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How do you schedule an insurance inspection?
SCHEDULING A SURVEY In this series we’re covering the basics surrounding insurer site inspections, from the perspective of an insurance provider. Whereas some facilities are used to receiving regular surveys from insurance companies, not all are. If a facility is not yet insured, is changing insurance providers, or is new, it may have not yet had a site survey conducted. When contacting the facility for the first time, it is important to remember the purpose of the survey and the context of this survey. It is also important to know who you should contact to schedule this visit. PREPARATION Before contacting the plant, be prepared. Review any existing information you have, such as previous reports for reinspection, or any information provided by the underwriters for a first inspection or a prospect. This is to ensure you know exactly what information is necessary to discuss with your contact when scheduling the date for your visit. For example, you need to know the size of the facility and the quantity of fire suppressions systems in place just to estimate the time needed to adequately perform your survey. It is not unusual, for a large facility, to need to spend several days on site, while the survey of a warehouse may only need half a day. You also need to know your facility contact and his or her role. It may be the Plant Manager, the Fire Chief Officer or a Maintenance Manager. You also need to know when you want to perform the visit, so you can propose a possible day or week of visit. If you’re looking to limit travel costs and time away from the office, you’ll want to coordinate this with other visits. Be prepared to propose a date that suits you, and possible alternatives in case the date does not match for the facility representatives. This also helps limit the effort and amount of back-and-forth with your facility contact. CONTACT When contacting the building owner for the appointment, you need to explain the purpose of your visit, what you want to do, why you want to do it and how you want to do it. You also have to indicate how much time you want to spend on site. This information is necessary to make sure that the right personnel will be present, in order to answer your technical questions about the process, the fire protection systems, the construction of the facility, and so on. An escort needs to be determined, as someone from the plant will likely need to accompany you throughout the facility and make possible access to the different areas, including utility rooms such as electrical rooms, mechanical rooms, or boiler houses. Additional personnel may be necessary for the water supply testing. Sometimes, external companies may be required if testing of the city water supply is necessary. This could be local contractors, the local water provider, or the local fire department. It is also important to inform your contact that a Management representative is mandatory for the entrance meeting, to explain the purpose of the visit, and at the exit meeting, when recommendations to improve the situation are proposed. Clarity and good communication surrounding the visit are key to having the process be smooth and helpful for both parties. ORGANIZATION IS KEY Good organization surrounding the appointment is normally a key element for a successful survey. In my personal experience, I have seldom issues with regular surveys or surveys at large facilities with dedicated personnel that are used to receiving insurance visits. But I’ve had some issues with smaller facilities where the people did not really understand what I wanted to do or what I really needed. This might have happened if I was not clear enough during the scheduling of the inspection. Sometimes, they did not plan an escort to make the tour of the facility as they expected that it was just a 2-hour meeting in an office to review some documentation. It is then very hard to find someone available at the last minute, who knows the plant sufficiently to answer your questions and guide you to the right places. I have had some situations where my escort had no idea on how the fire pump was working and was expecting me to take the responsibility to make the tests and manipulate the equipment. And I also made tour of the facility with people not knowing the process and with no access to most utility rooms. These situations resulted in the need for a second appointment with a better prepared survey. Time lost for you, and time lost for the plant. While scheduling site visits seems simple enough, having an organized process and clear communication through the entire scheduling process is the best way to set yourself up for a purposeful survey of the facility. I am Franck Orset, this is MeyerFire University.
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