Why Do Insurance Company Engineers Often Say "No Damage" When Damage is Clearly Observed? Part 2
- Mike Stall, MSCE, PE, DFE, CPAU
- Jul 23
- 2 min read
Our experience has shown that insurance company-retained engineers do not try to determine how much damage exists but rather, take the position that no damage exists even when the damage is obvious.
The photograph below of a water-damaged HVAC duct provided by the property owner-retained engineer in a report showing water damage caused by rood leaks. The insurance company-retained engineer’s response is the caption below the photograph.
gnores the water in the light fixture and the fact that leaks from the roof actually caused this damage.
Despite the fact that the insurance company-retained engineer correlated moisture stained duct to being in the vicinity of moisture stained ceiling tiles, he did not understand that the moisture stains on the ducts were caused by leaks from above – not condensate on the ducts as is typically used as a reason by this engineering firm not to pay a claim.
It is just one of many situations we have witnessed where insurance company engineers say "no damage" and did not evaluate losses in a professional and unbiased manner. Our opinion is that this conflict of interest situation has been created because engineers that have become dependent on insurance company business must evaluate losses in a manner that favors insurance companies to maintain that business.
Managed Response, Inc. has been in the disaster recovery and damage assessment business, working for property owners and insurance companies since 1998 to evaluate, quantify and reconstruct property losses. During those 26 years we have observed the gradual establishment of what we refer to as the Engineering/Insurance Industrial Complex which provides insurance adjusters with plausible deniability and the ability to defer to engineers for claims that are denied – no matter how obviously biased the engineering evaluation is.
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