The Lawyer Monthly Expert Witness Awards 2021

contractors who basically say whatever they like and are always supported by loss adjusters and insurers. These contractors who invariably hold a two- or three-day certification in fire and flood remediation, now believe they can undertake a £200,000 fire or flood restoration believing they are experts. They almost all quote their remediation work follows BDMA standards, unfortunately these standards do not exist. Most also quote IICRC S500 and S520 but usually fail in every aspect of performance criterion. If any evidence was required to confirm the industry conspiracies and collusion, we have to look no further than British Standards. In 2013 I was a technical support on British Standard “Code of practice” for water damage. In this document we proposed “verified” scientific clearance and certification of substrate dry and air/surface decontamination, quite an onerous requirement for incompetent contractors. Two years later the BSI with the help of ABI and CILA published BSI 12999 and verification was simply wiping with a white glove. Quite rightly I complained to the government and the BSI was ordered to include PAS 64 in the appendix of 12999. The Loss Adjuster who used to be impartial, now openly states they work for their client (the insurer) and often boast to policyholders they have 30 “ Insurers can try to limit mould claims with policy wording and even ignore them, but they cannot ignore the law or requirements to engage competent nominated contractors. years’ experience when challenged for obvious failures. Unfortunately doing something wrong for 30 years is not a qualification, yet invariably they will opine on biological hazards and inhalation risks and even policyholder’s safety, without a shred of supportive evidence or knowledge. The joint efforts of contractor and loss adjuster will invariably see the policyholder receive an exceptionally low level of remediation and restoration, often resulting in latent damage and chronic health risks remaining. The recent expert to materialise is the PhD in donut making, as it appears their actual thesis is irrelevant, and even if they have no relevant qualification, the insurer will take their opinion if it saves them money or challenges me with classy verbiage. Typically, they invest in junk science that quickly provides irrelevant information which is polished to appear supporting contractors’ actions saving insurers money and or even better if it can be seen to challenge me by signing off PhD. To date we have several companies who have appeared with junk science and insurers use them extensively and you must wonder why insurers use them. Of course, the answer is as usual, follow the money. Initially I made a serious mistake in my belief, insurers were being fooled by these incompetent unqualified experts and destroyed several of their reports but to no avail. Insurers and their agents the loss adjusters continue to use these companies and of course, I now realise insurers need them to keep profits up and or reduce costs. My challenging insurers has not been a revenue stream, in fact I have probably spent most of last 10 years working pro bono challenging fools and incompetents and storing their arguments to a point now where defamation is the current route taken by insurers. What I have found to be encouraging is the fact that policyholders quickly see through the false reporting and always accept my reports. They rely on common sense and verifiable facts and ask the contractors and loss adjusters relevant questions and are always astonished at the answers. Policyholders recognise the serious implications of poor restoration and GOOGLE has provided all the backup they need to confirm the incompetence and risk factors being offered. Generally, policyholders are not after more money but realise they are being hood winked and just want their home back to a pre loss condition and possibly hold someone responsible for Jeff Charlton - ‘A Day at the Office’ LAWYER MONTHLY EXPERT WITNESS AWARDS 2021 UNITED KINGDOM - 24 - www.lawyer-monthly.com