LOUISVILLE, Ky. — As clean up continues in disheveled yards and on hollowed-out homes, both elected leaders and professionals are sounding the alarm on potential storm related scammers.
"I feel like a lot of bad actors in the industry, they'll use the urgency to make you sign different contracts," Ryan Jackson, who works for Louisville Roofing, said. "Whether you want to use them or not, you're locked in with this contractor."
Jackson said those bad actors make up about 10 to 15%.
"It's very angry and frustrating. Like I told you, I swore to myself, I would never do that," he said.
The issue is a personal one for Jackson after his experience in the aftermath of the 2012 Henryville, Ind. tornado, when an EF-4 tornado was on the ground for nearly an hour, covering 49 miles across Indiana and Kentucky with maximum winds of 175 miles per hour.
"There [were] power lines on the road, fire trucks everywhere, grapefruit sized hail on the road, and people are already knocking on doors and dropping door hangers," Jackson said. "I just remember driving by and being like, 'I'll never do that.' I was in the industry—we're not going to be three hours after the storm."
Now, working in one of the hardest hit neighborhoods in Buckner, Ky., he's noticed an uptick in opportunistic service.
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"While working on this project, we've seen wrapped trucks, full logos driving by—men we don't know—like roofing companies we're unaware of which is pretty rare for us," Jackson said.
The issue of post-storm scammers was on the mind of many of Kentuckiana mayors, mere hours after the storms.
In a post to social media Thursday, LMPD officials said they "want to make sure you & your family don't become victims of fraud while you are trying to rebuild."
The post offered up tips for avoiding scammer contractors:
- Get more than one estimate
- Get everything in writing
- Ask to see the salesperson's driver's license and write down the license number and their vehicle's license plate number
- Never sign a contract with blanks; unacceptable terms can be added later
- Make sure you review and understand all documents sent to your insurance carrier
- Demand references and check them out
- Never pay a contractor in full or sign a completion certificate until the work is finished and ensure reconstruction is up to current code
- Never let a contractor pressure you into hiring them
In Jeffersonville, also hit by a tornado, city officials posted road blocks in the hardest hit areas to prevent onlookers and some contractors from hindering the clean up process.
"[We] want to protect people from a lot of the contractors that show up all the sudden from out of state and I would warn people to be careful," Jeffersonville Mayor Mike Moore said. "There's an element out there that looks to take advantage of this time and don't just write a check and sign a contract with somebody you don't know anything about."
Contractors from Ohio, West Virginia and Tennessee have all flocked to the city looking for work, Moore said.
To make sure you're doing your due diligence, Jackson said to be weary of contractors who are willing to forgive your insurance deductible.
"In the state of Kentucky currently, it's a state felony to forgive it," Jackson said. "So if someone's willing to commit a felony to do your roof, I think that's an issue."
You should also check if the contractor you're looking to hire has general liability and workers compensation insurance.
"It'll show that they're financially responsible contractor, that their men are covered on the roof," Jackson said. "They expose you to risk by doing your house if they don't have that."
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