Why hasn't my adjuster returned my @$#%#!# call??!
Have you ever gotten into an accident and waited 1 week, 2 weeks or even over a month to receive a call?!! Don't that shit just make you mad!?!? Well you are not alone and if you have never been in an accident, you should read this too! My past experiences has showed me that your claims adjuster may be more difficult to get in contact with, than TRUMP which isn't that hard to do since he is always on social media, but I digress-) and the reasons due vary.
The most common is that your beloved adjuster is just being over worked, or the adjuster has been out of the office, or the adjuster is just lazy and has a problem with prioritizing.
I am an insurance policyholder too, so I understand that if you are reading this, that you're probably already frustrated with your claims rep, but please allow me to shed a little insight on the business of claims adjusting. I know for a fact that the claims adjusting business is a hectic business and 8 times out of 10, the adjusters are overworked and overwhelmed. Claims adjusting requires a specific set of skills, but nothing close the skills that the Liam Nielson, character possess in "Taken." In order to be successful in his business, we claims adjusters must be good at multi-tasking, prioritizing, customer service, investigation skills, contract reading/interpreting, knowledgeable of state laws and that is just a few of the skills needed.
Another piece to the puzzle is that Insurance companies have to forecast or predict how many claims they will receive in a few months time, next quarter or the following fiscal year in order to come up with the right of staff needed. And they come up with this number by reviewing and analyzing the type of risk they insure, current or future weather conditions, claim count from past years and other factors. A lot of times the companies predict incorrectly or they predict correctly but don't have the claim-man power to handle the volume of incoming claims. When this happens, the bulk of the work falls on the existing claim adjusters at that insurance company, which may double, triple, quadruple their work load. This then affects You!-the insured or claimant on the quality and speed of resolving your insurance claim.
Unfortunately, there is not much you can do when this happens, except be a pest!! This will take some leg work, but it may be worth it, depending on the circumstances of your claim. You should call everyday and if you don't receive a call back, ask to speak to a supervisor. And if the supervisor does not call you back, than you can believe the work load might triple the average reasonable workload. So if the supervisor is tied up, than you contact the head manager and at that point you will get a call back from anyone of the 3, adjuster, supervisor, manager. If you receive no response from the manager, than you should file a complaint with the insurance regulator...the DOI for the state of CA; DFS for the state of NY; etc.
TIP - Send all correspondence in writing, as per state regulation, an insurance carrier has 10 - 15 days to respond depending on your state. This will assure a phone call from your adjuster in that amount of time.
Another reason it's hard to get in contact with your adjuster is because your adjuster may have been out of the office for vacation or illness. When that happens, everyone suffers because obviously your adjuster isn't there to pick up the phone, but more importantly when they get back, your adjuster has to do whatever work that they left and any work that came in while they were out of the office. This delays the claim handling process and the adjuster now has to deal with angry phone calls, backed-up mail and new claims that come in everyday. This than becomes a catch 22, because now the adjuster was out of the office, comes back to a mountain of work, and gets stressed from the pile up of work and the angry calls, that now the adjuster has to be out again. Its a vicious cycle and some times there appears to be no end, but we still try to help every insured, no matter the workload.
Now, don't go thinking we are all the same. There is that small percentage of claim adjusters that have a bad work ethic and don't realize the amount of work the job demands, and they just don't care to effectively manage their claims. In those cases, just look out for my blog, handling the overworked adjuster!
Hopefully you understand a little about what your adjuster deals with on a day to day and that will suffice your curiosity. Follow the steps above to reach your adjuster and you will be sure to make contact and receive a call back in no time. If not, try directing your frustrations to management and if everyone does it, you might just see a shift towards the right direction.