On the Continent

After leaving Law school in the early 70's I had a brief work experience with an insurance company (agricultural insurances) and then with an insurance broker (contractors insurances). Intrigued and curious what Loss Adjusting was about I wrote to several firms for interviews. Shortly afterwards I found myself sitting in front of John Pollard, a thin wiry chain-smoking Loss Adjuster at the Robins Davies and Little Maidstone offices above the Phoenix Insurance Company. He painstakingly highlighted the negative aspects of being a Loss Adjuster. I was then dismissed for a month with instructions to think it over.

These days you call this a cooling-off period.

At my second interview I eagerly re-confirmed my interest in a profession I had little idea about, and later asked him – “why did you paint such a black picture of what it is like to be a Loss adjuster?” John Pollard (to become my employer and future mentor, I soon found out was nicknamed in the firm “The Boss”) replied “So that you can never say I didn't warn you! And what did he have to warn me about? Well if the answer is of any interest to you, read my second article.

After a successful interview I started as a trainee Loss Adjuster and within a month was assigned to a major fire loss in Bristol to assist on the stock check. In those days there were not computers and excel sheets so everything was committed to paper in the form of working notes – which you had to sign. For a month I counted nuts and bolts and reconciled these against stock cards.

You initialled the cards and initialled the paper roll from the adding machine. Stock lists were prepared manually. At Robins there was a hierarchical system where everything was checked and rechecked. For the first three years I never signed a letter or report – drafts were handwritten, and if approved, impressed onto letter headed paper by mechanical typing machines in the typing pool, with end-of carriage bells. Reports were signed “We are dear Sirs yours faithfully”.

The office was also manned on Saturday mornings.

The early years were also filled with quantum checking exercises. The ‘Boss’ would come back from a loss with detailed descriptions of items and I would have to go about Maidstone checking amounts. Today we use the internet for this purpose but at the time this involved telephoning or visiting suppliers to have confirmation regarding prices and discounts. Amongst the many, I became acquainted with Peter Bonnert the antiquarian horologist who had his workshop in an old warehouse building on the other side of the river Medway. “I’ll tell you what details about a clock you should obtain in order to enable me to tell you what type of clock it is, what it’s worth, and possibly who the owner is, and perhaps even who the previous owners were.” – how many times it chimes, and at what hour, where you enter the key to rewind it, the kind of numerals, and so on and so forth.

He was better than the internet.

One day I went to see him and when I was only halfway through my recital about a stolen carriage clock, he stopped me short and said – “Young lad I have the carriage clock here. A local dealer brought it in to me for restoration and valuation and I can assure you this is your clock!” And so it was to the displeasure of the receiver who was promptly arrested at Dover after returning from Paris where he had been for the weekend to spend his illgotten gains.

I was something of a novelty because I had studied languages and in particular Italian. In those days there were very few linguistical Loss Adjusters (outside the rugby community), and the Channel was, after all, the English channel. By the mid 70's I found myself on assignment counting veal calves sur le continent in northern Italy, a welcome change to cabbage garments in Hackney. During my three month stay based in Verona I worked side by side with agricultural expert Bernard Unsworth of Robins Manchester office and Trevor Ball the liability director at the Robins London Wall office. We worked in parallel with American Attorneys, Anthony Lanzone & Partners.

This Loss Adjusting and linguistical experience confirmed my conviction that sooner or later I would come to live and work in Italy.

I finished training and qualified as a Chartered Loss Adjuster in 1979 having had a superb training under the guidance of real professionals, to name a few John Pollard, Terry Clark, Charlie Bedford, and John Everett. Under Jack Redfern the firms’ esprit de corps was palpable as it was indeed in other Loss Adjusting companies. Stephen Richards said the same spirt was present at Pycraft and Arnold.

In between dealing with losses in the clothing trade in east London and storm claims in Thanet I found time to attend night school where I obtained a Linguists diploma.

In 1980 I came to Italy, initially for Brocklehursts, and in the late 1980's set-up my own company. In the early 90's we decentralised, purchased the office freehold in a small town equidistant between Milan, Genoa and Turin. On a sunny winter day you can see the snow-capped Alps. Unless we have visitors, dress is casual and save during telephone and conference calls, my office has permanent baroque musik in the background.

We have a name plate outside our offices showing we are Chartered Loss Adjusters. There is no equivalent Italian translation. Fortunately the locals do not ask us what this means. When we have visitors from the UK many remark this is what Loss Adjusting offices were like thirty years ago.

I take this as a compliment.

We deal with high-value property and liability claims mainly for multinational groups on Insured or Self Insured schemes and travel throughout Italy, and other central European Countries. I also get involved in specie work. Each day is varied in terms of the people we meet, the subject matter under consideration, and the amounts at stake. When I left England I also left behind me household claims. Hallelujah. They might have a different name today.

I enclose a photograph of the Venice Grand canal where I started writing this article some two weeks ago and completed this evening after having recrossed to the main land. In the meantime I have been dealing with a case closely linked to Thomas Mann. Any idea as to where I was ?

I hope the reader does not find this article too bland. Contrary to John Pollard I have tried to avoid discouraging any faint-hearted aspiring loss adjuster or to raise readers’ adrenaline levels. So if there is ever a second article, you will read of my knife-edge experiences in Italy where legitimately you will ask if this has been written by a Loss Adjuster or a fiction writer.

Interested?

A presto.