How Restoration Contractors Can Avoid Coronavirus Derailing Payments

Restoration work is particularly still essential during COVID-19.

Join this webinar to learn:

• Tips for protecting payments to avoid disputes
• Best practices to keep your core business strong
• Why chasing COVID-disinfecting projects can leave you liable

Full Transcript

Pierson:
Thank you everyone for joining in live. And then we’ll obviously be recording this and sending it out to everyone who registered and then a lot of the other restoration contacts in our system. Um, obviously everyone knows what’s going on in the world right now. Coronavirus is a global pandemic. Um, and we’re kind of curious to see what that means for restoration contractors. Um, cashflow is as important as ever. Um, and so is protecting that cashflow and adhering to the core principles of your business. That kind of puts you in a good position, um, to fight through this entire ordeal. So we’ve got Klark Brown on today, uh, restoration thought leader, founder of air, uh, restoration advisors, a close partner of Levelset and a guy who is well known in the field. I think maybe I’m doing a disservice throwing all that stuff out. Um, Klark, if you don’t mind, when you want to introduce yourself in case anyone doesn’t know you, uh, by name or reputation.

Klark:
No, I like what you said. You said a lot better than, I usually say it, but, um, Oh, I am just, um, I find myself in a position where I like to, to be a lot of places, a lot of time and help a lot of people in a large scale. Um, so I, I’m a, uh, was a contractor in the commercial large loss world for a very, very long time, um, mostly commercial on floods, fires or quakes, tornadoes, et cetera. Um, and then I just became more of a risk manager for people helping me just get back in business. And, um, the travel just got to be insane. Um, over the 50 years we had lots of storms and I started restoration advisers, my company, and I’m literally just an advisor and a coach to companies that do that kind of work. So there’s a, certainly a lot of information and just trying to flatten the curve of knowledge, if you will, if I can steal that. But, um, there’s a curve alerting. There’s, there’s a cost to learning if we can just cut a few dollars in a few years off of that for some people. And see it and pleasant just helps our industry raise the bar. So, um, those are the things I do and yes, I’m a great partnership with Levelset and a lot of my clients and colleagues have turned around their collections in their, even their stance of trust with their customers with using Levelset.

Pierson:
That’s awesome. Yeah, no, you’re absolutely one of the experts that we like to rely on and lean to when we’re looking for more insight into whatever industry or vertical that we’re going to be working with. Um, so right here I’ve got a quick slide with just our contact information to where we’re going to run through a lot of stuff today. Uh, if you have additional questions, um, yeah, more than welcome to follow up with any of us. We’re available and we’re ready to talk. Um, so throwing up now I’ll wrap it up with that as well. So real quick, we have a few topics that we’re really gonna focus on today. Uh, a tips for protecting payments throughout, um, or avoiding disputes as a whole. That’s important. Like, if this is a world without coronavirus, it’s extra important. Now we’ll talk about why. Um, we’re going to talk about why chasing COVID 19 disinfecting jobs can leave you liable to a gluttony of different surprises that you do not want to be dealing with.

Pierson:
Um, and then of course, some best practices to keep your core business running strong, um, to our, you can motor through, uh, the fallout that’s, you know, gonna impact the entire country. And then we’re going to wrap it up with a Q & A to where you guys submit whatever’s on your mind. We’re going to talk about it and it gets matched from card. Uh, so let’s, let’s start off with that first topic. This is something I know that we’ve discussed. I think it’s fairly, I would say certain, um, but when there’s a lot of uncertainty, property owners are gonna be receiving checks to where pay $40,000 cash made out to them. You have just done work on a large loss or a residential loss. We’re feeling that they’re going to be holding those checks more often than they normally would, which is already a threat. Klark, what have you been hearing from the guys that you work with and uh, the folks in the field?

Klark:
Um, the very same thing and I think the word that we need to go back to every time is a certainty that’s uncertainty on when this will end. Uncertainty on what the government’s ability to help the small businesses or the stimulus checks are. And we’re finding there’s still some uncertainty on some of these policy language on what’s covered and what’s not. Um, so again, it’s paralysis analysis when people aren’t sure we tend to freeze until we get more information. And so, uh, we’re seeing that a lot with our claims and really have an up our game with onboarding our customer and set some expectations and things like that. But on some of them they just say we just don’t know. And I’d rather know that on the front side than the back side.

Pierson:
Can you tell me a little bit more about, um, onboarding the customer? Cause I feel like that’s going to align with what we try and, uh, help restorers do.

Klark:
I think it’s the second best thing you can do. The first thing you can do is set up your mission and vision for your company so that your customer, before they even maybe find you, they see somewhere either written on your website or they’ve heard from your friends what you stand for. Then you match that with an ability for your frontline, your middle. And everyone at your companies succinctly has an approach to the customer to provide information that’s going to remove as many question marks that they have. We don’t know if this is the first time or a third time or customer’s ever been through anything like this. Making assumptions is always a very risky thing. So onboarding your customer and telling them that what it’s gonna look like, smell like, how long this will take, what they may actually encounter with that specific carrier that they’re dealing with.

Klark:
Cause we all know characteristics and traits of certain carriers or even regionally what happens. So if we, if we help them and guide them through the claims process as the expert they hired and not just another contractor and certainly not a servant of the carrier who’s holding the deck first and put the customer first but onboard them with the end in mind, meaning at the end of this thing, I need them on my team. When it comes time with it, that check is really slow to come here. You want them making that call with you to the carrier because their voice carries a lot more weight than yours. So I teach on this an awful lot. Um, it’s different for different people in the company, but technicians are obviously earning trust, but they might not be dealing with the money as much, but more on the workflow. So that’s what onboarding means to me.

Liam:
Klark, I have a question for you and for the audience. My name is Liam Duddy. I’m an account executive at Levelset and had the pleasure of working with a lot of restoration companies, um, here. Um, Klark, what do you, what are some of those methods? What do they look like? Those onboarding methods, like we send notices, we send correspondence emails, make it real easy for companies to do. So what are some of the methods that you’ve seen work for companies to get that message across?

Klark:
Well, uh, so we, we, our industry is divided into small companies and medium and sometimes it’s even mental that they think that they’re, they are too small to have big company processes. But I will tell you if a company will adopt some measures, it’s like what you do, if they sit like the minute they set an appointment with the customer, they hang up contact. If they will send over a bio and even image of the people that are coming to their house. There’s also, there’s immediately recognition of this is real. These other things that I’m worried about. Is this guy going to be seven foot tall and this big or is he going to be real small? You know, those kinds, that’s if you put yourself in a customer’s point, that’s probably the first thing for any company is stop being a contractor. Become a customer while you design these.

Klark:
And how do you like to be treated? We all have the, you know, Chick-fil-A and you’ve got places that have great consistency in service. That’s what you want to create. But so obviously some upfront and then doing exactly what you say and then having a, you know, maybe an owner or a senior manager call hours later just saying, Hey, you know, this is so and so. I understand my team was out there. Cause sometimes they’ll take the customer, we’ll tell the owner or general manager something different. So just those kinds of steps just continue to stack the features on there for the customer. But it can be both digital and just in actions and honestly keeping your truck clean. Listen, if your truck and your equipment and your attire is clean, that’s part of your onboarding process. It’s a very subliminal thing, but it tells the customer you care enough about yourself and your own stuff, so you’re probably gonna have a better chance of taking care of their things.

Liam:
Yeah, I like that. That’s a good point. I admit, I haven’t really thought about that before. And especially now with everything that’s going on, you need everything to be clean.

Klark:
Speaking specifically about COVID, it’s sending the customer and my clients and bullying. Most people say industry, you’re starting to do this. Send them a good breakdown of what your processes for disinfection are and what your PPE is going to be in every case. How you’re protecting each other, sending that beforehand, setting them at ease that you’re not going to crowd and space them. There’s some of your processes that might be different during this time, but those are very specific to today’s culture.

Pierson:
Yeah, I think we have a, we have a sly ring dive into that and more specifically about COVID. I think you’re a little bit, but there’s something that you, you talked about just now. Klark, we’re used to, we’re saying, uh, setting the right expectations. Um, so if people don’t know much about level set, we help contractors with their lien rights. This isn’t supposed to be about using level set to do it. This is the process that contractors should be doing regardless with their lien rights. They’re given the rights that they have to get paid. Um, so I’m to kind of walk through our version of what setting those right expectations are and you know, having actionable next steps. And then if you two want to chime in, like as I walked through that I’m all yours. Um, so right here, uh, at the bottom we’ve got one of our guys, Brian Daughtry, uh, one of Klark’s guys that he works closely with a member of air.

Pierson:
He uses this same exact process that we’ve really learned from him about setting those right expectations with customers to where we can avoid situations, uh, where the property owner is holding the check, cause they understand the consequences involved. But it’s also because you’ve, like Klark said, stack the right things on top of each other. It’s about extending an olive branch and building the brand throughout, not just threatening a lean on somebody. So upfront, Hey, we’re starting a job. We signed work authorization. Let’s say it’s a quick job. It’s just water mitigation. It’s not like a huge reconstruction project. Um, as soon as we wrap, we’re to want to send a notice that’s acting as a friendly reminder, kind of saying, Hey, heads up. Um, you know, we appreciate that you chose us to do this work. Wanting to give you the notification that, you know, X, Y, Z state that we’re working in.

Pierson:
They have a lien deadline of 90 days. No reflection, no poor reflection on you. Basically we just need to get paid in time or else the state has a file lien or when it’s phrased like that, it’s not about threatening the customer, it’s about educating them on a world that they’re not normally in. So it’s still building that brand of they hired an expert here, um, and communicating with them, Hey, how smooth can we make this to where we get the check faster? The faster we’re out of your hair and it’s back to life as normal for you. So we want to get that to the customer, set the right expectations with them, and then also send it to carriers adjusters to where they understand if they’re the cause of a delay with the check, the customer is not going to be mad at you guys.

Pierson:
They’re going to be mad at the carrier for waiting to release a $50,000 check and potentially lose 100,000. I mean, a million dollar policy. Um, so that’s a huge aspect of it is setting the right expectations with the right message, with the right expertise from there, following up at a certain given time. A lot of guys, let’s say net terms of 30 days, um, if we’re not paid by then maybe another warning or we can send out a notice of intent to lien. Uh, this is basically gonna escalate the situation, let them know that, Hey, we obviously know the next step and it’s threatening that a lien will be filed against the property in 10 days, 15 days according to the state statutes for the state that you’re working in. So again, it’s kind of giving them an opportunity to say, I don’t want to force this upon you, but this is the last option before we have to jump to the nuclear decision of filing the lien.

Pierson:
How can we work through this now to get paid and get out of your hair and have life back to normal after that? Obviously it’s the final step of filing the lien, protecting the payments. Um, but from looking at guys like Brian looking at other guys that me and Liam have worked with, Klark works with, when you do a really good job of setting the expectations from the get go with that initial notice when it is necessary, following up with the notice of intent. And those are the contractors that are getting paid at their net terms and they’re not filing very many liens. Um, that’s really my message to where we’re going to see more property owners hold checks. Let’s just try to, you know, incentivize them to not do that and treat it like business as usual to where your cashflow stays protected and you’re a little bit sheltered during this time. Um, now I know I just spoke a lot, uh, kind of rapid fire, but I wanted to hear from Klark maybe your thoughts on that process or like other twists or turns that restorers could take that could add to that.

Klark:
Well I think you said it very, very well and I think back to onboarding every person in your company top to bottom needs to know this process so that it becomes an echoing effect that the customer says, look, you know, this is, it’s our intent is to get a five star review. And I know you don’t usually get five star reviews from putting liens on properties, but I also know that we have a lot of people here to depend on this company for this product, for the families and getting paid is a very crucial part of it. So it just said we do these all the time in your, your, your technicians is much as you trust them. I know Brian very well. He may feel comfortable saying we had, you know, 300 solid claims last year, never actually got to the filing of the lien, no.

Klark:
If you feel comfortable saying that set your customer needs because the word lien, depending on where people are in a business world, they’re, they’re extremely frightening or not knowing anything about it. So the more you can quickly, without getting super deep into the munition, you can explain that to them. But I think again, echoing it, calling each of these deadlines, just have real quick courtesy calls saying, Hey this date’s coming up? And I don’t want you to be surprised when you see it. We talked about it, but I know you’ve had a lot going on. I just think the more you can stay in contact and that’s it, that’s a two or three minute conversation or voicemail.

Pierson:
Right. And I think what’s also important is that a lot of the States have these deadlines set up for, you’re not calling just to check in and you’re calling for a reason because you are also against the clock because Hey, we’re just trying to follow the state’s requirements. So when the States have a 60 day, they have a 90 day deadline. That should be the absolute cutoff to where AR should not age past that because we’ve been using the lean process and that window before beforehand to where if you can draw a line and then adhere to that and your uniform with it, that’s how you get the results that you want to see. And again, that doesn’t take Levelset, that takes following the state laws, sending the right notices and then what Klark saying, having the right message throughout. Um,

Klark:
I’ve often said guys, that Levelset like many other things are another, they’re your partner instead of the tool. And the tool belt, the Batman, it’s, it’s not the always go to, but it is something there. It’s, it works in the background. It’s automated and, exactly. And I can’t, I mean, people who have AR, it’s just some unsurmountable amount of cash flow issues from AR that really dove into level sets are using a process beyond their fears. Come to find out their cashflow looks up, their customers give them reviews. Wasn’t as big and scary. But um, I’ve had a lot of people tell me it just changed the game for them.

Pierson:
Cool. I appreciate that.

Liam:
Yeah. I want to make a quick, go back to the, go back to the slide. I want to make a quick point too. Um, the notices that we send out initially or those that you should be sending out, they’re really not threatening in any mean, uh, like you mentioned, uh, Klark, they’re, they’re customer centric. They got the your bio. Um, and I don’t want to focus on Levelset I want to speak generally our process it should relate as well to others is um, you know, we’re, we’re, we’re making things customer centered from the get go as you see here, it gets to the red. We’re getting there when it’s like Pierson mentioned, when it gets to that 60, 90 day deadline Mark where you need to, you know, maybe escalate an issue. And that’s really what we’re trying to eliminate and that’s what it all starts with setting expectations. Like you mentioned Klark and having that customer centric facing front from the get go and having this sort of work in the background. Like you mentioned where you’re still making the phone calls of course, but you have this work in the background as a compliment. Um, I just wanted to make that point.

Pierson:
Great one. Uh, one thing I want to touch on because, uh, Riche just posted in the comments section and I actually, I spoke to Rachel on the phone yesterday, so it’s good timing. Um, he’s talking about in Maryland how they must have a judgment prior to placing the lien. Uh, what can we do within our system to complement the efforts? So Maryland is one of the handful of States, there’s about four of them that requires an attorney to be present to do the filing. Um, when you’re talking about doing something in our system or your own internal system to compliment their efforts, it’s exactly what we’re talking about here. So when we’re sending these notices or for one providing a paper trail for the efforts that we have made to remedy this before the lien actually is part of the conversation. Um, and then also if there are state requirements that need to be met, it’s been met the correct way.

Pierson:
So when it is handed off to an attorney, they can look back and understand, I can just go to work on what my expertise is. I don’t need to scramble or go backwards and double check and make sure that everything has been done correct up until this point in time. Finally, if we’re doing all of this again from our data, those are the people who are not filing many liens. So that’s the ultimate compliment is if we’re sending these notices at the right time and we don’t have to file liens, then we don’t have to worry about that question. Um, so that’s kind of what I wanted to say towards that. Um, and same thing guys, you can keep the comments coming in. We’ll address them as they pop up. I’m going to move onto that next slide cause I know it’s going to be a big hot button issue right now. Why don’t you take this Liam?

Liam:
Yeah. Um, Klark, we spoke about this a little bit. I have a, I know you have your, you’re gonna have the most to say about this as you have the most spirit experiences within this group. Um, you know, could you just kick off with this topic? What is your name when this comes to the forefront, what is your main opinion on this right now at the moment?

Klark:
This is certainly one that, um, I actually did a, an all day webinar yesterday for the RIA, which is the restoration industry association. They’re a 75 year old trade association and like many other things, their, um, their annual webinar, which was scheduled to be in new Orleans, your backyard like many was canceled due to the COVID pandemic. So they wanted to provide a, um, a lot of really good topic and they had experts that were industrial hygienists, uh, chemist, uh, everything, you know, doctors, medicals. I’m, I’m clearly not a doctor, but, um, I had a very specific segment about that and we can talk about that in a minute, but it’s very topical. Um, I started out when this thing first started happening that if you were, um, first off, you have to remember that many small businesses are going to be very emotionally reactive to our business, can be shut down.

Klark:
What’s a new opportunity to avoid that, which is a great thing that’s comes from our heart. I don’t want to lay anybody off. I want to keep making sure that everyone has a job when they come back and their families are fed. So this looked like on the surface that this was a great opportunity for one to chase. But I w I would tell you that if you have to ask if you’re qualified to do it, you’re probably not meaning what certifications I need that are different than what I do daily to do this kind of work. Um, that information has been flooding the market, so it’s coming out. Um, so generally there are some certifications that I would say restoration contractors should be pursuing. Um, they are the ICRA, the ICRA, some people call it, and that’s infection control risk assessment. There’s such a thing by OSHA called hazwoper 40.

Klark:
Um, you should in this downtime, it’s great to get your staff to get there, hazwoper OSHA, which is a lot again about donning and doffing and the right protection with your PPE. Um, the CDC and the who have done a really good job of publishing the improved chemicals. So, and then it gives, comes back to it and I’ll bring this all back. But the other big thing is the terminology and what people advertise that what you are doing, what you can would, you should, you shouldn’t be advertising you’re doing any that you can’t prove and the word and the terms, we will come in and kill COVID 19 is not something you should be doing. It might happen. Um, it might, but in a lot of cases we don’t even know if it’s present in a place.

Klark:
So these, all these kind of formulate that. So I will kind of simplify bringing it back. There will be a large number of commercial properties for sure. And then residences, a residential homeowner could clean their own home with bleach. And water. Um, things matter. Like is there a confirmed case there? Is there an exposure? Has there not? The CDC has said if there’s not exposure at a property, don’t spend the money in the time and the energy and the social gathering to clean a space that might not be caused posing a threat. Um, but there are going to be a large quantity of just whatever shutdown businesses are going to want to have a level of compliance saying that we can bring our staff back in were relatively safe. Um, there are some considerations on your extra insurance you might need. You might need more liability in pollution policies.

Klark:
Much like mold remediation requires a pollution policy to cover for those things. Your regular policy might have exclusions for this. Those are things you need to talk to your broker about. Saying if I were to pursue this kind of work, how am I positioned for coverage? So those are some of the things, but why chasing it can leave you liable. Um, we are in this industry watching maybe pressure washers, um, pest control companies going out, spraying really who knows what making claims that we will kill and leave and make this place safe for three months. Those aren’t true statements because there’s no testing to back that up. Um, and, and it, and also they don’t know how to price that and, and it’s, it’s just hurting everything. But what it’s doing is it’s causing more addition to the bad information that’s being in the confusion of information.

Klark:
But um, it can be done the right way, but there is a lot of information like at the RIA and with the, uh, the air store.org. You know, come there and post your questions if you want to, um, but get the right information. But if you aren’t sure, I would recommend you, you kind of let this one go by for now. Um, and then last thing I would add to that, you guys probably heard me say this before, we’re running into a real issue with supply chain. So the proper PPE and the production gear that we need to wear to do this work is becoming very hard to get your hands on. And what this might do is if you’re going to pursue these types of jobs, it might make it difficult for you to perform the kinds of work that you normally would, which are your general, your fire, your water and things like that. So all these things become more of a strategic thing is am I actually gaining any that thing or am I actually put myself in a, in a bigger risk category?

Liam:
I have a question. You mentioned commercial jobs sort of coming up about increasing for a contractor that’s traditionally doing restoration, sorry, residential restoration work. What are some ways they did successfully pivot and attract that commercial, those commercial gigs or methods? I’m just curious myself.

Klark:
Well, first thing I think that any, any restoration contractor that’s going to be doing this work needs to re create and write and publish a protocol. Um, um, people believe and trust and things that they can see tangible. Like if you spell out the steps of this is what my company is doing to protect ourselves and our equipment and our trucks and our vehicles and how we are protecting our clients. If you have a written protocol and what this will look like, how long it will take, much like setting the expectation again, then they can pursue because there’s going to be far more properties than there are contractors.

Klark:
It’s, it’s going to be one of the things where if the right people can put themselves in position, we’re doing the right work. There’s going to be a lot of good need and work for a lot of people, but, but one of those is just publishing what you do, right and then everyone in their property. I get the question, how do I get commercial work? Well, we pass commercial buildings all day, every day and if they don’t know you exist, change that. Drop in, give them your card, take five minutes, buy your lunch for your team from that restaurant, and then talk to the manager and say, Hey, by the way, you ever have a flood or a fire in here? This is what we do. We love, we hear every day. People love to shop local and small businesses. And, um, I often hear about people saying, I don’t get any commercial work. And I said, but do you ever pursue it? Do you ever talk to commercial properties? You go into the bank and you leave them your money. Have you ever mentioned to them, Hey, the way and in those places, that stuff happens every day. So does that answer your question?

Pierson:
Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. I appreciate that. Um, yeah. One other thing I want to talk about before we move onto the next topic is, so you talked about, alright, maybe talking with your insurance broker, seeing what covers you, um, the PPE you have, having the right certifications, those are all steps that might qualify you to actually go after this work. Let’s say you meet all three of those. What are you still gonna run into other pitfalls that we’re maybe not seeing right now? Um, or you think that’s like a good checklist to start off with?

Klark:
I think it’s good. Like I think there’s still a lot that we don’t know. Um, again, you, you going to continue your- first and foremost, you’ve got to put your client, you’ve got to have a very candid conversation with what they think and what they expect and they’re watching the same CNN, Facebook and they’re flooded with information and they’re brother-in-law told them that no chemicals help. So you’re gonna need the, you need to really get good at juggling those and pursue that. Now I have some clients that are processing 15 to 20 of these projects per week right now. So they’ve mastered it, but they’ve gotten these steps one through eight in place, but then talking to their customer and again, the customer’s expecting a, an extremely, almost a janitorial price on something while your overhead and your cost to do business might not, it might prohibit you from minimal to be that cheap net low. So I think the depth is make contact customers and have a sit down and say this is what we’re going to do. My section yesterday, by the way, Liam and Pierson, was on the professional pricing of this word. Uh, some people are a square foot, some people are trying to go all these different ways. Um, and we just kind of loosened up some of those questions and showed what some successful contractors were doing. Um, but Pearson, I maybe if I didn’t answer your question you can ask me one more time, but I think it…

Pierson:
yup.

Klark:
This is also problem. This is also probably going to be a cash, a cash job for a lot of people. Again, a lot of people’s business insurance isn’t going to cover pandemic. I’ve already seen a lot of policies that have exclusions for pandemics and of course that’s been in the news as well. And that goes back to policy language, which they need to be talking to their insurance representative. Those very specifically about that. But this might be a cash job and that might show that might change how you approach this thing.

Pierson:
Okay. Cause. Yeah. Would that be reason… I’m talking over you… Um, it’s not an additional question again. Um, just with what you said with jobs being, um, more cash, you know, cash jobs coming about, do you see that posing a risk for payment issues? Potentially?

Klark:
I think , think it needs to be Cod at that point. I think you need to be a, an agreement that possibly, um, a credit card on file, possibly half the money upfront and then an agreement that on the ed completion as you walk through and show the customer what you’ve done, you’re expecting to get that done there. But I would certainly say in those situations than what I’ve seen. There’s some cash up front and um, you know, not again, no reason to wait 60 days if there’s no insurance installed.

Pierson:
Kick onto the last topic we have here. Yeah. So last step, like obviously we’ve talked about, Hey, we’re going to see a rise in property owners holding checks. How are we going to avoid that? Uh, some pitfalls that we’re going to see with guys chasing COVID money. Um, but let’s bring it back to the basics. Klark. Um, I want to hear about some of the core tenants that every restorer should be practicing right now. Um, to keep those core competencies, core competencies like churn and along to where that’s what pushes them through to the other side of this.

Klark:
Yeah. Big topic. Big topic. Thank you for bringing this one up because what we’re seeing is, um, the hysteria of this is just come running through, coursing through everyone and that would start with things like, remember you have a business and remember this is going to pass. It feels like, but this is going to be eternal, but in 21, we’re going to be looking back and we’re all going to be telling stories about where we were when this happened. Much like I kind of kid this to 911, I kind of have some of the same feelings as I did the days and the week after nine 11, we were kind of frozen. Nothing felt normal. We weren’t focused on the things that we had before. Um, so the thing I keep remembering this is going to pass, we’re gonna go back. So that means your company, you know, your staff is working at home remotely.

Klark:
You know, you need to be in contact with them. You know, people may not be used to working from home and they, they may feel real detached. It’s checking in with your home, remote monitoring, remote operating people. Um, I’m watching a lot of people turn off their advertising and marketing for their core competencies like you mentioned, and focusing on only COVID. Like I’m watching advertisements, flood, flood, flood, social media about this is what we’re doing now. I’ve been critical and Mason jokes, I said, if you, people would market this much without COVID, I think your, your communities would really know about you. Like people are marketing like they’re mad man. I was like, I don’t ever hear from you until we have a pandemic. So if they kept that level up, they might, we’ll see their businesses grow from recognition. But I’m watching a lot of people forget about if you specialize in water and mold, they’re trying to specialize in this water and mold damages are still happening today.

Klark:
I was just in Florida for five days for a uh, an 11 story building, seven floors, flooded water ran about 18 hours. Those things are still happening. Plumbing is still breaking. Plumbing is immune to COVID19 pandemic. So people need to just stay focused, put their head down, wait for this thing to pass. If they want to pursue some code, it needs to be a small branch of their company, but they need to keep their eye on this cause what’s happening. And I’ll turn to Mike over those that a market that are doing what I’m saying and keeping our eyes on it are monopolizing because others have shut down and they’re not showing themselves as being present. So if, if contractor a and a market sits still and just keeps moving forward and markets that he does water and fire and mold, those that aren’t and they’re focusing on something else, those customers are finding the guy that’s marketing and he’s taking them all.

Klark:
I’m watching it daily. And um, those people may not ever come back. They may stay with this new brand. So I would say just keep your, keep your head about you emotionally, draw it back in. Remember that your leader of your company and if you had a goal, keep that goal straight in front of you and don’t, don’t let this take you off of it. It’s annoying, it’s distracting. But it’s our job as leadership to, to push through this. And I’m seeing some good examples of that and I’m seeing some poor examples of that. And I think that’s more driven by personalities of the owners and the leaders of the company.

Pierson:
Yeah, I appreciate that. Klark, I was actually going to ask the question, what are some things that shouldn’t be overlooked with COVID 19 being on everyone’s mind? That’s a really good point. Um, so they shouldn’t, absolutely. Uh, what I was really trying to pivot to is, I think that there’s more to dig at right here, but we should probably hear from the folks that are watching it right now. Um, so like obviously if you have got more topics on your mind that’s related to kind of what they should be doing right now, Klark, feel free to share. But I’d like to ask some folks, uh, chat in right now with some questions that they want addressed.

Klark:
Well, I’ll, I’ll add here that I think the, and you and I talked about this a few weeks ago when we were like, even coming up with the idea to have, this is our industry. We talked early on about some of these SLPs and onboarding, things like that. Well, everyone’s pretty slow right now and if you were fortunate enough to get in front of the government’s, you know, payroll protection plan, you get to keep your staff on, everybody gets to keep working. Now is the time to take advantage of that slow time, sit down as a team, as a group, and start creating those SLPs and processes that are gonna set you apart from everybody else. And, and plan on when we come out of this thing, when we finally break this, this nexus and this vortex we’re in, we’re going to be a completely different company and we’re probably going to rise.

Klark:
And so those things, again, this, this is not a time to freeze, is the time to dig in, let the things happen around us. Social distances. You need to everybody be it in the warehouse if I stand five feet apart, but we can’t create systems on the stuff that we do over and over and over that we just always kind of slightly don’t do the same way. And the customers realize it and they’re like, well, you’re not real consistent. So I think now is one of the things that I’m very passionate about. Building repeatable, consistent, concise system so that every time you can, you’re, you’re doing the same thing and everybody knows where to pick up where the other left off.

Pierson:
Yeah. You also mentioned too when we spoke is having, um, resources out there conveying that you’re still open, making sure that people know that you’re an essential service.

Klark:
Of course. And that comes from, yeah, it can be community service. You can be taking some of your supplies to the hospital, you can be delivering. We’ve got a chapter guys in Eastern Idaho of all places, Idaho falls, which is on the border of Wyoming and Idaho, which, air, all the business development, uh, men and women that are part of that chapter, which are our 18 companies. At about 32 people, they formed what’s called air angels and they’ve reached out to all these, uh, meals on wheels and all these other things that have seen fewer people that are volunteers. They’re stepping in and filling the places of volunteers and providing meals to nursing homes and to people, you know, living in a, in a, in a home that are used to a meals on wheels, but the drivers of the volunteers are the elderly and they’re more susceptible. So doing something like that in your market and then also on the side of your vehicle, we’re still open, we’re out running the streets, we’re still present and top of mind and we’re still, we’re an essential business. And you know, again, a lot of people did start putting up, you know, the essential on their website or you know, I’m deemed an essential business, which is, some people said, well we weren’t sure if you were open or not. So I’m glad you are.

Pierson:
Great. Good point. Yeah. Make sure that SEO is picking that up if it’s on your website. Cause that was, I mean I think we did a good job with that question just now. Maybe one other piece to add. If there’s anything to add to it, let’s talk about, but if not, we can skip it. But that’s amazing. Guerrilla marketing, getting out in the community, making a difference, you know, making a name for yourself. You talked about trying to find commercial jobs. Hey, stop by at the bank, have conversations with them. It’s a little disruptive to be able to do that. Like you normally would be. Um, you just gave a great example. But outside of that, what kind of marketing should restorers be focusing on right now to maybe get the best bang for their buck? Um, when they can’t do the traditional sources of walking into a business and seeing what’s going on, you know,

Klark:
well, I think phones and emails still work and I think I would say I appreciate the distraction from… Let’s talk, let’s contact your insurance agent or whatever, marketing resource referral partner and ask them how they’re doing. And they start asking those questions saying, you know, how are you, if you have a plumbing partner, ask, how’s this affecting your business? And this is what you know, and share with them. Tell them this is what we’re doing to cope and cope and make it through this. Maybe this is something that your plumbing house could do and maybe use, give them a completely different way to look at things. And they’re going to remember this when this thing starts to really get back up. So again, I’ve always been a person. If you help others succeed, you will succeed. And that that works. And works and works every single time.

Klark:
And those that rise to the top in the market are usually those that are looked at as giving before they’re taking. So certainly efforts like community service, you know, go get some groceries for people, whatever you needed to be, supplement just fine. Every community is different. There’s D, everybody has a different uh, demographic. So you kind of, we should know. Big cities are different in smaller. Um, but I think, um, if you’re practicing, you’re driving around practicing social distancing and you’ve got your mask on and say, you know, we’re going to come by and we’re going to leave it at your door. We won’t see you. We’ll wipe it off before we do whatever. But there’s definitely ways to get creative, but it takes you stop thinking about COVID and thinking about ways that you could help people that are dealing with it.

Pierson:
great. Great. Um, I’m gonna kick it over to this last slide as we kind of wind this down. Um, again, I’m gonna throw out a beacon, try and see if we can have some questions thrown into the chat and then we’ll have Klark or Liam or myself cover, you know, whatever you guys want to talk about how many people we’ve got. Yeah, we’ve got 20 sitting in here live. Um, I know we had, uh, multiply that quite a few times for who registered to be receiving a recording of this. Um, so I would assume that more folks will be hitting us up with questions maybe later this afternoon or next week after they’ve received the recording too. Yeah. And everyone you can see, you should be able to see a little Q and a, um, icon within the zoom, um, thing. You can post a question there. Feel free to just to throw it in the chat. Whatever works for anyone.

Klark:
Yeah, we prompt them. People might be anyone that’s watching that might be, now listen, this applies to roofers and any contractor, but if anyone is, has a success story and has found a niche or something that really working well for them or, um, I’ve heard of some people that raise money for the fire department and now all of a sudden they’re cleaning the firehouses. So if anybody has something unique that might can be shared with possibly hundreds later, that’ll be great.

Pierson:
So while we wait on that, I might just bounce another question or two that’s been in my head. Um, do I like there’s a lot of liability on you actually. Let’s pause that. It’s more important. Someone else came in. Um, Laura said, how can we keep from appearing or how can we like not appear money hungry when trying to file liens at this point in time? Um, so I think a big part of that is going to be you’re following the state requirements and the lien is the nuclear option. So that doesn’t necessarily have to be the big focal point of the conversation. It can be more of, Hey, this is not about you, us like thinking you’re a bad customer. This is just the state laws and I know this is not the world that you live in. I wanted to make sure that you’re aware of them because we do have to follow these rules.

Pierson:
Um, so for one it kind of, it shows that you’re trying to adhere to what’s required versus you care about money upfront. Um, and then also introducing the part of the conversation to where, Hey, this isn’t just about you. We want to send this stuff to the insurance carrier because in our industry they tend to delay payment as a whole. And when that happens, we’ve got no other option but to file the lien because we’re not getting paid within that set deadline. Um, so if we have you on the same page as us, then they’re going to prioritize that claim. You can get paid faster and this is never going to be an afterthought. So maybe those are two ways to approach it. One compliance and then be putting yourself on the side of the property owner, um, against maybe the insurance carrier, um, as far as the need for sending out these legal documents. I hope that addressed that. I’ll touch on that. Go ahead Klark. Go ahead Liam. I’m wanting to take a stab at it too.

Liam:
Yeah, yeah. Laura, I’ll touch on that a little bit. Um, there’s, we have some customers that will send out, um, a letter that memorializes essentially what Pearson said, basically saying this step does not reflect, reflect directly on you or your insurance provider if they are the ones that pay quickly. Unfortunately, some, some companies try to slow pay causing mitigation companies they’ve been on financial hardship. So sending out like a, some sort of letter talking a little bit about that, letting them know it’s not their fault, you know, it’s your state law really sets those expectations and there’s a lot of people that will send that letter at the beginning of the job. Bounce off what Pearson said. Go ahead Klark.

Klark:
Hey Laura, can you type into the box? What, what kind of company do you have? What services do you provide? Are you a Firewater restoration or manufacturer? What’s your field of service? Cause it’s gonna kinda, I want to play off of that a little bit and while I wait for that, um, I’ll, I want to speak from the stance of our industry, but the, that I can probably speak the most about fire and water. Our work that we do requires a large amount of empathy. Um, we have to be very, very empathetic to the situation that people are going through and our customers. Okay. So there are high volume program, general restoration contractor. Okay. So I will approach that in a second. But, so our industry, we, we, we ride along of teeter-totter or a Seesaw of empathy, but we can’t forget that it’s not evil to be a for profit company. I mean, honestly this, this nation is built off of companies being profitable. And I always tell my customers when they say, well, you know, why is the money so important to you guys? It’s because I think we do really, really incredible work and therefore I want to stay open so we can serve more people. If I think I do a good job, then my being profitable allows me to help more people and scale, which you said you’re high volume.

Klark:
So I don’t think that we’d, I think that appearing money hungry might be in our own heads. I don’t know that most customers work jobs and they realize what would happen if they didn’t get paid. So I think if you kind of, if shift that and not be afraid to ask for the money because it’s required, it’s, you know, you had these gentlemen, they showed up at 2:00 AM they wore these PPE, they left their families on Easter to go through things they need to be, you paid for that. That’s how this world works. Um, but I’ll, so you mentioned high volume program, general restoration contractor. When you say program, I’m thinking you probably only managed care programs for some carriers. Well that, and I, and I’m a big, big speaker in this industry about trying to become independent, which is why we charted, started the Alliance of independent restorers.

Klark:
But that causes some confusion on who you work for. Do you work for the carrier? Do you work for the homeowner where you’re still working for the homeowner and they’re still ultimately responsible to pay you. Although you may get a check directly from the insurance company causes it, causes you to get in a real confusing spot, but your practices with your lien process and everything you do still needs to be customer centric because they are the one that incurred the loss. But asking for money and even using tools like level-set shouldn’t be viewed as, um, as, as, as money grabbing. They shouldn’t be viewed as you’re diligent, you’re professional and you want to have a professional firm like Levelset to do it the right way. Cause what you don’t want to do is fallings too early. You’re Mister window and then expose your company to all the losses that at mountain curves. I hope that helps answer that question a little bit.

Klark:
Yeah. So, so, uh, Laura’s company is on, is on some, some, uh, vendor programs where they’re called by the insurance company. And you know, again, I wish that equaled, guarantee a payment, but it doesn’t always do so. So I think, uh, now that being said, I, and I don’t know, maybe Pearson and Liam, when you’re on a vendor program, I know that changes a little bit how you can use the lean process, right? Depending on the agreements that you’ve entered into. I don’t know. I couldn’t speak about that, but, but that’s just my 2 cents worth. And I want you guys to make sure you read what Zach wrote there too.

Liam:
Yeah, exactly. I saw that. That’s great. I was just gonna acknowledge that, that that’s awesome. Back to what Klark bout getting out to your community and…

Klark:
yeah, I want you to, because I want to see these pictures of the bunny years on these guys that better be on that social media. If I go look and hunt him now, I better see some advertisement. I always say you need PR and if you’re doing good work, you need to show people the good work that you do. So, um, but yeah, I would say guys, I don’t think it’s, if you, if you’re worried about me and money hungry, you need to make sure. And look at what you’re charging. And if you’re uncomfortable and you think we charge too much, you, you might need to have an internal conversation. I’m not putting anybody down, just saying come to terms with that because when you’re proud of what you do, it comes a lot easier to collect on the money and ask for it of what you’re deserving.

Pierson:
So there’s one last thing that I want to touch on. Um, that was mentioned for through Klark, by programs, meaning like what are the lien rights, uh, like what, what’s the difference? Is there between a traditional job, cause you might have some kind of causes in there with the, uh, liens themselves. Um, I’m a answer that and then we, I want to bring up the other question that was served on the Q and a and then we’re going to wrap this up. Um, so as far as the program work with liens, um, there’s really only two States in the country where liens can just be waived outright in a contract. So a lot of times that’s more of just an understanding that if you’re taking this all in, you’re not going to be filing liens. Um, but it’s not necessarily something that typically holds up in court generally speaking.

Pierson:
So not out here trying to say you should be slapping them Willy nilly, but you also shouldn’t be cow taling to um, you know, not taking the right steps for protecting your own payments. So this last question, uh, it was one from the Q and a was I think this is obviously for Klark. Can you explain the wording? Um, for the legality of saying like we disinfect, uh, which means it’s 100% clean versus we sanitize the area or items cause that’s going to be a big role for the guys that are chasing COVID money right now.

Klark:
So yeah. So the way we’ve tackled that, and again, I don’t want it to seem like anyone’s sidestepping because we can’t test and we can’t validate that term that, that we’ve killed the virus that we’ve made that thing safe for anyone. I will tell you this, if I clean a building or home or a commercial property the right way and five minutes later or two minutes later, someone walks in that is actually positive for the covid 19 and they’re not pro, if they’re not suited up, that building is once again potentially compromise and I can’t be responsible for that. So when you say disinfecting, I would normally say what we’re saying is we will do a deep clean with a registered disinfectant. So we will remove the bio, what’s called a bio load to the biofilm, which is just any kind of bacteria Laden surfaces on high touch areas.

Klark:
But it’s not making a claim legally saying that everybody can come rushing back in here. There still should be the protocols. You should, you know, someone’s, their fever should be tested and things like that. But just stay away from anything that the absolutes of 100%. Uh, and if a customer demands you to give that, I would certainly step away and say we just can’t provide 100% because you might have someone come in right behind us or something, but you are applying something that’s cleaning the surface but you don’t know if that served. Chris has a COVID spore cell on it or not. You’re just cleaning all services to make sure that there’s nothing on it. So if none of the hospitals, hospitals don’t claim that their facilities are 100% disinfected, they’d been in food grade plants, they can’t guarantee that. They can just guarantee that they cleaned it with the appropriate cleaning agent and that at the moment that they cleaned it, it was clear, but there’s just no real specific testing for COVID. There are other testing guys and James, I don’t know if you use ATP. ATP meters are a bacteria swabbing system that can be measured. Again, that’s it’s just generally over bacteria and fungus, but not COVID specifically. So, I hope that answers the question a little bit,

Klark:
but I just in, in, in final term, I would stay away from the hundred percent claims, the, the, the, the claim saying that we’ve disinfected this thing for no one would get sick. Not even CDC recommends that you make that claim.

Pierson:
Cool. So, uh, for now I’m going to say that’s a wrap. Uh, we covered a lot today. Um, obviously we could go much more in depth with every topic, every, you know, fold of the discussion. Um, so if anyone who did attend or gets the recording would like to talk with any of us after this, um, about those topics, here’s our contact information. Uh, we’re available for this and we’re happy to help cause we know this is going to be a stressful time, not just for you guys but for the world as a whole, as a whole right now. Um, so I’m going to go ahead and end the, in the meeting, but again, feel free to reach out if you guys want more clarification or additional help. Is there any notes from you Kark before you

Klark:
sign out of here now? Just, um, this is, I’m real proud of our world right now. And people in general, mostly this is when leaders step in, they lean in and out and people are looking for answers and, um, you know, some people are propping others up and this is, this is kind of what we do in that village mentality. So everyone just keep doing, um, what you do and, and, and uh, keep your ear on information and double check and fact check everything. But just, uh, thanks everyone for being here.

Liam:
Thank you Klark for, uh, join us and everyone attending is, is, is a good time. Appreciate your time. Awesome. Thanks y’all. Take care guys.