Good morning. We had a homeowner with a pier and beam house back have a copper line under the home freeze and bust. He hired us to repair it and 5 months later he found a small puddle of water. We warrantied it as it was a pinhole leak on our pex fitting, but now he wants us to replace all his kitchen tile saying the pinhole leak caused his piers to settle. I sincerely doubt that since I've seen 2' of standing water not move piers but if I turn it into our insurance they'll just pay him off to go away then cancel me or skyrocket our rates. How would an adjuster be able to determine the cause of the settling? Also, if we did cause the settling, I'd be happy to pay, I just can't imagine how a small 2'x2' puddle would be enough water to shift piers. TIA
Not at fault but customer says we are – Plumber
byu/Actual_Street_8468 inInsurance
Posted by Actual_Street_8468
2 Comments
Are there any older pictures to see if settlement was from before or not or a way to know when it settled?
Also, is there rain water pooling in the same areas?
Has this happened before and did the client put claims for this to insurance companies before?
Why was there a copper line in an area that freezes? That is suspect too. How long was it there?
Finally, ask them (without accepting fault yet maybe) what they think the damage amount is so you have a number to think with.
Side note: how many liters of water can run from a pinhole over 6 months or so? To help you determine if this could be due to the pex.
You’d probably need to have a civil engineer – not sure if structural or geotech would be best in this – do an analysis but they won’t be able to if the home owner won’t let them on the property to do it. They would have to cooperate with insurance if insurance went this route and they wanted a payment.
Insurance’s job is to defend you on claims, I’d probably contact your insurance explain that you disagree with this customer’s assertion, however, they want to pursue a claim. Provide your insurance all information that you have and/or is available and just let them handle it.