Photographing a Roof for an Insurance Claim

Documentation

On an insurance job, photographs are not marketing. They are the evidence the claim is paid on, and they are read by someone deciding whether to release money. Two identical houses on the same street after the same hailstorm routinely settle differently, and the difference is usually that one file had dated, slope-by-slope photographs and the other had a phone call and a memory.

A complete Edmonton roofing job produces four distinct sets, and each one does a different job.

The four sets of photographs a claim needs

• Pre-loss and pre-repair. Every slope, wide and close, dated. This is what establishes that the damage existed, where it was, and that it predates any work. Once a tarp goes on or a shingle comes off, it cannot be recreated.
• Test squares and collateral. Marked squares with counted strikes, plus the dents in gutters, vents, flashing and AC fins that prove impact rather than age. This is the set that answers a wear-and-tear denial.
• Tear-off and decking. Each failed sheet photographed in place with its location marked. This is what gets a decking supplement paid instead of argued.
• Completion. The finished roof, slope by slope, submitted with the final invoice. On an RCV policy this is what releases the held-back recoverable depreciation — frequently the larger half of the settlement.

Why the last set is worth the most money

If your roof settles on replacement cost, the insurer pays in two parts and holds the depreciation back until the work is done and evidenced. The completion set plus the final invoice is the evidence. Homeowners who never send it simply do not receive the second cheque, and nobody chases them about it. The mechanism, worked in Canadian dollars, is in ACV vs RCV on an Alberta roof claim, and the order the whole thing runs in is in how a roof insurance claim works.

The first two sets come out of the inspection itself — see what the free inspection includes. You get them whether or not you use us for the work.

How to photograph it yourself, before anyone arrives

• Shoot from the ground, in daylight, before any tarp or repair. Do not climb a wet or damaged roof for a photograph.
• Wide shots of all four elevations first, so the close-ups have context.
• Every dent in soft metal: gutters, downspouts, vent hoods, the air conditioner, the garage door, fence caps. Soft-metal damage cannot be produced by age, which is what makes it the strongest evidence in the file.
• Interior damage, with the date intact in the file metadata. Do not crop or edit.
• Hail on the ground next to a coin or a ruler, if any is left.

What you will not find here

Stock photography. The roofs in image libraries are Mediterranean tile under palm trees, or American architecture that does not exist in this city, and an Edmonton homeowner spots it in about a second. Nor will you find other companies' work presented as ours. When project photographs are published here they will be this operator's own work, shot on these roofs, and until then this page carries none.