Survey of Hail Victims re: Ceiling Dust Insurance Claims

By Rosemary Ayoub, The LEAD Group Committee

The LEAD Group attempted to contact 92 hail area residents who had contacted The LEAD Group's telephone advisory service about ceiling dust. Unfortunately, many hail victims have had to relocate during repairs so contacting them proved difficult.

RESULTS

The results were:

1. unsuccessful calls:
   No phone number specified and insufficient information to obtain the number from Directory Assistance - 15.
   Wrong numbers / no answers - 11.
   Number of callers who failed to return calls after answering machine messages - 14.
2. callers actually surveyed (total of 52):
   Number of callers who didn't require ceiling replacement - 9.
   Number of callers requiring replacement of at least one ceiling - 43.
3. breakdown of the 43 callers needing ceiling replacement:
   Of the 43 callers who required ceiling replacement all but 3 had submitted or intended to submit quotes for ceiling dust extraction. 1 of the 3 people not intending to submit quotes had decided not to do so because he already knew that NRMA wouldn't pay. 2 were tenants in a rental property.
   There were 13 callers who had not yet submitted quotes and all agreed to contact The LEAD Group as soon as they had a decision.
   2 callers of the 27 who had submitted quotes for ceiling dust extraction hadn't been advised yet of the decision. 1 of these callers was insured with NRMA.
4. breakdown of the 25 callers who had been advised about their claims:-
   All but 7 of those 25 callers who had submitted quotes for ceiling dust extraction and had been advised about the claim had had them approved for payment by the insurer. Of those 18 that were accepted, 3 callers had submitted the quote within the builder's quotation.

Those insurance companies that had approved ceiling dust extraction were:

GIO, ROYAL AND SOUTHERN, ZURICH, MERCANTILE MUTUAL, WESTPAC, QBE, COMMONWEALTH BANK INSURANCE and ROYAL AUSTRALIAN ALLIANCE

Of the 7 unaccepted quotes for ceiling dust extraction, 6 were from NRMA and one was from QBE. There were no surveyed callers who had claims approved for ceiling dust extraction from NRMA. The callers were given a number of explanations for this (none as yet in writing, one caller is still waiting and fighting): the following verbal responses from NRMA were passed on to the LEAD Group by four different residents (names withheld):

1. "They don't believe it's a health hazard and even if it was they argue that it's a maintenance problem."
2. "They said their health and law codes don't require that they pay for it."
3. "They won't pay for ceiling dust extraction. They won't pay until the ceilings have come down - for clean up."
4. "NRMA are not doing anything - It's not a problem they say."

The rejected QBE caller asked verbally if they would pay for extraction and they said "no".

Another QBE caller had been accepted for ceiling dust extraction but not for clean up after repairs were carried out without her knowledge. Old building materials were dumped on her front yard. QBE will not pay for topsoiling (name withheld).

No Response to Complaint to ICA

The LEAD Group wrote (by email) on the 20th August 1999 to Chris Henri of the Insurance Council of Australia (ICA) to advise ICA of the insurance survey results (above) and to complain about the inconsistency of policies on ceiling dust removal among ICA's membership. The biggest complaint was about policies not being put in writing. To date, no response has been forthcoming (3 months later). On 25th November 1999, the complaint was faxed to ICA and a day later still no acknowledgment or response has been received.

The Formation of ADRA

By Elizabeth O'Brien, ADRA Development Committee

In August 1999 over 50 ceiling dust contractors from around Australia were invited by The LEAD Group to a meeting to discuss a proposal by the Lead Reference Centre, The LEAD Group and a number of ceiling dust contractors in Sydney, that ceiling dust contractors set up their own association. At the proposal meeting the name Australian Dust Removalists Association (ADRA) was chosen and the date was set for the inaugural meeting of 5th October 1999. Again, all ceiling dust contractors in The LEAD Group's database were invited to the inaugural meeting and at that meeting it was decided that a Development Committee be formed to get the association started and to clarify and begin to implement its role and goals.

The ADRA Development Committee consists of 5 members (with no two members from the same dust removal company):

Peter Kearns of the new Lead Dust Centre
Chris Lawrence of Insulvac
Colin Rule of Lead Alert
John Kessey of Australian Lead Free Services
Elizabeth O'Brien of The LEAD Group

The ADRA Development Committee has set about investigating training possibilities for ceiling dust contractors and deciding on a structure or affiliation that will help achieve the following:

Certified training for ceiling dust contractors and requests to Standards Australia and WorkSafe (National Occupational Health and Safety Commission) to fast track the development of a Standard and Code of Practice on Building Cavity Dust Removal which between them includes:

• guidance on circumstances which trigger the removal of building cavity dust
• how to remove it,
• equipment required,
• waste recycling and / or disposal,
• clearance guidelines or other methods of determining the safety of the property for inhabitants during and following the dust removal process, and
• health monitoring requirements for ceiling dust contractors and other building, demolition and emergency workers who are regularly exposed to building cavity dust.

At its inaugural meeting on 26th October 1999, the ADRA Development Committee drafted a Code of Practice for the association to address the majority of the six points listed above, and agreed on a financial support mechanism for the association during its development phase.

At the second meeting of the Development Committee on 9th November 1999, CTI Consultants presented a proposal for an ADRA-accredited training course to be developed before April 2000 for the limited market of around 50 dust contractors. Representatives of the Lead Reference Centre (LRC) (a part of the NSW EPA) and WorkCover NSW also joined the discussion and the draft Code of Practice was able to be distributed to all ceiling dust contractors with the minutes of the meeting. WorkCover has already provided comments on the draft and it will be attached to the WorkCover Guidelines on Dust Removal due out at the end of 1999. At the NSW Lead Service Planning Meeting (12th November, 1999) meeting attended by Elizabeth O'Brien the EPA's Graeme Head made it clear that ADRA would need to make it's own approaches to each relevant government body (eg Waste Section of NSW EPA, WorkCover Authority, TAFE, Standards Australia) as the Lead Reference Centre is closing and lead issues are being "mainstreamed" back into each relevant government department.

Graeme Head, now Assistant Director General of the EPA, (in charge of waste and contaminated sites policies) agreed to meet with one member of the ADRA Development Committee to discuss the ceiling dust issues raised by The LEAD Group in a letter to Environment Minister Bob Debus. A fact sheet on waste disposal was drafted by Patricia Parkinson, Master of Environmental Law, at the Lead Advisory Service for discussion at the meeting. Graeme Head viewed favourably the desire and effort at simplifying the EPA's waste guidelines in a special publication for ceiling dust contractors. Education about ceiling dust for renovators was also suggested as a possibility by Graeme.

The second full ADRA meeting was held on 23rd November 1999 and representatives of ARCA Asbestos Removal Contractors Association (affiliated with the Master Builders Association) and BISCO were asked to write their affiliation offers for the Committee to review on 14th Dec 1999. TAFE advised that if training for ceiling dust removalists was made mandatory in regulation (like asbestos training is) and if 2000 contractors looked like attending the course in the next few years, then they could offer cheaper training than CTI, some time down the track.

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