Crawford & Co. CAT Services Ready for 2005 Season

July 7, 2005

Charley; Frances; Ivan; and Jeanne. Those names still haunt residents of the Southeast; many of whom are still recovering from last year’s unprecedented hurricane season.

And the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) recently released its prediction for an above-normal hurricane season for 2005 — a season which began June 1.

Atlanta-based Crawford & Company, whose catastrophe services unit
(CAT) responded to all of last year’s hurricanes and tropical storms in the U.S. and the Caribbean, reportedly took away some valuable lessons after that experience.

As a result, Crawford has invested heavily in its Catastrophe Services Unit to make it a state of the art, premiere catastrophe response program for the industry.

Recent changes in the program include:

New Leadership

Bud Trice, who has almost 30-years of catastrophe experience, was promoted to lead the catastrophe services unit. Trice has been a part of several CAT teams handling claims from both man-made and natural catastrophes.

Some of the more well-known catastrophe’s he has handled include the Valdez oil spill, war damage in Kuwait and Hurricanes Elena, Alicia, Frederick, Andrew, and Iniki, as well as last year’s hurricanes in the southeast.

New Technology

Crawford invested in a fleet of satellite communications trucks to
facilitate voice/data transfer when infrastructure is compromised. These satellite trucks will allow Crawford CAT adjusters to begin processing claims immediately.

New Personnel

Crawford increased its administrative catastrophe staff in Atlanta and
have identified, contacted, and renewed relationships with more than 1,000 independent and retired adjusters to be “on call” for the company. Beverly Trice, a 15-year claims services professional, was also hired as a long-term consultant.

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