We proceeded with the meeting despite the claimant being unavailable. DRS went through the claim with the carrier to justify missing scope items that the carrier did not have .The carrier stated that with flood insurance, it only covers necessities towards repairing the damaged structure, and often times does not provided enough to make the damaged property able to be restored to its original state. Some items DRS convinced the carrier to add on, however there were some items in which the insurance company absolutely refused to cover. This would leave the remaining financial balance the responsibility of the homeowner. The homeowner was still expecting DRS to move forward immediately after this meeting, even though many items were not going to be covered under her insurance policy. After the January 23rd meeting, the claimants insurance adjuster agreed to provide the claimant with a detailed listing of what would and would not be covered in regards to the repairs. However it was going to take the insurance company two weeks to be able to provide the claimant with this information.

DRS had received payment from the claimant in the amount of $41,915.84. DRS had applied this to the mitigation invoice, which was $32,695.09. The remaining balance of $9,220.75 was then applied towards the deposit on the repairs. The total cost of the repairs again was $90,000. The deposit needed to start the repair work was $41,015.84 of which the claimant had only applied $9,220.75. The homeowner did not meet the deposit requirement per the repair contract. Therefore DRS was wary and began limited repair work while waiting from the update from the insurance company.

During the two week waiting period, the complainant began to act irrationally in the events described below. She knew of another job that DRS was also working on, and she decided to trespass onto another clients property, enter the premises, and began to harass DRS hourly employees about her repair contract. The employees on the job site were not management and were not qualified to make decisions about her contract. The claimant was upset, and the DRS employees did their best to calm her down, and instructed her to call [redacted], owner of DRS. The DRS employees then communicated the incident back to their management team. At this point [redacted] tried to contact the claimant several times through phone calls, voicemails, and emails to address any concerns she was having. She made no attempt to respond to DRS management. Instead she continued trying to talk to the DRS field crew, who had no authority to make such decisions, and kept redirecting her back to the owner, [redacted].



After this situation and several attempts to contact the claimant, an issue arose at the claimant's property where a water main broke. (The broken water main was at no fault of DRS.) However, DRS went back to her home, and remediated any damage that had been sustained from the water main break. DRS did this at no additional charge, since we had already done a large mitigation at her house, and were planning on beginning the reconstruction at her home as soon as the insurance company made clear what was going to be covered for repairs. During this wait time, the claimant continually harassed our field crew working on a neighboring job. She also spoke negatively about DRS to our clients, to her neighbors, subcontractors, and local building departments. DRS then received a letter from the homeowner, wishing to cancel the repair services. All the while, DRS was trying to contact her in regards to her concerns, however she was not responsive.

At this point, DRS felt that they had gone above and beyond to make this customer happy. It was not the fault of DRS that the claimant's insurance company was not providing her with the final quote for the repairs timely. DRS decided to honor her letter of cancellation. DRS provided a detailed letter of explanation of services rendered and provided a refund for the cancellation of the repair. DRS refunded the claimant the $9,220.75 which was the deposit for the repairs. The claimant did not respond to the cancellation letter, however she did cash the refund check. After numerous attempts to contact her, we took this as acceptance of the cancellation of the repairs.

DRS has been more than fair and ethical in how they conducted business with this claimant. DRS had a signed repair contact by the homeowner. It was well over the cancellation period. According to our cancellation policy, DRS should have been entitled to any projected profit on the repairs, instead of pursuing this, DRS simply refunded all monies paid towards the repairs.

In response to the claimant's accusation of price gouging, DRS has been consistent in its billing practices with all customers. DRS utilizes computer software which is required by most insurance carriers for billing called [redacted]. This is industry standard computer software used for creating estimates and billing for losses due to disaster. [redacted] updates its price lists on a monthly basis which adjust according to economical standards in the industry. This information was told to the homeowner prior to initiation of work performed.

According to our contract it stated $4,000 for permits and fees. The homeowner apparently overlooked the fees portion of the line item. The types of fees incurred included Asbestos testing, analysis, and abatement. These testing's and analysis are quite expensive and this is why the line item for permits and fees totaled $4,000.

The homeowner was dissatisfied that DRS was unable to install wood floors. The homeowner had specifically stated that they did not wish to spend any additional money on upgrades outside of what the insurance company was willing to pay. With flood insurance, the insurance adjuster specifically stated that flood insurance does not cover code upgrades and typically covers only about 80% of the amount of the total repairs needed. The customer was not willing to pay for upgraded floors, and the insurance company was not willing to add upgraded floors in their contact, the homeowner was going to be responsible for the cost of upgrading from the laminate they previous had to expensive hard wood flooring.

In resolution, you will find our documents are in order for the services provided. We have refunded the customers deposit for the repair, when we could have kept the deposit per the guidelines in our contract