Having your commercial property and potentially your livelihood damaged due to flooding is a tough experience for anyone. It’s natural to be scared about the expense, inconvenience, and chaos that come with water damage clean-up. For anyone who has recently experienced commercial flood damage, you’ll want to ensure you contact your insurance company and turn off electricity and gas immediately in your business. Following the initial reaction, there are a few essential steps to follow, which can potentially save your commercial property and business.
Water Damage Clean-Up
In the event of flooding, you should call a professional flood damage restoration company, such as Clear Choice, and not attempt to remove any of the wet or contaminated materials yourself. If the area affected is more than a few square feet or is in an area containing hazardous materials like chemicals or asbestos, you should also call the fire service. The reason for calling the emergency services is that there may be gas leaks or structural damage, which can be further damaged by prying eyes and hands.
The materials used by professionals have been carefully selected not to cause any damage to your business. It is recommended that you get a water damage restoration company that uses proper protective equipment and has trained professionals. While it can be tempting to try and cut corners by dealing with the issue yourself, you’ll often find this causes more damage than good.
Call Your Insurance Company
You’ll want to ensure you have everything documented when it comes to making your insurance claim. If they have any reason to doubt that you’ll be able to recover from the damage, they’re likely to drop your claim. The best thing you can do is take a few minutes and jot down what you did in your first twenty-four hours after the flood. This will help you explain what actions you took immediately and what actions still need to be taken. An example would be that if a basement is flooded and it damaged some shelves, computers, or office furniture, they might ask for photographs of the damage prior to any repairs.
How much does Water Damage Restoration Cost?
A professional should be able to give you a rough estimate of the cost after seeing what damage has occurred. Professional water damage services can also offer access to insurance adjusters, which can help with negotiating your insurance pay-out. You should expect the cost of flood damage to be between 15% and 20% of your annual profit. This is because in order to get your business back to where it was, there is going to be a lot of labour and material involved.
Reopening Your Business
This depends on how much damage has occurred and what type of occupancy permits you require from your local government. The general rule is that if you are not allowed into the building until the structural damage has been repaired, cleaned, and sanitized, then your business should not be allowed back into the building until all of these conditions have been met. If your building doesn’t have a basement, sewage has backed up on the second floor, or floodwaters have reached higher than the first floor, then you’ll need to work with an environmental company to ensure that any sewage and water is safely removed.
Types of Water Damage
You may not be aware that there are a few different types of water damage that could harm your commercial property. All of these types of water damage come with their own risks to your building and human health.
Clean Water
Clean water damage usually comes from leaks in the kitchen appliances or the building’s water tank. These are low-risk problems that can be solved with quick action. Leaving stagnant water to stand for a long time can be dangerous because different organisms and pollutants can seep into it.
Grey Water
Greywater is any water that’s been used for anything other than drinking. This includes cooking, washing dishes, or cleaning. Greywater poses a moderate risk to human health, and you still will need to follow flood clean-up procedures to avoid future issues.
Black Water
Blackwater is highly unsanitary water contaminated by sewage or other harmful chemicals or agents. This type of water is unsafe for humans to handle because it has the potential to make people sick. A water damage restoration service has the equipment to clean this up.
The quickest way to clean up a flooded commercial property or a fire damaged property is to have an experienced and competent commercial flood restoration company attend to the job. Clear Choice can work with your insurance company to provide an accurate description of the damage and work required to return your business to its former state.
