What To Do After a Fire

Stop, do not go back into your home until you have had the go ahead from the fire brigade. Remember safety first! Talk with the fire brigade safety officer regarding safety issues.

Don't do anything until you speak with your insurance company; it could affect settlement. Ask about immediate protection you can make to secure your home such as boarding up windows or covering roofs that have been damaged.

Securing Your Property

• Reasonable expenses spent to protect property are part of your loss and are generally reimbursed by insurance companies. Check with your loss adjuster to learn how best to deal with any expenditure it may affect your claim in the future.
• Arrange to have doors, windows and other areas secured against intruders. This also helps prevent further damage. While examining your home for structural and general damage, take notes of any possible damage you may have to revisit certain elements of your home to check if there's been any further movement.

Once you have been given the go head to call a professional damage management company, we will attended the damage scene immediately make arrangements firstly to secure your home from further damage as well as intruders. If possible we then set about documenting the internal and external damage including taking pictures / videos of key areas / items that have been affected.

We will start with one room at a time and then slowly move to another taking pictures of everything from multiple angles including close-up photographs of damaged / missing sections of the house, rooms, furnishings, and personal property, we are also are able to appoint our own fully qualified structural engineer to ascertain if there is any structural damage, he will also advise you how best to prepare your home for the future i.e. re-fixing of timber members-removing and replacing any fire damaged elements etc. After we complete our inspection we will compile a complete catalogue of all items damaged, including a description of the item, its age, and the cost to buy it now at a current price If you have prior pictures that could serve as pre-disaster documentation, find them, its also a good idea to ask relatives if the have a photos etc that may be of help.

Your photographs will play a major roll in your claim so its important your photos show the overall context of the damage so that you can make your claim to your insurance company / loss adjuster.

We will remove any undamaged items to a safe area of the house or to a secure unit if large objects, like a sofa / furniture are salvageable we will endeavour to restore them to there previous condition.

Do not throw away any damaged items until after an inspection is made. All damage items are taken into consideration in assessing your insurance claim.

Insurance approved contractors specialising in fire, flood, accidental or malicious damage, roofing, subsidence, escape of water burst pipes and emergency insurance including commercial maintenance repairs, working throughout Surrey, Sussex and the South East including Horsham, Dorking, Reigate, Brighton, Hove and surrounding areas. For further information email info@abmbuilding.co.uk