Also note that Lott's brother-in-law, a trial lawyers, made some majo0re $$$ off of the deal. Just like he did when he sued big tobacco.
Lott and others paid their premiums, they deserve to get reimbursed and the insurance companies should be prosecuted for fraud.
Lott is a political scumbag. He was paid for his loss by the flood insurance & now he wants to be paid a second time by Allstate. He is nothing but a greedy thief who wants to profit from his loss.
Houses were destroyed in a hurricane.
The insurance company has chosen, on its own, to call it all "flood damage". How do they know this? Wind certainly was also a part of the destruction.
Beyond that, what, precisely, is a flood? STORM damage is not a flood, unless its water rising from a river. Is a storm surge, which is wind-driven water, a flood?
The insurance company, on its own, has decided that it is, and that therefore they don't have to pay.
The insurance companies, on their own, have decided that all wind damage in the case of houses also destroyed by storm surges, will be disregarded completely, and that it's ALL flood damages.
Nice try. But the lawmakers may have a different view of the definitions of those words. The insurance company doesn't get to determine all on its own that 100% of destruction when there is a storm surge is caused by the surge. If the house was already ripped apart by wind damage, and wind-driven rain, and was THEN washed away by storm surge, the insurance company doesn't get to ignore the other two sources of damage and simply assert, for its own reasons, that 100% of the loss will be assigned to storm surge and 0% to the other factors.
Sure, they WANT to, and that is what the people with the legal power to define words: the legislators, are pounding down on their asses. Insurance companies think that they have the right to collect premiums but can be very, very particular about when they decide to pay out. They think their determination that 100% of damage is flood damage, and that wind and rain can be ignored because of flood damage, is the final word on the issue. They're wrong.
If this were the Mississippi River rising, it would be an easy case. That's a flood. However, if a tornado ripped apart the houses and the river flooded, the insurance company doesn't just get to set the rule on its own that the tornado and wind damage will be totally ignored and the loss entirely assigned to the flood. Sure, they can TRY, but it's no surprise, then, that the lawmakers reset the rules for them to make it fair for policyholders.
Likewise with a hurricane. Wind, rain, flying debris AND storm surge. It's nice that the insurance companies want to ignore the first three factors and assign everything to the catastrophic storm surge. It's nice that they want to call the storm surge a "flood" (is it?). It's nice that they want to hold the line and not even PARTIALLY compensate for wind and rain damage. But it's not going to work, because contracts are subject to law, and law is decided by politics, and people don't like insurance companies deciding all by themselves that they're going to define all storm damage as flood damage and not pay.
State Farm has already decided to get out of the insurance business in Alabama. Fine. Other companies will get the Alabama profits instead, and will set their premia accordingly. Or NO insurer will insure, and the government will do it instead.
The real bottom line is that if you collect billions in premia, when the time comes to pay, interpreting words to avoid payment is going to get you thrown into a skillet and fried like a catfish. The insurance companies needed to be a lot smarter here. SOME damage was attributable to wind and rain, and they should have made partial payments on all those policies. Calling everything flood damage is an exercise of power that invites a greater exercise of power to slap you down.
Lott is a disgrace.
Why?
If you have to ask ...
His Vacancy's suggestion for a Republican campaign slogan:
Vote Republican in '08, so you can be fully compensated if your underinsured beachfront mansion is damaged in a storm.