The Art of Adjusting® Podcast

Episode #82 - Giving Thanks (and Adjusting Attitudes)

• William Auten & Chantal Roberts • Season 3 • Episode 82

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🎧 Spotify Episode Description 

Episode 82: Giving Thanks — Bill’s Back!

This Thanksgiving episode is all about gratitude. Bill returns to the podcast, and we share what we’re thankful for — from the people who make our work meaningful to the everyday wins that keep us going in the P&C claims world.

Whether you're driving to a loss site, reviewing files, or heading home for the holiday, take a moment with us to reflect on the good stuff.

đź’› What are you grateful for this year?
Share your thoughts with us on LinkedIn or Spotify’s Q&A — we’d love to hear from you.

Follow, rate, and tap the bell so you never miss an episode.

#TheArtOfAdjusting #ClaimsAdjuster #InsurancePodcast #Thanksgiving #InsuranceProfessionals #DailyClaims #AutenClaims

For more insights, you might consider a career in liability adjusting or if you're searching for reliable adjusting services, visit Auten Claims Management.

To explore more about Chantal Roberts and her contributions to the industry, visit CMR Consulting.

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William Auten:

Hello, I'm Bill Auten of Auten Claims Management.

Chantal Roberts:

I'm Chantal Roberts of CMR Consulting, and welcome to the Art of Adjusting podcast.

William Auten:

Today we're going to talk about life as an insurance adjuster from the perspective of property, auto, liability, or workers' compensation adjusters. Our goal is to bring interesting topics in the world of claims adjusting to people who are working as an adjuster now and to people who are considering a career as a claims adjuster.

Chantal Roberts:

Hi, Bill.

William Auten:

Hi, how are you?

Chantal Roberts:

I'm so excited to see you.

William Auten:

I'm excited to see you too. It's been a long time. We were just talking, the last time I did this with you was in May.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

William Auten:

And uh here it is, here it is, November. November. Time flies.

Chantal Roberts:

Yes. And you know, it A, it does. Um, because when when we were talking, you know, you were like, Oh, I we're I'm grateful because work is busy, um, personal life is busy, and I just gotta, you know, step back. I mean, something has to fall. And every way, and we talk about that all the time. In fact, Heather and I had talked about that recently with the with the cat claims. Like, you gotta take care of yourself, yeah, you know, and um so I was uh fortunate enough to be able to have people step in for you. Um, so I thought what we would do, because it's gonna be the Thanksgiving uh episode, and we've done this before, we do it like every we have we have theme. You know, I love a good theme. You know, I love a good theme.

William Auten:

That's that's what the spreadsheet's all about.

Chantal Roberts:

Exactly. Um, yeah. And and I love a good theme. And so I thought, and to ease you back in from being gone for six months, we fortunately we're starting off with Thanksgiving, and we could talk about how grateful we are for like everything.

William Auten:

And oh yeah, there's a long list too.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah, like how grateful are we both to Sandy and to Heather for stepping in and being co-host. And um I loved talking with those ladies.

William Auten:

Yeah, they they're great. I um I you know, I hope they'll come back and uh then I'll have an opportunity to uh to chat with them also.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah. And and I really appreciated them coming in and and being a co-host because you the reason why we started talking is this was originally your podcast. And uh it's it's just really hard to hold a conversation with yourself, yeah.

William Auten:

It gets pretty dry pretty quick.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah, yeah.

William Auten:

Of course, now I talk to myself all the time because I'm a genius, but or you have multiple personality disorders, so you have plenty to people, plenty of people to talk to.

Chantal Roberts:

Don't uh isn't that like letting HIPAA go and stuff? Like, I didn't even want to let people know that um one of the reasons why um you were having to step away, and I think we had announced it previously, is that your wife had had taken a bad tumble and and um uh had to have surgery. And I think you said that she's she's going to have to have her pens removed or something shortly. But um Yep, yep.

William Auten:

Uh second operation's coming up here soon, so um she'll be down for the count for a little while there. But boy, what an experience that has been, because the type of injury she has is one of the most common injuries that we get from slip and falls and trips downstairs, and um watching an actual reduction take place in the emergency room, for example. Um, I read all these medical records, you know, we see the after effects, the long-term, you know, PT and disability that happens from it, but um, I've lived it now. So uh I and I've had conversations with attorneys who's had who who are representing clients who have this injury, and I tell them, look, I know what this injury is about. You you uh you know, there's not much to um exaggerate about it. They're they're bad. Um we got on a Facebook group, well, she did. I'm not allowed in there because I didn't have the injury, but if you have this type of injury, you can go into these Facebook groups where it's almost like a support group. So all these people have the same type of injury, they all show pictures of their x-rays with all the hardware and and they brag about how many screws they have in their leg. It's really interesting.

Chantal Roberts:

Oh, that's nice. Um, you know, my husband, he he has uh a Facebook group that he has joined. I won't let people know what what he has, but uh they do the they kind of do the same thing. Um, although he sometimes has to monitor how much he reads the Facebook page because he gets a he gets upset. You know, it's like, oh my gosh, I'm I'm I'm never gonna be well again and blah blah blah. And so yeah, it's um one of those things. But I would also say um, you know, how grateful we are for modern medicine to be able to take care of of um those kinds of of things. Um oops, I looked at the wrong thing. Oh well. Uh I pulled up the wrong agenda. That's fine.

William Auten:

It's okay. I I have the right one here.

Chantal Roberts:

That's good. I'm glad. Yeah. Um, so I would also say what? Um I know because I I usually put it up at the very, very top, but I got so excited about seeing you. I was like, oh my god. Because I haven't seen you in forever.

William Auten:

Um it has been a while, yeah. Like I've been watching you guys, though. I've been watching. Oh, have you? Yes, yes.

Chantal Roberts:

Oh wow.

William Auten:

Yes, and you did a nice series on mutuals uh on LinkedIn there. That was that was pretty good.

Chantal Roberts:

On um LinkedIn, yeah. So go check it out on LinkedIn. Um, by the way, guys, like, subscribe, comment on LinkedIn, on YouTube, on Spotify, especially on YouTube and Spotify, because that helps bring the podcast, the algorithm up. I mean, like literally helps. And I had been asking, I've listened, I don't know if you heard, but I've started listening to this podcast where the woman, the host, would be like, just give me five new listeners and should get 10 or whatever. And and so I'm like, Yeah, let's just get three new listeners. There you go. Three new subscribers, and um, so that's what I want. Like three new subscribers. Woo! Three new, three new subscribers. Um, to go with to go with the six that we already have.

William Auten:

Yeah, I think it's more than six, by the way. I think it is more than six.

Chantal Roberts:

But um yeah, so um talking about what we're grateful for as adjusters, uh, you know, now you know, and you can be more empathetic uh because your wife has suffered this this this injury and and you know what's going on and and know that people aren't you know exaggerating. And I think that um is is particularly helpful.

William Auten:

Yeah, yeah, for sure. When you can kind of feel their pain a little bit, you at least know realistically what um what they're going through, and and being able to demonstrate that you know, I think helps to grease the wheels a little bit with uh with a claimant or their attorney, just so that you know they understand that you're not coming from uh coming at this from a place of um you know disdain for them or you know that you're doubtful about what they're going through or anything like that. That you really do understand what the you know the the pile of doo-doo that they're in right now and the deal the deal that they have for the next uh six or eight months or even 12 months.

Chantal Roberts:

So yeah, yeah, absolutely, yeah. Um, and and you know, like you said, treating them with care and compassion always opens doors. And I know I've used this um example before, but uh when Aaron had to go to the hospital, I I was very nice to the nurses. I was like, hey, I'm getting ready to pick up my dinner. Do you want me to pick you up anything? And next thing I know, he had been upgraded to like a semi-private room, and this was during um COVID and everything. Um, and so yeah, I mean, rooms were hard to come by uh and everything, especially in the ER. So always being nice never never hurts anybody.

William Auten:

Yeah, and and it's this this is not a tactic, by the way. This is not like uh some sort of tactic to try and uh get your get your claim values lowered by any means. All it is is being human uh for a minute, so that you can uh kind of it's a it's this business is all about relationships, and though those relationships uh exist between you and your policy holders, you and your client if you're in a business like mine, uh, and you and your claimants or their attorneys. Um and you have to be, you know, you're still a person at the end of the day.

Chantal Roberts:

Right. So and you have to realize too that you you do run into the same people over and over and over again. Like you're gonna like you, like you said, you're gonna run into the same attorneys over and over again.

William Auten:

And a shout out to all my attorneys that are uh on the opposing side out there in in the the New York area.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah.

William Auten:

Hi guys, hi gals.

Chantal Roberts:

Do they listen? Hi, we should have some. I don't know. We should have some of them on because I think one of the things that would be would be a good topic would be how do lawsuit suits work? Like what's the what's the flow?

William Auten:

That would actually be a great uh a great interview for uh if a claimant's attorney would be willing to come on. Um, and this will be my public shout out to all my peeps that uh that I have files with that if you're brave enough to come on uh talk to us about that, I'd love it.

Chantal Roberts:

We did have Broden on um a couple like yeah, last year or maybe early this year, I have no idea. Um, but he was a uh plaintiff attorney, and um that was really an interesting conversation. So uh, you know, again, thankful for for our brain trust that is willing to to come up and and talk with us and and share with us um their knowledge and everything.

William Auten:

One one of the things I had on here, uh, in addition to your uh what are we thankful for as an adjuster, um is I hate to say it, but attorneys.

Chantal Roberts:

I mean hey, no shade. I am I am not not upset about an attorney at at any given point in time. In fact, I have had uh insureds and claimants who just did not understand what I was saying to them. You know, they they they just didn't trust me. Um, and and and I'm gonna go get an attorney. And I'm like, I think that's a good idea.

William Auten:

There are cases that we've had that have been so um either serious or complex or a combination thereof that it just makes better sense for them to get an attorney. We can't really tell them that. We can't really say, you know what, I don't want to deal with you, you go get an attorney. It's it's not about that, it's more of um look, this is you know, for this claim to reach its logical conclusion, there's so many things that have to happen that an attorney is really the best way. And one example of that is when there's a child, uh, because we have to get a court order to settle it anyway.

Chantal Roberts:

The ad lightum. If you don't know what an ad lightum is, guys, that is uh technically we are and we don't always do it, but technically we are supposed to go to the court and have the court rule that we're doing everything correct, even though we're dealing with the parents and you know, all of that kind of stuff. So, yeah, absolutely. And um, you know, the attorneys who have done this before can smooth the process because it's so hard when you are involved with your house. You know, think about your house burning down and all your memories and all your clothes and all of this kind of stuff. It it's hard because it's personal. Whereas you and me, we're the adjusters, and it's not personal for us, it's our job. And so sometimes having an attorney there can help make this not personal and and can right translate things that are going on.

William Auten:

Yeah, yeah, and and and sometimes the uh the injured party, either property or injury, uh using it the term kind of interchangeably here, but when an injured party is um they they need somebody to talk to, they need an ear. Yes, and sometimes that's us, but we are adversary, uh and um having someone to represent them is probably the best bet in some cases, not every case. Um we settle cases directly with claimants a lot.

Chantal Roberts:

Oh yeah. And then and and and it's the same thing with a with a a public adjuster. Uh now I have feelings about public adjusters, and I know that public adjusters listen to this podcast, uh and they know my feelings because I'm I don't hide those feelings from from people. But um, you know, sometimes the public adjusters help, uh, just like our agents, just like, you know, uh the agents, they sometimes help, be just like the attorneys, because there are they are other people who can explain things to the insureds or the claimants or what have you. Um because we work for the big bad insurance company.

Speaker 1:

Right.

Chantal Roberts:

So I'm thankful for for these guys as well.

William Auten:

At the end of the day, uh there's there's adversarial relationships um in in this business, it's just part part of the deal. Uh it doesn't make the people on either side of the argument bad people. Um and uh the way that you get to uh meeting eye to eye is uh is a demonstration of how professional and uh how good a person you actually are at the end of the day.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

William Auten:

Because if you're if you're only doing this with uh uh you know to try and bludgeon your opponent um and to be mean about it and and underhanded, it's not gonna work out well. No.

Chantal Roberts:

Um no, I totally agree with you. And open communication, of course. And I I'll tell you, uh with the plaintiff attorneys and the policy holder attorneys and the public adjusters, I've actually learned quite a bit from them. You know, uh I recommend to my students that they read Chip Merlin's blog, get on his newsletter, read his blog, and I have learned, I'm like, oh yeah, you know, Chip has a point. And I was talking to a public adjuster about ITEL, the the system that uh that you can, or the company that you can send like a shingle to or some carpet to, and they can tell you, like, yeah, there's this place over here where you can go get the remnants of this carpet so that you don't have to get all new carpet or um all new shingles or whatever. And they were pointing out that there are some issues with that, being that the contractor usually goes to Home Depot or Lowe's or whatever and gets a contractor discount. But if they have to order it from, I don't know, Spokane, Washington, because that's where the remnants of the tile or whatever are, they have to pay shipping, they don't get the the refund. So it actually does cost more. And and so then we as adjusters have to balance that out. And I'm like, wow, you know what? This is a good point. I've never thought about that.

William Auten:

So yeah, that comes up quite a bit, actually.

Chantal Roberts:

Um I'm thankful for these sorts of open communications. So yeah. Yeah. Uh so what what else? Uh listeners and guests who have joined the podcast. We've thanked them, our co-hosts uh thanked them.

William Auten:

Um I have here insurers who recognize the need for quality investigations because those are the folks that send us business, and they've done so uh um remarkably well in 2025. So uh it was just amazing.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah.

William Auten:

And continues to be.

Chantal Roberts:

So absolutely. I am continuously uh grateful for all of the uh education that people want to get. Like you had mentioned the the module or the the the thing that I had done on on LinkedIn where I was talking about mutuals and shareholders and how insurance companies make money because I see this thing on LinkedIn all the time where it's like insurance companies deliberately low pay or no pay or slow pay to save money. And it just drives me up the wall.

William Auten:

It's a trigger with me, it's a trigger, and um yeah, the the whole dn den uh delay, deny, defend um tax you know, opinion about insurance companies.

Chantal Roberts:

Now, does it happen? Sure, it happens. Yeah, in my own opinion though, never mind.

William Auten:

It's just well here's here's the thing. Uh it doesn't happen intentionally. Um yeah, I think it probably does, and where it does, it should stop. It should not be an intentional um tactic or strategy for a company. Right. Um, I don't really see it happening um intentionally, but they're uh you know to get to the end of a claim, a lot of things have to happen. Right. And that's just the process. And it that process is in place to make is it is in place to ensure that everything is fair. Because if we didn't have that, um there would just be an you know an ATM machine with an unlimited amounts of money available um that people would just go to and just you know, we we can't have that either.

Chantal Roberts:

So no, and let's talk about that too, because then our insurance premiums would be unaffordable.

William Auten:

Right.

Chantal Roberts:

It it really is all tied together. And one of the things that my class said to me this just this past Tuesday when I had class, because I asked him again, I'm like, remember, there are like you know, four, five, six, depending on which book you use, reasons why we have exclusions in the policy. And I said, What are some of those exclusions? Uh you know, yell them out to me because we studied that last semester. And so they were doing that. And one of the students typed in the chat saying how grateful she was to learn that and and how surprised she was at how everything kind of you know meshed together. And I'm like, amazing. Yeah, but we didn't we just don't teach that, unfortunately. Not that necessarily claims adjusters need to know that because it's not going to come up that often in um your conversation, except to say, what do my policy, what does my premium pay for? What am I paying premiums for? Blah, blah, blah. And the answer is usually covered claims. Something very specific.

William Auten:

Yeah, it's it's paying for something very specific. Exactly. I mean, if you look at some of the exclusions, I'll take the liability side. So there's an employee exclusion on the general liability side. That means if you're a business and your employee gets hurt, um your general liability coverage is not gonna apply there. But you know, it does apply, workers comp. So you gotta pay, you know, if you if you wanted the GL policy to cover employees, then maybe we should do away with workers' comp and it all goes under the GL. And your GL premiums would reflect that. It would be, you know, it would take you would take your workers' comp premiums and then apply them to your and they would probably be double because uh workers comp has its own set of rules and exclusions and limitations and stuff, and that's to keep the premiums affordable. Uh so it it all does uh uh flood is another one. Um, you know, your uh flood exclusion is on your homeowner's policy. Well, why do I buy insurance? Well, you buy it for the other stuff that could happen to your house. If you want flood coverage, you have to pay extra on a different policy, and then there's a vehicle for that. You just have to go find it. Exactly. So exactly. And not everything, and and not everything can be insured. Uh Lloyd Zaludin does a pretty good job of insuring some weird stuff, but um but you know, you you can't you can't insure for war or bad cooking. War, yeah, yeah.

Chantal Roberts:

I don't know though. I mean, bad cooking can turn into a a fire and a smoke. You know, uh if if I'm cooking, that's then it could probably be covered because there would be smoke damage and uh maybe a fire. Uh this is why my husband doesn't let me cook. Uh he's like, no, babe, why don't you sit down? You've worked hard today.

William Auten:

That was a terrible example. Bad bad cooking is is covered on so many levels. I mean, food poisoning is covered.

Chantal Roberts:

Out of wax. Oh my goodness gracious. Well, you know what? Let's move on to um, you know, maybe Thanksgiving around the work site. I mean, you were still working, you have been very blessed. You said you you've got a new client. Um, they were keeping you busy. Uh, what was some of the surprises that you had this year?

William Auten:

So surprises. Um we so 2024.

Chantal Roberts:

Gratitudes or whatever. Yeah.

William Auten:

Uh 2024 was the biggest year we've had, and 2025 beat that by 60 some odd percent. Wow. Congratulations. That kind of yeah, I know. That's a lot to to uh uh absorb in a short period of time. You know, we we had been growing maybe 12-15 percent each year over the past six years. This one this was big, and it was in a bad year because of Amy getting injured and all that. Uh we moved our office. Um thankful for that. We have uh a fairly large team now helping. Um we've got uh four adjusters within the region, and then we have uh probably 30 or 40 that can help with field work, so in three different states. So that's pretty cool. So I'm pretty thankful for that. Yeah, I'm I'm thankful for that and that we that we learned how to manage it so that I don't want to grow again this much in one space. I I want to manage what we have um and grow and get back to our 12 or 15 percent.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah.

William Auten:

Um but I am thankful for it and it's thankful that we uh lived through it. Um you had some really interesting things to be thankful for as adjusters, and one of them is clean photos from field adjusters.

Chantal Roberts:

So yeah.

William Auten:

Shout out to my to my adjuster friends. Um, you know, if you if it's dark, use a flash. Yes, maybe um, um, or at least keep your camera really still when you take the photo because uh motion blur is a thing.

Chantal Roberts:

Yes, yes. You know, and and I love again the measurements. Uh I used to do low impact. We discussed, we had a podcast about low impact claims, and I used to do low impact claims, and it was so important to take measurements. And you with with you, they would get the tape measure out with the bumper, and and that way they would compare the insured's bumper to the claimant's bumper, and you know, you would either see that yes, they would match or no, they wouldn't match. And so maybe that would be something we need to be looking at, you know. Uh so that was something that was great with clean photos. Same thing, and I'm sure you get this a lot too, especially in New York, because I think there's special rules about sidewalks and who owns the sidewalk, but then you're you know, like the city will own the sidewalk, but the store has to take care of it or something to that effect. Well, if there is a quarter of an inch, half inch difference in between the the levels, a good little measurement helps out a great deal.

William Auten:

Yep. And if and if you don't have a tape measure, use a quarter or use a dollar bill or uh a big pen is a good uh reference or a uh a penny on its edge.

Chantal Roberts:

Um which we won't have anymore. Um much more.

William Auten:

No more pennies.

Chantal Roberts:

We're gonna have to start hoarding them, I guess.

William Auten:

I guess so. They'll be worth in about 15 years, they'll be worth what 1.3 cents because they're exactly.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah, I was gonna say like 1.5 cents, maybe two cents. I don't know. Not not a lot, probably. Probably not. Okay, so um trivia question. Do you know what the currency is underneath a penny? Like there used to be coins underneath a penny.

William Auten:

I don't.

Chantal Roberts:

It's a mill, M-I-L-L. And back in the day, of course, our younger listeners won't know what we're talking about, but back in the day, there used to be gas stations which would say, Yeah, gas is one dollar and ninety-nine cents, and then there would be a little bitty nine up on the top of that one dollar and ninety-nine cents, like a little bitty nine, like a subscript or whatever, or not a subscript, because that'd be bottom.

William Auten:

Like a thousandth.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah, like a thousandth or whatever. Um a superscript. That's what it's called, a superscript. So, and anyway, uh that was a mill. And one guy, I have no idea how he did this, how he convinced a bank to do this, but one guy uh had convinced a bank at one time to give him all the mills that they collected from everybody, and he became a millionaire. I'm like, that's a genius idea. Anyway, but yeah.

William Auten:

Remember the movie The Office? No, office office space, I think it's yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Chantal Roberts:

I love that.

William Auten:

And they they did that, they they shaved off the fractions of the pennies in the in the trades on the stocks or something. Yes, yes, and they and then they burn the building down.

Chantal Roberts:

Yes.

William Auten:

That was a good movie. Don't burn buildings down, but don't burn buildings down.

Chantal Roberts:

Likewise, don't be like a gangster and and take your printer slash copier out into a field and beat it up with a baseball bat.

William Auten:

Oh, I've been close.

Chantal Roberts:

I can I have been too. I I I sit with my printer right next to me and thank god. Let's be thankful for our technology that we have. That's right. That was on the list too. You know, like these things that we are talking about right now. Uh internet that works, you know, claim systems that are up. Uh and I mean, because how unproductive is it when your claim system is down all day long and you can't do anything. But anywho, yeah, so I look at my printer every once in a while and I threaten to throw it out of my second story window and then take a baseball bat to it if it doesn't cooperate. And then all of a sudden, like it speaks English, it starts working.

William Auten:

Now you're probably too young to uh relate to this, but digital cameras uh are are a really big deal when I first started. It was 35 millimeter. We'd had to take them to the developer and you'd get free duplicates. Yeah. So um I started and then you'd have to you'd have to tape them all to the photo sheet and

unknown:

Yeah.

Chantal Roberts:

Yes, yes, yes. So yay, technology. I remember okay. Member by the way, Heather Blevins and I started like the musical version of the Art of Adjusting podcast because we just started singing randomly, but yes. So anywho, um we both remembered faxes. GPS. Oh god, yes, GPS. But we all remembered faxes that would come in over like the thermal paper, and after two years it like all went away. Yeah, it would all fade. Yeah, who knew? Yeah.

William Auten:

How many how many paper book maps do you have in your car these days? Because when I started this business, I used to have uh at least three. Uh and then a big New York State map. Um, I don't have any now.

Chantal Roberts:

No, I don't have any. No, I don't have any. And in fact, it's kind of fun because I do like to tell, I do like to do this to my students every once in a while. Like, how are you going to find your insured's house? And they're like, oh, you just point it in. I'm like, he lives in the middle of the country. Yeah, you there's no cell reception. How are you going to find you know, yeah, you can point, you could do Route One, blah, blah, blah, but you drive out to Route 1 and it is a cow pasture. What are you gonna do? That's the mailing address. But anyway, yeah.

William Auten:

So SMS messaging, uh text messaging has been uh really a game changer because it's been around a while, but I don't think we've been actively using it in my line of work uh until probably the last four or five years.

Chantal Roberts:

Um and uh I do have issues with it though. Although I'm become I'm I'm turning around to it. Go ahead. I interrupted.

William Auten:

Well, I from a business operations standpoint, um it it does a few things. Uh one, it um it allows for more immediate and direct contact because a lot of people are busy and they're not answering their phone or whatever. They get that text message and and they may respond to it at 11 p.m. You know, uh which is fine. Um at least now you've got a trail of contact.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

William Auten:

Um the other advantage is you can transmit documents and photos and um various things through through that medium, and that's been a big game changer as well. And the the last thing I love about it is um when you're when you're dealing with someone who is not a native English speaker, um, because you can use a translator app and communicate with them that way. I've had uh situations where on my end, I'm sending them translated messages in their language so that they can read them and they respond and and we we work that way. In other situations, they like it because they're the ones using the translator and they want to translate and and send it to me. And um, so that that's been for our line of work really important.

Chantal Roberts:

That's great. My original concern, and and it, and it's not becoming so much of a concern now, was that when we were texting people, it wasn't showing up in the claim file. And now with a lot of the major insurers, the adjusters can quote unquote text and it immediately shows up into the into the claim file. So I do like that. I do like that. Uh, because that's that's my main concern is keeping the the claim file intact.

William Auten:

Yeah. And what we have, we can import all that stuff into our claim file. So that's you know, if you're a carrier or anyone, you know, dealing with claims in any way, uh, try and find a system that'll allow you to do that because it's as valuable as email. I mean, emails transfer right into our claim files as well.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah. And so I'm sorry, and I was gonna say, and so often when we're sending emails to people, originally it lens lands in spam and and they say, Oh, you we've not been contacted.

William Auten:

Right. That that can happen.

Chantal Roberts:

Uh-huh.

William Auten:

Happens on both ends, and just one of those things you gotta watch for.

Chantal Roberts:

So absolutely.

William Auten:

What else from a tech standpoint? That I think that's all I have.

Chantal Roberts:

I want to move on. Because I want to ask, I want to do I want to do mad libs. I think that'd be fun.

William Auten:

Mad libs? Yeah. Okay.

Chantal Roberts:

Okay, so fill in the blank. I'm thankful for blank because it saves me from blank.

William Auten:

I'm thankful for adequate limits because it saves me from having to tell an insured that they are at risk of um an excess verdict.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah, that's brilliant. Yes. Yes. That's but that's a bad day. That is a bad day.

William Auten:

When you've got to tell somebody that uh look, there's somebody got hurt to the tune of X amount of dollars, and you only have uh X amount of dollars on your policy, it just it just sends them, you know, into the stratosphere with worry and but what are you gonna do? You know, so um make sure you have adequate insurance limits on your policies, people.

Chantal Roberts:

Absolutely. Yeah, I mean, I I have an umbrella policy, and I just can't get rid of it. I started it, I've I've mentioned this before. I started it when my two stepsons started driving at 16 because bless them, they didn't have one brain cell between the two of them. And and so I they I just petrified me that they would hit a bus full of nuns and orphans. And I cannot get rid of that. I I I just I I just can't. I mean, I would and I would love to raise the limits, uh, but uh it's through my underlying carrier, and they only sell a million. So please don't sue me for over a million, guys, because that's all I got.

William Auten:

Um, so they they are uh affordable too.

Chantal Roberts:

They are, it's like 300 bucks.

William Auten:

When you talk about the value that you get uh from that coverage as compared to some of the other insurance products out there. Um and I'll say this probably every episode: get a renter's policy. If you're renting an apartment, get a renter's policy. It's the it's the cheapest insurance out there. What is it now, 150 bucks a year? Yes.

Chantal Roberts:

So we've just started in class uh talking about the HO policies, and the students have just started to learn about the HO4. And because you know, they're like, I don't need to, you know, the H04 because I don't own the place. And I'm like, yeah, but here's the deal. Do we really trust Bill with cooking? I mean, he just said that we shouldn't trust Bill with cooking, so you know.

William Auten:

Well, there are many cases where tenants um are somehow related to an injury claim or a fire or you know, whatever. We had that's what we had a case where one tenant um the heat in the building was not controlled per unit. It was like uh it was like the whole place was yeah, and it was too warm for this couple. They didn't like it so warm, so they left the window open. Well, it went down to five degrees. And uh the radiator located right directly under the window that they left open, froze solid, and then uh thawed out and destroyed the apartment building because where were they that they that this that this lasted so long that they were able to get to uh uh I'm just they uh the floor they I I think it was the situation where they just um got up to go to work and just left things the way they were. They may have closed the window, which caused it to heat back up and and allow the water to flow again. By then the pipe was already burst and they came home from work uh to a flooded building.

Chantal Roberts:

Yep, yep, and they'll be responsible. Yeah, and I explained that to the students, yeah. So what's on your table for Thanksgiving?

William Auten:

Oh, that is gonna be traditional turkey for sure. Yeah, yeah. Mersh potatoes.

Chantal Roberts:

Uh oh, I love mush ma mashed potatoes. Yeah, especially when they're homemade. Yeah, yeah.

William Auten:

Probably have sweet potatoes too or um yams, you know, that kind of thing.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah, yeah. The regular stuff.

William Auten:

You know, we're stuff they see on a Thanksgiving greeting card, all that stuff.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah, yeah. We're not a big Thanksgiving traditional kind of uh I mean, you know, it it's usually just the husband and me, maybe the two kids and their spouses, girlfriends, all of that kind of stuff. So it nowadays it's almost impossible to get a small turkey. It's like 500 pounds, and then you're eating turkey until next Thanksgiving. So we've started doing untraditional stuff like Porchetta and uh, you know, yeah. Yeah, that's funny. Uh yeah, and and so it's definitely different, and and I like that. I definitely like that a little bit better.

William Auten:

So we usually have um 10 to 12 people, uh sometimes more. The biggest, the biggest one we had, I think we had almost 30 people here.

Chantal Roberts:

Wow. Um that's huge. Do you all do the cooking and the hosting?

William Auten:

Mm-hmm. Well, everybody brings something too. Oh yeah, oh yeah, yeah.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah, yeah. That's good. That's awesome.

William Auten:

Yeah, we have fun. Yeah.

Chantal Roberts:

That's good. Yeah. So let's see here. I um, you know, am thankful for all of our listeners. Um, our six, our six subscribers. Uh please share with your friends so that we can get nine. That's what I'm shooting for.

William Auten:

Sure, sure. I I have I have not looked at the stats uh for a long time until today.

Chantal Roberts:

Oh yeah, yeah. What do we have?

William Auten:

Uh oh, it's in the thousands. I didn't uh I I don't know, I don't remember the number. What I was looking at is the um the locations.

Chantal Roberts:

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Those are fun.

William Auten:

The cities, uh most of the cities are in the US. Uh-huh. But there are a lot in Europe. And um there was um there was this one, and I mentioned it before, that used to show up on every episode, and it was Ansbeck, Lower Saxony.

Chantal Roberts:

Oh, yeah, the Germany place.

William Auten:

Yeah. So I don't I haven't seen that one uh on on anymore. So if you're out there, come back.

Chantal Roberts:

Come back. Maybe maybe it was because you were gone and and they are listening because of you.

William Auten:

I don't know. I don't know anybody in Lower Saxony.

Chantal Roberts:

You know, who knows? It could be that. I actually know on I you know, we kid, or I kid about you know, our six listeners, but I know on YouTube I think we have like a hundred followers or something like that. So let's make it 103. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so anyway, happy Thanksgiving from all of us at The Art of Adjusting. I do want to tell you, next episode will drop on Thursday, December the 4th. And like I said, I've already got it planned for you so that I can ease you back into everything. Uh, is gonna be the rules of the road um for auto liability, which A, I think you'd like. But B, when I teach, or I'm sorry, I don't teach, I facilitate CPCU 530, which is the legal what insurance people need to know about the legal environment. I always talk about the rules of the road. I have this example where I use the rules of the road, and if you're not an adjuster, they're like, what uh this is so wrong. This is this person is at fault. I'm like, no, no, no, no, do y'all not remember the booklet that you had to study to get your driver's license? Yeah, the rules of the road, and everybody's forgotten it. So I thought it would be good to talk about the rules of the road again.

William Auten:

Is there a place we can find a copy of of that uh that document that you have to study?

Chantal Roberts:

I'm sure it's online now. Like, but every state is gonna be different. However, I think the rules of the road are mostly They're pretty universal. Yeah, universal. Like just because just because you have the right of way doesn't mean that you should go plowing through an intersection.

William Auten:

Right.

Chantal Roberts:

Like there's control of the for example, the thing that really starts this because the example is, and this just leads us into the next podcast. The the example that I use is a left-hand turn, and how a car was making the left-hand turn, and it deals with control of the intersection. Uh, and I show these various pictures, like one has damage in the back of the car. So the oncoming car, the car that quote unquote had the right of way because they were going straight, hit the car that was making the left-hand turn in the rear. Well, in my opinion, the car that was making the left-hand turn had control of the intersection because they were more than halfway through the intersection. Am I right? I mean you know, and so therefore, just because you have control of the intersection does not mean that you just continue to plow through. You have a duty as the rule of the road to yield.

William Auten:

Last clear chance.

Chantal Roberts:

Yes, last clear chance, exactly. So that's kind of what I'm doing. So I think you could probably just Google rules of the road, or like I know Arkansas, for example, had their book up on the internets, which is always correct, the internet's because it's on there.

William Auten:

I would like to to dive into four-way stops because nobody seems to know how to handle those.

Chantal Roberts:

Oh my god. It's it's always the person on the right, unless unless all four of you l get there at the same time, and then you do rock, paper, scissors. Okay, we'll talk about that next time. We don't want to spoil all the fun that we're going to have. Um, but yes, I do actually have four-way stops on on our all on our little agenda. So yeah.

William Auten:

Cool.

Chantal Roberts:

Yeah. So happy Thanksgiving.

William Auten:

Yes, happy Thanksgiving to you too.

Chantal Roberts:

And we will see everybody on December the 4th to talk about cars and everything. Bye.

William Auten:

Thanks for joining us on the Art of Adjusting Podcast, where we talk about life as an insurance adjuster. Hit that subscribe button real quick and tell all of your adjuster friends to check this out as well. For independent adjusting services, go to www.autin.claims. And for anyone interested in working as an independent liability adjuster, go to the contact us tab to join our roster.

Chantal Roberts:

So this wraps up another Art of Adjusting podcast. If you enjoyed this podcast or this episode, please give us five stars and a review. It does help the algorithm pick us up. In the meantime, you can contact me at theartofadjusting.com for consulting and training purposes.

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Chantal M. Roberts, CPCU

Co-host
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Heather Blevins, CPCU

Co-host
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Sandy Avina, MBA

Co-host
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William Auten

Co-host
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Nicholas Kearns

Editor