Help Your Clients Prepare for Flooding

During your region’s flood risk season, when flooding is likely to be top-of-mind, reach out to your clients to encourage them to take crucial loss avoidance steps and to assure them that you’ll be there after the flood.

Flood loss avoidance

When flooding is forecast or imminent, encourage clients to take flood loss avoidance measures that can help minimize flood damage and losses.

Your client’s National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) flood policy will cover up to $1,000 in reasonable expenses to protect your client’s insured property, and up to $1,000 to move your client’s insured property away from a flood or imminent danger of a flood.

  • Expenses to protect or move insured property, including:

    • Sandbags, including the sand to fill them
    • Fill to create temporary levees
    • Water pumps
    • Plastic sheeting and lumber
    • Boxes and packaging materials
    • Moving, transportation, or shipping costs
    • Labor, including your own or a family member’s labor, at the federal minimum wage. Labor charged by a professional may also be reimbursed.

    Note: Personal property that is moved must be placed in a fully enclosed building or otherwise protected from the elements.

Documentation 101

In anticipation of a possible flood insurance claim, make sure your clients have the following information on hand and in a secure, waterproof location:

Encourage clients to keep the follow flood insurance policy information on hand:

  • Their agent’s name and the name of their insurance company
  • Their flood insurance policy number
  • Their Policy Declarations Page, if available
  • The name of their mortgage company
  • How their agent can best be reached after an event