And For What? A Little Bit Of Water

I'd like to write a little bit about a topic that is near and dear to most of our hearts: insurance. A lot of people like to dump on insurance companies, so someone needs to put their foot down and say something positive. And that foot is me. The insurance industry should be commended for being a renegade in the business world, where everybody else places paramount importance on customer service. If you can manage to piss off your customers while making a handsome profit, you must be doing something right. What has been happening since Katrina is a perfect illustration.

The Attorney General of Mississippi is suing five insurance companies in order to get them to pay out claims for water damage, which are excluded from coverage in most policies. The insurers are correct to claim that flood insurance is sold by the federal government, and is supplemental to policies with private insurers. After all, the flooding that happened recently across the Gulf Coast just came out of the blue, right? You can't really prove that it was a result of the storm surge that came about because of Katrina and her high winds, can you? I hope I will have this kind of ingenuity, when on trial for murder after pushing someone off a tall building, to argue that it was the impact with the ground that caused the death and not my shove.

A number of insurance companies were also thoughtful enough to issue cheques for living expenses to their policyholders who were affected by Katrina. All they asked in return was for the policyholders to sign a document to acknowledge that the damage to their homes was caused by flooding and not wind, thus absolving the insurers of claims. It didn't matter whether the homes were thoroughly inspected to assess what the actually cause of damage was, or that the policyholders were under great duress when signing the document. The insurers were there to be Jacob to the victims' Esau. Vince McMahon is still trying to line up an angel for them.

Even if the lawsuit in Mississippi is successful and the insurers have to pay out claims for flood damage, they won't be losing any money. They will recover the funds by upping the premiums for all of their policyholders. You have to love insurance companies. They are the only businesses in the world who can reap large profits without assuming any risk. They have my utmost admiration.

Tune in next week when I wax poetic on garden snakes.