A builder and insurance assessor challenged by a tape measure...

PPC was contracted by Standard Bank Insurance Brokers to do an assessment on our boundary wall which was leaning outwards. Their report stated that: 1. The wall had collapsed - it hadn't. It did collapse four months later after a severe thunderstorm. 2. The wall retained 1.8m of soil. It didn't - it retained 1m of soil. 3. The wall had a width of 220mm (two bricks). It didn't - it was 220mm above the retained soil and 330mm (three bricks) below. 4. It didn't have true piers. It did. 5. The height of the wall was 2.3m. Yay ! They got this right. Their conclusion - the wall does not conform to regulations. SBI rejected the claim on the strength of this report. Non compliance to regulations is a stock reply anyway from SBI - they reject every claim on this basis. There is no insurance cover although you pay for it and believe you are insured. A wall is classed as a retaining wall in the current regulations if it retains 1.8m of soil. So this is where the figure in point 2 above came from ! After the wall collapsed I asked SBI to come and see how the wall was built - they refused. So I contacted a firm of civil engineers, Sinakho Consulting, who visited the site three times before submitting their report. Surprise - the wall retained only 1m of soil (so not actually a retaining wall) and did comply with the current building regulations for a retaining wall even though it had been build prior to the promulgation of the regulations. This and other docs were submitted to SBI. The claim was confirmed rejected by SBI as non conforming, and, after getting no joy from the Ombudsman (a toothless entity and a waste of time) either, I decided to contact the assessor, Ms Kretzmann at PPC. The aim was to try to get her to correct the blatant errors in her report and to resubmit it to the insurer in an effort to get the cover we have paid 47 years for. Ms Kretzmann had signed the assessment report although she was never on site. I pointed out the mistakes, particularly the height of the retained soil. I sent her a copy of the civil engineer's report and correspondence from SBI. A soil level of 1.8m and a wall height of 2.3m meant that the boundary wall was 0.5m (knee) high on the inside. Not so according to the engineer's report nor according to the pics on Ms Kretzmann's own report. The wall is shown shoulder height. However she stands firm on the correctness of her report. Really ?? I invited her to come and see the wall, which has been rebuilt the same as the original at a cost to us of R200 000. She has refused saying she must contact SBI to get a directive. This has been weeks now - she receives work from SBI but can't contact them herself ? She also says she is not an engineer but only a builder. Ah hah - don't builders use a tape measure too ? Perhaps SBI chooses *********** people on purpose to do their ********* work for them ? It would certainly seem unwise to use PPC for anything complicated like building something - you might just not get what you wanted. Still waiting in eager anticipation for her response...