by LadyHomeOwner » Tue Apr 20, 2010 04:39 pm
Hi:
I'm a homeowner, insured by the same insurance company for the last 45+ years with only one very small (@$3000) claim over all of those years. In January we had a sewer backup in a powder room that had just been refurbished from top to bottom. Sewerage backed up UNDER the ceramic tiles and oozed up through the grout lines. The insurance company deemed it necessary to remove the tiles to make sure that there was no moisture or mold remaining. This left the level of the concrete floor built up to a height where it has to be "power chipped" to take it down to a level where the replacement tiles will fit evenly with the threshold and under the metal rim of the toilet sewer pipe. The problem lies in the fact that in originally refurbishing the room (3 years ago), we had custom, handmade wainscoting built directly onto the walls, on top of the tile floor. This was done so that the tiles would butt up against the walls, not the wainscoting. Now that the tiles have been removed there remains jagged edges of those tiles sticking out from under the wainscoting. The insurance company doesn't want to pay to have those tile remnants removed so that the replacement tiles, (exactly the same as the ones removed), can again slide under the wainscoting. They want to have the jagged edges cut off and the replacement tiles butted up against the remnants which will still be notched and uneven under the wainscoting. This will leave huge gaps under the wainscoting in places where some pieces of the tiles were broken off unevenly. In doing it this way any water on the floor will eventually end up in pockets under the wainscoting. The insurance company sees this as being fair. I see it as a "make-shift solution". I didn't design this room to have tile butting against wood wainscoting. I didn't design it to need latex caulk where the floor meets the wall. I designed it in a very mindful and functional manner. What do I need to do to convince the insurance company that cutting off jagged edges of tiles and butting the new ones against jagged edges is not being "made whole" again?
I'm a homeowner, insured by the same insurance company for the last 45+ years with only one very small (@$3000) claim over all of those years. In January we had a sewer backup in a powder room that had just been refurbished from top to bottom. Sewerage backed up UNDER the ceramic tiles and oozed up through the grout lines. The insurance company deemed it necessary to remove the tiles to make sure that there was no moisture or mold remaining. This left the level of the concrete floor built up to a height where it has to be "power chipped" to take it down to a level where the replacement tiles will fit evenly with the threshold and under the metal rim of the toilet sewer pipe. The problem lies in the fact that in originally refurbishing the room (3 years ago), we had custom, handmade wainscoting built directly onto the walls, on top of the tile floor. This was done so that the tiles would butt up against the walls, not the wainscoting. Now that the tiles have been removed there remains jagged edges of those tiles sticking out from under the wainscoting. The insurance company doesn't want to pay to have those tile remnants removed so that the replacement tiles, (exactly the same as the ones removed), can again slide under the wainscoting. They want to have the jagged edges cut off and the replacement tiles butted up against the remnants which will still be notched and uneven under the wainscoting. This will leave huge gaps under the wainscoting in places where some pieces of the tiles were broken off unevenly. In doing it this way any water on the floor will eventually end up in pockets under the wainscoting. The insurance company sees this as being fair. I see it as a "make-shift solution". I didn't design this room to have tile butting against wood wainscoting. I didn't design it to need latex caulk where the floor meets the wall. I designed it in a very mindful and functional manner. What do I need to do to convince the insurance company that cutting off jagged edges of tiles and butting the new ones against jagged edges is not being "made whole" again?
Posted: Tue Apr 20, 2010 09:17 pm Post Subject:
You will probably need to press this issue up the corporate ladder. Move up the ladder on the phone, write a letter and send it to the President of the company (it won't go that high but it should move upward) and also file a complaint with you states Dept of Ins (these almost always make it very high up in the claims dept with a status report usually going even higher. You need to let them know that you are not just going to go away. If all of this does not work or does not appear to be working, though out the words "Bad Faith". You are telling your insurance company that they are not honoring the contract you both agreed to.
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