MONDAY, DECEMBER 29, 2014 BUSINESS Insurers dogged by claims of slanted Sandy reports JACKSON CENTRE: In this Oct. 22, 2014 photo, Airstream travel trailers line the factory floor as they are assembled at the Airstream factory in Jackson Center, Ohio. Not only are the Airstream trailers still being built by hand at the same western Ohio site that has produced them for the past 60 years, but the company also can’t roll them out of there fast enough to meet the demand these days. —AP Flying high: Airstream can’t keep up with demand JACKSON CENTER: Bob Wheeler still gets the question sometimes when people find out he runs the company that builds those shiny aluminum campers: “Airstreams? They still make those?” Not only are the retro-looking “silver bullet” travel-trailers still being built by hand at the same western Ohio site that has produced them for 60 years, but the company also can’t roll them out of there fast enough to meet the demand these days. The instantly recognizable silver bubble design — inspired by airplane fuselages — hasn’t been tweaked much since the first Airstreams took to the open road in the 1930s on the way to becoming an American icon. The polished campers have cameoed in Hollywood movies and even quarantined the Apollo 11 astronauts when they got back from the moon. They have also inspired a legion of devotees who socialize with one another at Airstream caravans and rallies all over the world — including an annual Ohio jamboree known as “Alumapalooza.” “Any time we’ve seen an Airstream, it’s like the clouds part and an angelic choir starts singing,” says Cliff Garinn, a 49-year-old college career counselor from Dallas. He and his husband bought a new one in April and are already trading up to a larger model for frequent weekend camping trips and summer vacation. Airstream builds 50 travel-trailers every week at the plant in Jackson Center, all gleaming and aerodynamic and riveted by hand. The backlog is about three months, and ground has already been broken on a major expansion at the factory north of Dayton that eventually will increase production capacity by 50 percent. The RV industry was dealt a body blow by the Great Recession but has rebounded with gusto. Shipments in 2014 are expected to be up more than 8 percent, following the best October in the industry in nearly 40 years. Production next year is expected to return to levels seen before the economy tanked. Big bubble Airstream — owned by the larger Indianabased RV maker Thor Industries — is riding the wave, surging with three record years in a row. Wheeler says shipments now are about twice what they were during the best days before the recession. Besides a better economy, Airstream is benefiting from a big bubble of Baby Boomers, many now choosing not to wait until their 60s to buy one, and a new wave of desire for the classic designs of America’s yesteryear — even if they command top dollar. New Airstreams run $42,000 to $140,000. “For us, the Airstream just represented this beautiful piece of machinery, this beautiful design that other trailers and RVs don’t give you,” says 46-year-old Kate Gilbert. She and her husband, Iain, sold their house in San Diego this year and now live full time in their 27-foot solar panel- equipped Airstream, traveling the country. Tara Cox, a 40-year-old magazine editor who wrote a book called “Airstream: The Silver RV,” notes the fandom bordering on fanaticism that the trailers inspire, besides the fact that they cost more than other RVs, usually have less storage space and require more maintenance to keep the outside looking nice. She compares Airstream owners with Harley-Davidson riders who baby their bikes. “It’s that labor of love,” she says. Baby Boomers are still the heart of the demographic, but the company is actively reaching out to younger people, using social media to show them how an Airstream could fit their lifestyles. It’s also testing less-expensive, lighter and easier-to-tow designs that Wheeler says might be “less intimidating” to younger buyers. Airstream got an injection of hip recently when it collaborated with the Columbus College of Art and Design to plan and build a camper with a workspace and living area aimed at people in their 20s and 30s whose jobs allow them to work from anywhere. The company says the design elements — including a rear hatch that opens the convertible work area to the great outdoors — will be incorporated into future production models. Meggin Hurlburt, a 34-year-old paralegal from San Diego, says the Airstream purchase was an investment in her family. She’s married with a 6-year-old son. She says the vintage look and the reputation for durability drew them in, even with the $70,000-plus price tag. “We didn’t want to wait until we were retired because we wanted to enjoy it now,” she says. “It’s not like the white box trailer that’s going to fall apart in 10 years. We bought this knowing we can give it to our son, and maybe he can give it to his children.” —Agencies NEW YORK: Superstorm Sandy hit the East Coast, flood insurance companies working for the Federal Emergency Management Agency dispatched an army of structural engineers to do some detective work. Their assignment: Find out how much damage to policyholders’ homes was caused by surging seawater and how much predated the storm. Now, two years later, lawyers representing about 1,500 homeowners are trying to prove that some engineering firms hired to inspect the damage issued bogus reports to give skeptical insurers ammunition to deny claims. Broken foundations, the lawyers say, were falsely blamed on poor construction or long-term settling of the soil. Cracked and warped walls were written off as being due to old age. So far, there’s been a little proof available publicly. Some engineers who worked the coast after the storm say a lot of homeowners were simply unaware of long-standing, but hidden problems exposed by the storm. But the issue got the attention of a federal judge in New York after a Long Island family uncovered evidence that an engineer who examined their property had been instructed by a supervisor to reverse his initial finding that the flood caused irreparable structural damage. US Magistrate Judge Gary Brown ordered insurers to produce reams of additional records that could help reveal whether engineering contractors edited damage reports in ways that improperly minimized payouts to hundreds or even thousands of storm victims. “These unprincipled practices may be widespread,” Brown wrote in his Nov. 7 order. New York’s attorney general has opened a probe. FEMA has asked its inspector general to investigate. Homeowners made similar claims about doctored engineering reports after Hurricane Katrina, when some insurers were accused of trying to shift blame from the 2005 storm’s winds to its monster flood, which wasn’t covered by homeowner policies. This time, though, there is no wind-versuswater fight, and it isn’t clear why any insurance company would have a motive to cheat. Most were merely processing claims for FEMA; none of their own money was at stake. The government pays insurers marginally more to approve a claim than to deny one. “There is simply no incentive ... to try to guide the engineer to an opinion, or to try to find no coverage,” said Henry Neal Conolly, president of Wright Flood, the nation’s largest flood insurance company. He wrote in an email to The Associated Press that he was “not sure at all what the alleged conspiracy is or could be not to pay claims.” Lawyers for flood victims have suggested that fighting claims is so deeply ingrained in the insurance industry’s DNA that it is applying the same bare-knuckle tactics to the National Flood Insurance Program out of force of habit. Others say the industry knows the program is under financial strain and is trying to help preserve it so they can continue to collect fees for selling and serving policies. Penalties Insurers can also be penalized by FEMA if they pay a claim later determined to be invalid, though in recent years those sanctions have been rare and light. From 2011 to 2014, FEMA imposed just $742,000 in penalties on flood insurance contractors that were found to have overpaid claims, according to agency figures. That’s a trifling amount compared to the $8.1 billion in flood insurance payouts made to 132,000 Sandy victims. To homeowners who feel shortchanged, motive doesn’t matter. “I can’t say why it’s happening, but it’s definitely happening,” said Chris Gerold, an attorney representing some of the roughly 1,500 homeowners in New York and New Jersey who are suing over what they say are improperly denied flood insurance payments. The scrutiny of engineering firms began after a New York couple, Deborah Ramey and Robert Kaible, raised questions about damage reports prepared on a badly flooded investment property they owned in Long Beach. The engineer who visited the house in December 2012 initially concluded that it suffered a partial foundation collapse in the flood. But those findings were rejected by a supervisor at his engineering firm, Louisiana-based US Forensic. The manager then rewrote the report with a reverse conclusion, that the home’s sloping floors and tilted walls were the result of long-term settling, not flooding. As a result, the bulk of the insurance claim was denied. The family complained so loudly that their insurer, Wright Flood, asked US Forensic to do a second inspection. When the engineer returned, he was carrying his first draft of the report, which the family read and photographed. US Forensic stood by its work, saying the report was changed because the original draft contained gross errors and unsupported assumptions. But after conducting hearings, Brown ruled Nov. 7 that the revisions, made by an engineer who hadn’t actually visited the property, were “baseless.” The judge also said some details within the report appeared to have been invented to cover up shortcomings of the initial inspection. He accused US Forensic of engaging in “reprehensible gamesmanship” and ordered all insurance companies in Sandy-related litigation in New York to disclose any similar draft reports. Since then, a Texas lawyer, Steve Mostyn, has filed additional lawsuits accusing another engineering firm of misconduct. The suits said a manager at HiRise Engineering, of Uniondale, New York, completely rewrote two reports submitted by a freelancing Brooklyn engineer, Harold Weinberg, then affixed his signature without his consent. In one of those reports, Weinberg had written that “the entire cellar, including the slab and the foundation walls” of a Brooklyn home “were damaged extensively” by the flood. That was replaced by a conclusion that “there were no structural damages observed that were caused by flooding.” The final report blamed cracks in the house on regular building settlement over many years. Underpayments HiRise did not respond to a request for comment. Lawyers for most of the suing homeowners said they have been getting additional documents over the past few weeks and are reviewing them, but have yet to receive the bulk of the paperwork. At the urging of members of Congress, FEMA Administrator Craig Fugate wrote to insurance contractors Dec. 5 saying he was “deeply concerned” about allegations of underpayments and “disreputable engineering practices.” “We must do better,” he wrote. Fugate also expressed concern about criticism that insurance company lawyers might be on track to spend more to litigate claims than it would cost to settle them. On Dec. 2, a panel of magistrate judges said some industry lawyers were unreasonably delaying settlements and unnecessarily inflating legal costs for both sides. So far, FEMA has spent $12.4 million on litigation related to Sandy flood insurance. After Sandy, engineering firms working for the insurance industry relied heavily on independent subcontractors with varying levels of experience to investigate damage. The job included a close examination to look for signs that the damage was there before the flood. In dozens of reports reviewed by the AP, engineers wrote that they ruled out flood damage after noticing previous repair attempts, like shims placed beneath sagging support beams or layers of patching material built up over a crack. Engineering experts told the AP that it isn’t always easy to say for sure what caused damage. Nevertheless, engineers were told not to hedge their findings or express uncertainty. “It is critical that you provide conclusive and unambiguous opinions as to causation,” said instruction materials that HiRise provided to at least one inspector. “Weakly worded conclusions using words such as ‘appears,’ ‘may have,’ ‘likely,’ etc. will be rejected by our clients.” Several independent engineers who inspected homes in Sandy’s aftermath told the AP they were occasionally challenged by supervisors who felt findings were unsupported by the evidence or could have been worded differently. But those engineers said they only changed their reports if they agreed with the suggested alterations. —AP EXCHANGE RATES Al-Muzaini Exchange Co. Japanese Yen Indian Rupees Pakistani Rupees Srilankan Rupees Nepali Rupees Singapore Dollar Hongkong Dollar Bangladesh Taka Philippine Peso Thai Baht Irani Riyal transfer Irani Riyal cash Saudi Riyal Qatari Riyal Omani Riyal Bahraini Dinar UAE Dirham ASIAN COUNTRIES 2.443 4.622 2.918 2.223 2.892 223.990 37.846 3.755 6.581 8.938 61.555 121.740 GCC COUNTRIES 78.338 80.706 763.320 780.260 80.003 ARAB COUNTRIES Egyptian Pound - Cash 44.950 Egyptian Pound - Transfer 40.985 Yemen Riyal/for 1000 1.371 Tunisian Dinar 158.820 Jordanian Dinar 414.580 Lebanese Lira/for 1000 1.971 Syrian Lira 2.094 Morocco Dirham 33.069 EUROPEAN & AMERICAN COUNTRIES US Dollar Transfer 293.650 Euro 360.220 Sterling Pound 458.390 Canadian dollar 255.130 Turkish lira 126.570 Swiss Franc 301.800 Australian Dollar 239.620 US Dollar Buying 292.450 20 gram 10 gram 5 gram GOLD 238.100 121.740 61.560 UAE Exchange Centre WLL COUNTRY Australian Dollar Canadian Dollar Swiss Franc Euro US Dollar Sterling Pound Japanese Yen Bangladesh Taka Indian Rupee Sri Lankan Rupee Nepali Rupee Pakistani Rupee UAE Dirhams Bahraini Dinar Egyptian Pound Jordanian Dinar Omani Riyal Qatari Riyal Saudi Riyal SELL DRAFT 231.71 256.71 302.93 362.08 293.55 461.65 2.49 3.761 4.636 2.220 2.893 2.918 79.77 779.11 40.93 417.10 761.26 80.83 78.19 SELL CASH 228.71 257.71 300.93 363.08 296.55 464.65 2.51 4.031 4.936 2.655 3.428 2.790 80.23 781.18 41.53 422.75 768.56 81.38 78.59 2.710 3.945 87.645 48.035 9.885 131.225 Sierra Leone Singapore Dollar South African Rand Sri Lankan Rupee Taiwan Thai Baht 0.000065 0.218818 0.019295 0.001880 0.009160 0.008589 0.000071 0.224816 0.027795 0.002460 0.009340 0.009139 Bahrain Exchange Company Bahraini Dinar Egyptian Pound Iranian Riyal Iraqi Dinar Jordanian Dinar Kuwaiti Dinar Lebanese Pound Moroccan Dirhams Nigerian Naira Omani Riyal Qatar Riyal Saudi Riyal Syrian Pound Tunisian Dinar Turkish Lira UAE Dirhams Yemeni Riyal Arab 0.772055 0.039520 0.000081 0.000194 0.409898 1.000000 0.000145 0.023926 0.001192 0.756316 0.079906 0.077630 0.001740 0.154130 0.124804 0.078928 0.001325 0.780055 0.042620 0.000082 0.000254 0.417398 1.000000 0.000245 0.047928 0.001827 0.761996 0.081118 0.078330 0.001960 0.162130 0.131804 0.080077 0.001405 Syrian Pound Nepalese Rupees Malaysian Ringgit Chinese Yuan Renminbi Thai Bhat Turkish Lira COUNTRY Belgian Franc British Pound Czech Korune Danish Krone Euro Norwegian Krone Romanian Leu Slovakia Swedish Krona Swiss Franc Turkish Lira Dollarco Exchange Co. Ltd Rate for Transfer US Dollar Canadian Dollar Sterling Pound Euro Swiss Frank Bahrain Dinar UAE Dirhams Qatari Riyals Saudi Riyals Jordanian Dinar Egyptian Pound Sri Lankan Rupees Indian Rupees Pakistani Rupees Bangladesh Taka Philippines Pesso Cyprus pound Japanese Yen Selling Rate 291.750 260.085 456.630 366.500 303.035 775.760 79.330 80.935 77.975 411.660 40.707 2.225 4.716 2.867 3.759 6.481 715.865 3.480 Australian Dollar New Zealand Dollar America Canadian Dollar US Dollars US Dollars Mint Bangladesh Taka Chinese Yuan Hong Kong Dollar Indian Rupee Indonesian Rupiah Japanese Yen Kenyan Shilling Korean Won Malaysian Ringgit Nepalese Rupee Pakistan Rupee Philippine Peso SELL CASH Europe 0.007640 0.450768 0.004921 0.044110 0.352802 0.035456 0.084186 0.008593 0.033606 0.291108 0.124804 SELLDRAFT 0.008644 0.459768 0.016921 0.049110 0.360802 0.040656 0.084186 0.018593 0.038608 0.301308 0.131804 Australasia 0.230339 0.222091 0.241839 0.231591 0.247414 0.289400 0.289900 0.255914 0.294100 0.294100 Asia 0.003438 0.046110 0.035758 0.004399 0.000019 0.002358 0.003284 0.000257 0.080747 0.003000 0.002749 0.006483 0.004038 0.049610 0.038508 0.004800 0.000025 0.002538 0.003284 0.000272 0.086747 0.003170 0.003029 0.006763 Al Mulla Exchange Currency US Dollar Euro Pound Sterlng Canadian Dollar Indian Rupee Egyptian Pound Sri Lankan Rupee Bangladesh Taka Philippines Peso Pakistan Rupee Bahraini Dinar UAE Dirham Saudi Riyal *Rates are subject to change Transfer Rate (Per 1000) 293.000 360.650 459.800 254.850 4.615 40.965 2.220 3.740 6.555 2.914 780.250 79.850 78.300
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