A pipe bursts and water ruins a corner of your Brazilian cherry wood floor. A windstorm tears off half of the vinyl shingles on one side of the house. A fire burns a couple of kitchen cupboards. Although your Homeowners policy will cover such partial losses, the extent to which the insurance company must go to make everything look just the way you’d like can be tricky.
Let’s say that the new siding contrasts with the older, weathered shingles or that you can’t find replacement kitchen cupboards that precisely match the originally.
Your claim should put you back to pre-loss condition so the new part shouldn’t stick out like a sore thumb. For example, this might mean replacing the entire floor of a room even if only a portion needs repair, or repainting all four walls after damage to only one.
In some states, if replaced items don’t match in quality, color or size, the insurance company must make “reasonable repairs or replacement of items in adjoining areas.” Although other states don’t have laws on matching, some Homeowners insurers have added similar “non-matching language” to their policies.
Besides varying by state, insurer, and policy, the issue of patching versus full replacement can depends on insurance company adjusters.
If you can’t get make any headway with the adjuster on the repairs you want, consider going over his or her head to a supervisor, or file a complaint with the state insurance department. Another option is to hire a public insurance adjuster to work on your behalf through the claims process. These professionals usually charge about 10% of the final settlement.
Read more
Following these principles of leadership will help you and your employees focus on job safety:
- Don’t walk by. It is everyone’s responsibility to prevent any potentially unsafe acts and conditions they witness from turning into accidents.
- STOP! Encourage employees to stop working whenever they feel unsafe, no matter what reason they give.
- Focus on a safe working environment. If you expect your workers to work safely, make their workplace as safe as possible.
- Don’t blame the worker first. Unsafe ways of working, accidents, incidents, and ill health aren’t necessarily the worker’s fault. The problem often comes from less obvious causes, such as decisions by management.
- Use your workforce for ideas. Employees often have a more accurate idea than you or your managers about which safety and health practices will work, because they deal with these issues every day.
- Be patient. Don’t expect quick wins. Improvements will emerge over time, but only if you stick with them.
- Explain your decisions. Just telling workers that something is wrong or a safety risk isn’t enough. If they’re to act on the information you provide, they need to know why and how to avoid harm.
- Lead by example. Your behavior sends powerful signals. If you carry out your job in a safe way, your workers are more likely to do the same. If you don’t, they won’t imitate you.
- Focus on co-operation. Treat your subcontractors in the same way as employees by encouraging them to communicate with each other.
- Don’t neglect occupational health. If you look after the health, as well as the safety, of your workers today, you’re less likely to create problems for them or your business tomorrow.
Sound advice!
Read more
May this year brings all the desired success and happiness in your life that you can cherish always. Wish you a successful and prosperous 2016.
Read more
No matter how prepared you are – or believe you are – you can still suffer a cyber-security breach. What you do next can have a profound impact on the reputation of the business, customer loyalty, employee morale, and, ultimately, your bottom line.
An effective communication strategy should follow these guidelines:
- Notify key regulatory and legal authorities as soon as possible, unless this might impede a criminal investigation. Even if notification isn’t required by law, it’s an important courtesy.
- Make sure that staff roles and responsibilities for communicating the breach are outlined and understood clearly.
- Tailor the notification process to the audience – high-value customers, senior employees, or individuals who might particularly vulnerable (such as the elderly, the disabled, and minors) and to the nature of the breach; handle the theft of confidential client information differently than stealing employees’ Social Security numbers.
- Have legal counsel review the method and content of all communications.
- Prepare for media inquiries to deliver a clear message for parties affected directly or indirectly. Be sure that your spokesperson is qualified and trained to deal with the media.
- Provide ways for victims of the breach to ask additional questions and/or learn how to minimize potential harm.
- Test the plan: If you had to execute it, how well did it work, and how did you update it? Many businesses have discovered holes in their response plans after failing to consider the impact of a cyber security breach on daily operations, or underestimating the attention the event drew.
To learn more about spreading the word after a data breach, please get in touch with us.
Read more
It’s the Holiday season and we just wanted to say
‘ Thank You ’
and that…
It’s been a pleasure working with you this year…
Hope you and your family have wonderful Holidays and…
A Happy New Year.
Read more
A recent study by the Consumer Federation of America (CFA) spotlights the value of employer sponsored disability coverage in helping meet the health and financial well-being of workers.
According the Social Security Administration, one in every four employees will use their disability coverage at some point.
Despite this need, the nationwide survey found that fewer than two in five workers (39%) in the private sector have short-term disability (STD) coverage through their employers and only one in three (33%) have employer sponsored long term disability coverage (LTD).
Studies by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and Mathew Greenwald & Associates have found similar rates of participation in these programs.
CFA Executive Director Stephen Broback says, “Surveys have shown that disability insurance is a critically important part of the social safety net”. . . “that plays an essential role in protecting the emotional and financial lives of workers.” Based on the study’s findings, he urged “all employers to offer the option of obtaining disability coverage.”
The survey also found that when businesses don’t offer LTD, many workers would buy it for themselves if they could receive the lower group rates available through employer sponsored coverage. Most disability plans cost workers between $10 and $30 per month, and the average monthly premium for STD coverage comes to $18.
More and more employees are benefiting from these plans, an estimated 650,000 disabled workers received employer sponsored LTD payments last year.
If you’d like to offer your employees this valuable “peace of mind” benefit, or for a complimentary review of your disability plan,– feel free to get in touch with us at any time. It’s our pleasure to serve you.
Read more
