The day the wind blew 

The Met Office had given warnings of biblical weather so even before the phones started to ring on the morning of the 12th we held a quick meeting to discuss a strategy. Our maintenance and insurance departments decided that once damage was reported contractors should be given a verbal order to make safe or repair, if possible, but to also take photos of the damage. Our insurers confirmed that they were happy for us to proceed in this way. As our claims handler can authorise a claim up to £10,000 before we need to appoint a loss adjuster, we were able to instruct contractors to proceed with repairs and in turn forward their invoices for submission to the insurers.

Every storm damage call we received was automatically logged as a claim on our system. We then logged the claim with our insurers informing them of the incident date, policy number and full postal address, a note of the damage  and whether we believed scaffolding or cherry pickers may be needed.

Our panel of contractors also kept us updated with anything they thought we needed to know with regard to other potential problems. The contractors were sourcing scaffolding before the winds had died down, in many cases scaffolding was erected at the first opportunity and access to roofs was available as soon as the weather permitted. Feedback from roofing contractors, for instance, allowed us to instruct other contractors to make safe fences, walls and remove debris, all the time gathering photos and emailing to the office, which in turn helped our insurance department put together the file for the insurers.

To date more than 60 claims have been logged, the largest being £17,800 and the smallest being £375; we have had only two claims over £10,000. We received our first settlement cheque on 25 February and continue to receive more daily. In the cases where a loss adjuster has attended we have received their report the next day and been able to ask the contractor to proceed with the repairs immediately.

In the cases of multiple-damage (roofs; windows and fences on the same site for instance) our relationship with our insurers has allowed us to log this as a single claim and therefore incur only one excess charge. Again this demonstrated the advantage of good liaison with contractors on site.

We have had no issues with obtaining scaffold or contractors starting work. The only hiccup is the fact that 5ft larch lap fence panels are extraordinarily difficult to source. Jewsons have stated that their normal order for this time of year is 6,000, however their order last Saturday stood at 36,000 with no deliveries expected before 21 March.

Several weeks after the 12 February storms and the hard work and team work continues, making sure the insurers have the information they require to settle any outstanding claims and ensure our contractors’ invoices are paid promptly.

The conditions tested our systems, staff, responses, contractors, loss adjuster and insurers, and we are delighted that all proved up to the task.