CLAIMS MANAGEMENT
Super Storm Sandy – National Grid
When Super Storm Sandy hit the East Coast of America in October 2012, it left devastation in its wake. National Grid and its customers were badly hit, with over 1,000,000 customers left without power on Long Island and 140,000 without gas in New York and Rhode Island alone.
Over 16,000 workers were involved with repairs and reinstatement of services, with 90% of the work completed within 8 weeks. The scale of the devastation, scope and speed of reinstatement was unprecedented for National Grid. Our client identified that they and their insurers faced a unique problem in the management and resolution of the claim.
Early in the claim, National Grid retained INDECS to prepare the claim as part of a small dedicated National Grid claim team, knowing that our experience of early identification of coverage issues, setting a claim strategy, managing communications and handling vast quantities of data would pay dividends in achieving resolution of the claim. INDECS formed a link between National Grid’s UK and US operations on the one hand and insurers and loss adjusters on the other to prepare and present a fully supported statement of facts and costs.
During the claim process, INDECS dealt with a variety of complex coverage and accounting issues whilst focussing on our client achieving stage payments and a final negotiated settlement with insurers.
Feedback from Neil Hughes, National Grid Insurance Manager:
“I felt it appropriate to write to advise that we finally signed the agreement that will result in resolution of our claim. I would like to reiterate my personal thanks for your invaluable input, counsel and persistence in securing this outcome. As a team we performed and all had our input to what was a claim with some very interesting issues and challenges to overcome.
Whilst we can all now move on from this particular chapter I just wanted to say a huge thank you on behalf of National Grid and in particular the team who worked on the project in the UK and US.”
