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Insurance & Legal Matters

Experts on insurance and legal matters in the restoration and remediation industries offer advice and guidance for legal issues facing your company, and liability insurance questions you may have.

Why I Did Something Stupid (And Why You’re Probably Thinking About It Too)

August 24, 2026 7:00 am

I want to be upfront about something before you keep reading: this is not a success story. Or at least, it’s not only a success story. It’s the kind of story where the ending isn’t fully written yet and the middle was a real mess. I did not wake up one morning and decide to become a technology company. I run a restoration business. We do water, mold, and fire. We deal with TPAs, carriers, adjusters, property managers, commercial building owners and homeowners who are usually having one of the worst weeks of their

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Fight Fire with Fire

August 20, 2026 7:00 am

The same technology that insurance carriers are using to shrink your estimates can—and must—be turned into your most powerful documentation and negotiation tool. There is a quiet revolution happening inside the claims departments of insurance carriers and most restoration contractors have no idea how dramatically it is about to affect their bottom line. Artificial intelligence is no longer a future-state concept in the insurance industry. It is here. It is deployed. It is making decisions. And in far too many cases, those decisions are coming at the direct expense of restoration professionals who are

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The Restoration Industry Has Changed. How We Respond Will Define Its Future.

August 18, 2026 8:33 am

After more than 20 years in the restoration industry, I’ve watched our profession evolve in ways I never expected. Some of those changes have been positive. Technology has made us more efficient, documentation has become more sophisticated, and we have better tools than ever to prove what a property needs. At the same time, however, one of the biggest changes has made our jobs significantly more difficult. Years ago, it wasn’t unusual to have spirited disagreements with insurance adjusters. We didn’t always see eye to eye, but there was usually a mutual understanding of

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The Claim Gap: Why Restoration Contractors Are Normalizing Underpayment

July 13, 2026 12:16 pm

Every restoration owner knows that claims get cut. The dangerous part is how normal it has become. Across more than 250 restoration companies, we keep hearing the same pattern: estimates come back lighter than expected, justified line items get rejected or reduced, and supplements turn into weeks of back-and-forth. Many teams describe a 10-20% gap as if it is simply part of doing insurance work. One owner told us his team no longer argues every small cut because a few hundred dollars on one claim does not feel worth the admin time. The problem

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Xactimate’s New Labor Efficiency Setting: What It Means and How You Can Prepare

June 25, 2026 11:47 am

The third tier introduced in early 2026 changes the labor math at the trade level, not the job level. Here is what is actually happening, why it matters more than the headline suggests, and what to do before the first call from an adjuster lands on your desk. By Anthony Nelson, Peer Group Facilitator, Pivot My Biz Somewhere this week, a restoration estimator is on a call with an adjuster who has just asked, in a perfectly reasonable tone of voice, whether the Large Restoration/Remodel setting should apply to a fire job. The estimator

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E-Verify 101

April 28, 2026 9:31 am

In today’s environment, it is important to understand the basics of verifying your employees’ legal status to ensure your business is compliant with applicable federal laws. This includes understanding the federal E-Verify website. While not federally required in many cases, many states do, in fact, require its use and most have their own procedures for verifying employee eligibility. Therefore, it is important to check with your local state to determine what other specific state statutes may be applicable to your employment practices.  Federal law has established an employment verification system (using the Form I-9)

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RIA Insights: Leadership to New Heights

March 12, 2026 12:43 pm

The Restoration Industry Association (RIA) is entering a defining moment marked by new leadership, expanded advocacy, and a stronger voice for the independent restorer. From a new Chief Executive Officer to a dedicated Director of Advocacy and Government Affairs and a brand new Voice of the Independent Task Force, RIA continues to build on strong momentum and advance its mission on behalf of its members and the industry through member-driven ideas. Saima Hedrick Named CEO RIA recently announced a planned leadership transition as Kristy Cohen moves on to a new professional opportunity after a

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Modernizing Contract Validation: Digital Documentation and Signatures Are Rewriting the Rules

January 14, 2026 9:10 am

In an industry where agility, documentation integrity, and operational uptime drive both profitability and client trust, clinging to outdated paper-centric workflows is not just inefficiency, it’s a strategic liability. Did you know that a prominent restoration company with multiple locations in Canada has been using digital documentation and signatures in the Time and Material world for over fifteen years? Yet across the restoration industry in the US, many professionals are still navigating legacy mindsets, often reinforced by adjusters or consultants who insist that wet signatures are required simply because “that’s how the playbook has

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2026 Restoration Trends

January 9, 2026 12:39 pm

After a tumultuous 2025, I expect to see a return to more normal restoration business conditions in 2026.  Last year, the biggest issue for many restoration companies was the lower volume of claims, both from a catastrophe basis and in everyday claims volume. I would expect to see similar issues impacting the industry this year, although in a more normal way.  Insurance companies had a strong year from a financial perspective with a very favorable loss-ratio, yet they are struggling with pricing models due to unpredictable catastrophic losses and uncertain inflation.  These items will

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There Should Be a Policy for That

December 19, 2025 7:02 am

When it comes to how employees interact with customers, vendors, and others, a lot of that behavioral guidance comes from what they see modeled by long-term or leadership-level staff. Ideally, that example-setting finds its way into a written policy manual early in the company’s development.  In this article, “manual” refers to a company policy manual or employee handbook. The term is interchangeable, as long as it’s used consistently. It’s important for the manual to remain distinct from standard operating procedures (SOPs). While SOPs outline the “how-to” of tasks and may evolve frequently, the policy

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