Sounds like a great deal for the inspector.
How long till he gets paid after the inspection?
Sign me up :roll:
There is not any reason for the insurer to be allowed to determine the inspection firm. That is the homeowners money and he should determine who he pays for the service. No offense intended but the practice is a violation of free trade and an obvious illegal act.
Here we go again!
Trish, you are completely misinformed.
Direct from Citizens Underwriter:
*Once the property is inspected for the homeowner as part of the Re-inspection’ program, No other Wind Mitigations will be accepted. Any issues will be treated as per Citizens remediation process.
*The HOMEOWNER MUST PAY the re-inspection firm to return for remediation.
Jay, she is right. She is referring to a QA inspection intitiated through a complaint, and this is not paid for. A remediation inspection is paid by the insured.
To clear this up, direct from Citizens. Of course this is on the Agents side of their site. They do not want this generally known:
[FONT=Arial][size=1]Citizens Consumer and Agent Services Page 6 of 7
*Inspection and Outreach Program FAQs[FONT=Arial][size=2][FONT=Arial][size=2]
"19. **How can **[/size][/size][/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman][size=3]property owners dispute inspection findings?
[/size][/FONT][FONT=Arial][size=2]A property owner who disagrees with the results of an inspection can file a dispute with Citizens. To file disputes, property owners should work with their agents to submit documentation to Citizens’ Underwriting department that refutes the inspection findings. Supporting documentation can include, but is not limited to, finalized building permits, receipts, notice of acceptance letters for mitigation products and work invoices. Upon review of the dispute, Underwriting will advise agents of the outcome via
email.
[/size][/FONT][FONT=Arial][size=1]Top [/size][/FONT][FONT=Arial][size=3]T
[/size][/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman][size=2]20. Can property owners make changes to their buildings to earn back credits
removed as a result of the inspection findings?
[/size][/FONT][FONT=Arial][size=2]Yes.
• The property owner may choose to make upgrades to the home to receive mitigation credits. Documentation and photographs of the upgrades must be submitted to Citizens’ Underwriting department.
• If the submitted documentation is not sufficient to reapply credits, the property owner may contact an inspection program administrator to order a remediation inspection, at the owner’s cost, for a reduced fee.
[/size][/FONT][FONT=Arial][size=1]Top
[/size][/FONT][FONT=Arial][size=3]**2 1 . **[/size][/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman][size=2]What is a remediation inspection?
[/size][/FONT][FONT=Arial][size=2]A remediation inspection is an optional inspection that the **policyholder can *purchase from an inspection program administrator at a discounted rate. The
purpose is to review mitigation features that generated a discrepancy during the initial inspection and determine whether upgrades made to the home are sufficient
to reapply mitigation credits. During a remediation inspection, the inspector will review only those mitigation features that had deficiencies noted in the first
inspection and subsequently were updated by the policyholder."
[/size][/FONT][FONT=Arial][size=1]Citizens Consumer and Agent Services Page 6 of 7
[/size][/FONT]
[/FONT][/size][/FONT]
Then she is incorrect. 
We are not talking about Q/A.
Which if the insurer demands the inspector must be the same inspector … is illegal, promotes a monopoly. Violates free trade. What’s your point? This is the meat in this matter. The insured being forced by the insurer to utilize the services of a firm as designated by the insurer without the free will to choose another. It’s his money he should be able to use it as he chooses.
A QA inspection is what the IPA calls a re-inspection of a re-inspection, and there has to be a definitive discrepency in the first re-inspection for this to be initiated.
Some have taken care of minor corrections like missing supporting docs, etc, by submitting to their agent to forward to underwriting for review. I had one of my retail clients do this after the re-inspector did not do his research fully.
“Once Citizens has inspected your property, we will not accept a newly completed mitigation inspection form as evidence to reapply mitigation credits. Additional documentation must be submitted to Citizens to show clearly that the discrepancy noted in Citizens’ inspection results is inaccurate or that updates were made to correct the discrepancies noted in the report.”
…https://www.citizensfla.com/policyholder/about_inspection_outreach.cfm?show=text&link=/shared/policymap/iop-policyholdersinspection.html (See the “Note” towards the bottom of the page)
…and more about Remediation Inspections here…
https://www.citizensfla.com/shared/training/train_library/InspectionOutreach/player.html
…see “Handling Disputes”
I understand. We are not talking about the famous Q/A.
No one on the board has a problem with properly performed and accurate re-inspections. No one is concerned about permit info or shutter documentation being submitted to update a properly performed and accurate re-inspection.
Our problem is when the re-inspection is not accurate, improperly performed, or otherwise insufficient. At which point, the homeowner has to PAY the re-inspection firm to return. The homeowner CANNOT hire their own professional to provide them with an accurate and properly performed inspection.
For the prices you guys get for this s h it inspections, I can’t for the life of me understand why you don’t tell these people to go to hell and get on with real inspections, making a six figure income not crawling around attics for a living.
Hey Dale called Brent with InspectPro yesterday… Thanks for mentioning him here on the board!
It is really simple, if you do not do the wind mit you loose clients.
If you do them wrong you look like a fool and loose clients.
If you do them right, you are getting paid to market your other services.
Exactly!
If the reinspection is not accurate, or if an “unknown” is marked due to radiant barrier, etc, usually that can be corrected with additional documentation from the homeowner without the need for another inspection. Again, the only time a HO is required to pay, is when they have remediated insufficiencies found on the original reinspection (adding a shutter,etc). If they allowed the HO to hire the same yahoo to come back and do a whole new inspection, that would defeat the purpose of the reinspection.
I think most of the people on this board are good inspectors, so this wouldn’t apply to you.
Here’s an interesting example of an honest inspector…I just bought a house and had a re-roof done this month, permitted of course. My brother (the inspector) found a few places where the 6/6 renailing wasn’t done. So he will only give us 6/12. In addition, the SWR won’t fly either because they didn’t use tar paper in addition to the peel and stick (this is a normal practice in our county and does NOT count as SWR since it is used as a primary, and not secondary, barrier. In essence, in our county the roofers are just using really expensive tar paper! But how many other inspectors do you think would have given us 6/6 plus SWR on our report? Most!
So most are selling their homes so your doing a type of move in certified inspection?..or a maintenance inspection?
Or your hoping leaving your card will lead to other inspections?
How many full home or commercial inspections do you guys do in a year?
I should add we’ve had a few of our inspections reinspected. 1 was because there was a radiant barrier on the decking that prevented the reinspector from verifying nail spacing (they’re not allowed to touch it because notoriously someone would sue them). So, we went out and with the HO’s permission, removed several more areas, and properly documented with the required photos. We charged a reduced fee. Got it overturned.
Another of our clients was given the “glazed openings only” rating on our original inspection (which equates to no discount). He was reinspected, and of course his rating remained the same. But he decided to have rated accordions installed over those 3door openings so he could get the full credit. We went back out, for a reduced fee, took photos of the 3 openings and a copy of his invoice and photos of the stickers on the accordions, and now he has his full credit.
My point is, you can still help your clients as long as the specific item is addressed with enough photos and documentation to back it up.
But like my original point, if a reinspection finds 12" nail spacing (as in the house I just bought) and the original inspector said 6", there’s really nothing to argue. There are photos to verify the 12" spacing. You can bet the photo’s date and time stamps are tracked on the reinspections.
I would also venture to guess that the original inspectors are being tracked for error rate, and if you get a lot of reinspections, your name will be flagged and soon every one of your inspections will be reinspected (when I say “your”, I’m not talking about anyone on here specifically…just a general).
For others making comments about why anyone would do these, it’s all about volume. If you’re NOT doing wind mitigation inspections, you are missing out.
Dale the only reason I do them is to be a one stop shop. I am not a big time wind mit report guy, but some here are and they can make 10K a month or more…not bad, for a years wages.
It stands to reason that since the WCE’s have completed the majority of statewide inspections, they should be “redflagged”… Instead, they are getting paid to do them again. whats up with that
Who do you think would have a greater margin of error?
- An inspector who works for a WCE whose work is combed over by a quality assurance department looking for every little, possible mistake?
OR
- An inspector who has no one to answer to, and guarantees that the homeowner will save $ or the inspection is free?
OR
- An inspector who does the best job they know how to and performs an inspection, regardless of possible discounts, but “according to the form”?
Hmmm…that is a really tough one.