The bowling alley’s sign out front was all that remained after the blaze, but instead of reading “Reopening Soon,” the sign reads, “DELAY BY INSURANCE,” according to the paper.<\/p>\n
![\"The](\"http:\/\/blog.myphillylawyer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/5-17-12-bowling-alley-blog-by-adventtr-iStock_000015119928XSmall1-300x225.jpg\" "\\"5")
The burned out Garden Spot Bowl in Lancaster County wants to get its insurance settlement and be able to rebuild as soon as possible, but its insurance company is apparently delaying that process. Image credit: \u00a9 iStockphoto.com\/adventtr<\/p><\/div>\n
That\u2019s got its owners Don and Cheryl Kercher upset, since they expected to be rebuilding by now.<\/p>\n
The insurance company hasn\u2019t avoided paying all of the business\u2019 claims, however, according to the story. \u201cThe insurer provided four checks, each for $32,500, to cover operating losses for May, June, July and August,\u201d the paper reported. \u201cIn September, it sent $400,000 and notified the owners that it would be the last money until the claim was settled.\u201d That payment went to the bank and is being held in escrow for the mortgage.<\/p>\n
Now the business owners and the insurance company are in a stalemate over how much money it will take to rebuild the bowling alley. Originally, the insurance company asked the owners what it would take to rebuild, but they rejected that figure, according to the paper. The insurers later rejected a lower figure and asked the business owners to give an exact accounting of all the equipment in the destroyed building at the time of the fire. That was difficult, of course, because all the records and receipts were burned up in the blaze.<\/p>\n
That put the owners behind in their schedule to reopen because they thought the insurance company was working with them to come up with a settlement figure so they had not yet begun creating such a detailed list of property, the story reported.<\/p>\n
North Pointe’s parent company, QBE, declined to comment to the newspaper about the case, citing privacy for the business owners.<\/p>\n
But that wasn\u2019t the end of the story. Even after the owners submitted lists of what was destroyed, the insurance company continued to ask for receipts to prove that the items had been in the building. Those were the same receipts that were burned in the fire. It was a bowling alley \u201cCatch-22\u201d if there ever was one.<\/p>\n
And that\u2019s where things apparently still stand, the owners say.<\/p>\n
“We don’t know where to turn,\u201d Don Kercher told the paper. \u201cWe really don’t.”<\/p>\n
The whole scenario is just not fair, and it\u2019s a tactic used all too frequently by insurance companies in all kinds of cases, from property claims to auto accidents to personal injury cases, says Saul Langsam, a partner with MyPhillyLawyer<\/em>.<\/p>\n Once fire marshals have investigated a fire and ruled out such factors as arson, insurers should move in to pay claims swiftly so that property owners can get their lives and businesses back together as quickly as possible, Langsam said. \u201cOnce arson has been taken out of the equation then there\u2019s absolutely no reason that there should be any delay in the processing of a claim.\u201d<\/p>\n What can happen, though, is that the little guy is basically defenseless and insurance companies often try to hold on to their money as long as possible so that it earns interest and dividends for the companies and their shareholders, Langsam said.<\/p>\n \u201cIt almost borders on \u2018bad faith\u2019\u201d by insurance companies, when they don\u2019t fulfill their obligations to their policyholders, he said. \u201cInsurance companies have to be mindful of being sued for bad faith, especially if their intention is to drag their feet to avoid paying a claim.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s not a new practice, Langsam said. \u201cThat\u2019s just the way of the insurance industry. It\u2019s sad but true. They do what they do best, which is drag their feet. If your payment to them is late, they penalize you, but if they delay they don’t worry about you.\u201d<\/p>\n To fight this, you need to bring in competent and experienced legal help to protect your rights.<\/p>\n \u201cYour lawyer will investigate to determine whether the insurance company has properly completed its own investigation and if there are any alleged delays, can determine whether they are legitimate or of the insurance company\u2019s own doing,\u201d Langsam said. If the delays are unfounded, your lawyer can then send a demand letter by certified mail which makes a demand for the insurance proceeds. Usually that includes a payment deadline or timetable, or else the attorney will proceed with litigation in the courts. That will mean additional interest, costs, and legal fees for the defendant insurance company in pursuing a collection that you never should have been forced to file.”<\/p>\n We hope that The Garden Spot Bowl will soon receive their insurance payouts and finally be able to get their rebuilding project on track.<\/p>\n If you or a loved one is ever involved with an insurance company that is slow to pay your legitimate claims, be sure to talk to a lawyer to move your case forward.<\/p>\n When Winning Matters Most, Call MyPhillyLawyer<\/em>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The owners of a Lancaster County bowling alley paid their property insurance premiums and successfully ran their business in their community for years, even giving special discounted rates for local groups that wanted to put on special event s and fundraisers. But since a huge fire burned The Garden Spot Bowl in Strasburg to the…<\/p>","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[63,64,37,1,65],"tags":[821,822,167,823,465,231,804,824,825],"class_list":["post-1755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-law-in-the-news","category-law-you-can-use","category-myphillylawyer-cases","category-news","category-the-law-and-you","tag-bowling","tag-business-destroyed","tag-business-owners","tag-fire","tag-insurance-bad-faith","tag-insurance-claims","tag-insurance-settlements","tag-lancaster","tag-property-loss"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myphillylawyer.com\/yue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1755","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myphillylawyer.com\/yue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myphillylawyer.com\/yue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myphillylawyer.com\/yue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myphillylawyer.com\/yue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1755"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.myphillylawyer.com\/yue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1755\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6607,"href":"https:\/\/www.myphillylawyer.com\/yue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1755\/revisions\/6607"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myphillylawyer.com\/yue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myphillylawyer.com\/yue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myphillylawyer.com\/yue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}