Disaster Authority

unknown

On Monday, June 11, 2012, my home was water damaged. Since the company contacted by my insurance company failed to show up, I called Disaster Authority. They arrived at my unit at 11pm, and removed all of my area rugs and some other water damaged items. Then they began the mitigation process and placed 2 large dehumidifiers and 3 fans in the unit. When they came back in two days, they started to remove items that I had already packed myself. I had to beg them to pack some things, and they left me to do most of it. They carried out approximately 1/5th of the total volume of items in the home, and placed it in storage units that I also paid for myself. They promised to remove the items from the home so it could be restored. They promised to restore the property, and put in new carpet. They promised the return of my water-damaged property that they removed from my home in a couple of weeks. On Tuesday, Tim of Disaster Authority promised to provide and stated that he had done an inventory list of all items his company removed from my unit, however, no such list of any kind has been submitted by him or his company to my insurance adjustor or myself, despite the fact that he billed my insurance company $1600 for that service. They took enough area rugs to fill at least 6 large bags, but they told my maintenance man they only had one bag to return. One rug was very large (12x10 ft) and that would have filled one whole bag. During the second week of August, two full months after they removed my personal property, Tim’s brother, Andrew of Disaster Authority called to tell me that he was “picking up my area rugs from the cleaners,” and wanted to return them to me with my payment. Without the promised inventory list, I have no way of knowing exactly what was removed from my unit. On June 14, 2012, my insurance agent promised them payment for their services, (packing, removing items, storing, etc.), the president, Tim, suddenly left the premises at 2pm and his 2 men sat down outside and stopped working. They never did anything to help me after that, and I had to finish removing the other 4/5ths of the property out by myself, and finally hire a moving company at a price of $2000 to finish the job that Disaster Authority promised to do. In addition, they left their dehumidifiers in my unit for an extra week without monitoring them, and I ended up with a $336.76 power bill as a result. A week after they left, I called to tell them that their dehumidifiers were cold and no longer serving any purpose. Disaster Authority literally left me hanging with no help whatsoever to remove items from my home so the insurance adjustors could enter and inspect the unit. As a result, there was a two-week delay for them to enter, which caused more delay in handling the insurance claim and more delay in reaching the restoration phase. On June 14, 2012, only four days after the water damage mitigation began, and after promising to remove the items from my home for restoration, the Disaster Authority men sat down outside my unit for two hours doing nothing, leaving me to remove items by myself. I called my insurance adjustor, Jason, at 2pm and he told Andrew of Disaster Authority that payment was authorized for the removal, drying, packing and storing of my personal property. Despite my insurance company’s promise to pay them, all of the Disaster Authority men walked away, and never did anything to assist me in the unit ever again. The implication was that after all items were removed from the unit, then the carpet would be removed. However, right after lunch that day, their first order of business was to rip the carpet out of the front part of the unit, before removing any more items. I was advised that this could affect my insurance claim, so I contacted my insurance adjustor. At this point, the Disaster Authority men stopped working. On Tuesday, June 12, 2012, Tim of Disaster Authority promised to provide and stated that he had done an inventory list of all items his company removed from my unit, however, no such list of any kind has been submitted by him or his company to my insurance adjustor or myself, despite the fact that he billed my insurance company $1600 for that service. Therefore, there is no evidence said list was ever composed. ,They took enough area rugs to fill at least 6 large bags, but they told my maintenance man they only had one bag to return. One rug was very large (12x10 ft) and that would have filled one whole bag. During the second week of August, two full months after they removed my personal property, Tim’s brother, Andrew of Disaster Authority called to tell me that he was “picking up my area rugs from the cleaners,” and wanted to return them to me with my payment. Initially, they never stated that payment was required before they would return my personal property. In mid July, my insurance adjustor stated he would payment for the drying, packing, inventory, and storing of my personal property and he has issued a joint check to both Disaster Authority and myself. Upon discovering that they did very little packing whatsoever, showed no evidence of doing any kind of inventory (Tim stated that he never did one on the last day I saw him at my unit, as he was removing the dehumidifiers), that I had to pay movers for removal of the vast majority of the property myself, and that I personally have been paying for the storage of most of the items myself as well, my insurance company voided the check they sent to pay Disaster Authority. I have photos to prove that disaster authority left so many items in my property, that it would have been impossible to even see the floor, let alone replace the carpet. In fact, they left so much in the unit that the insurance inspectors could not have even gotten through the front door. Disaster Authority literally left me hanging with no help whatsoever to remove items from my home so the insurance adjustors could enter and inspect the unit. As a result, there was a two-week delay for them to enter, which caused more delay in handling the insurance claim and more delay in reaching the restoration phase. On June 14, 2012, only four days after the water damage mitigation began, and after promising to remove the items from my home for restoration, the Disaster Authority men sat down outside my unit for two hours doing nothing, leaving me to remove items by myself. I called my insurance adjustor, Jason, at 2pm and he told Andrew of Disaster Authority that payment was authorized for the removal, drying, packing and storing of my personal property. After their departure on June 14, Disaster Authority failed to monitor the dehumidifiers in my unit for an entire week after that, and the machines were no longer doing anything but pulling power from my home, resulting in a $336.76 DP+L bill, which is much higher than I would ordinarily have had to pay. I feel I should be reimbursed for at least $150 of this bill from the insurance check. A week after they left me with no help, the other co-president of Disaster Authority, came to my unit and offered to remove more items if I would pay more money out of my own pocket in addition to what my insurance company had already promised to pay. After promising to remove the items (the implication was ‘all of the property’) from my home, Disaster Authority left me with the entire burden of lifting many items out of my unit all by myself during the entire week after they left, and then I finally had no choice but to hire a moving company to help finish the job they promised to do at an additional financial loss of over $2000. I feel I should be reimbursed for this expense from the insurance check. Their excuse for not removing any items after June 14th at 2pm was that they could restore the unit without removing said items, just by moving them around. I have photos to prove that even the insurance inspectors could not gain entry or see the property with the amount of items Disaster Authority left in my unit. They did no mold mitigation, other than spraying microbial, so the unit has been molding for the past 2 months, which may have resulted in permanent mold damage requiring expensive mold mitigation services. Because of Disaster Authority’s refusal to complete the services they promised to do, my property may need mold mitigation as well as a new carpet and drywall. Their failure to provide the services they promised has caused further damage to my property, and may have left it a total loss, since I do not have the funds to restore it. My insurance adjustor has advised me to not sign the check issued to Disaster Authority and myself until a fair agreement can be made with respect to how they handled my mitigation situation and how much money they should be paid considering the financial and physical burden they left me with when they did not complete their promised services. Since Disaster Authority is expecting to receive the full amount of the check, I am formally requesting mediation services to resolve this issue. Until this situation can be resolved fairly, I will not sign the check. I am also requesting the immediate return of my personal property removed from my home that should not have been denied to me for this length of time for any reason. I am also requesting a complete inventory list of all damaged items from my home as promised by Disaster Authority. For the past 3 weeks Disaster Authority has been harassing me on the phone, calling every day, sometimes twice a day, and also sending threatening text messages suggesting they would come to my home. At this point, I am a bit concerned for my safety, I have lost the use of my home, and it still hasn’t been mold mitigated or restored after all this time.