Contents Estimation & Restoration

The fundamental aspect of your work as a restoration company revolves around inventorying, documenting, and restoring contents. Your primary goal is to restore rather than replace whenever possible. However, the task of contents estimation is often disregarded as a secondary job due to its tedious nature and perceived lack of impact.

However, there will inevitably be a comprehensive inventory of items that cannot be restored and must be estimated for replacement. Currently, your contents estimation department follows a similar process as outlined below:

1. They receive a list of contents that require replacement.

2. They thoroughly review the claim and its details.

3. They determine accurate estimates and replacement costs for each item.

4. They categorize the items and factor in depreciation.

5. Finally, they compile a detailed estimation report.

Oftentimes there is a significant amount of waiting involved as you rely on the contents estimation department to estimate the replacement items. This waiting period can be quite lengthy due to the overwhelming workload faced by the estimation team and the manual processes they currently have in place. Essentially, there are too many repetitive manual tasks being performed and this ends up delaying your ability to finish the project.

However, with the implementation of powerful estimating software, your estimation department will be equipped with the necessary tools to streamline their tasks and eliminate their backlog of contents. This will be achieved with precision and speed, allowing them to generate industry-leading estimates that help you efficiently complete projects. To gain a better understanding of how estimating software can benefit your restoration company, let's delve into some of the key challenges faced in contents estimation.

Estimation Challenges at a Restoration Company

Given that the primary objective of a restoration company is to restore contents, the challenges regarding contents estimation mostly just consist of:

• The need to work more efficiently to prevent or minimize a backlog of contents.

• Ensuring the accuracy of replacement prices.

However, it is important to note that simply working more efficiently and accurately is not enough. The estimate you send to your client (whether it is a carrier, IA firm, or PA firm) undergoes thorough scrutiny from both your client and the insured. There may be complaints that you are not even aware of when they review your estimate:

• The pricing lacks basis or proof, causing the insured to not trust the pricing.

• The claim is settled at a later date, rendering the prices irrelevant.

• The insured does not shop at the stores where you found the replacement items.

• The adjuster is frustrated with the inability to easily edit incorrect prices.

These challenges highlight the need for an effective solution, such as adopting estimating software, that can address these concerns and improve the overall estimation process.

Performing contents estimation manually poses significant challenges in ensuring accurate estimates that meet all requirements. That is why an increasing number of restoration companies are opting to implement estimating software for their teams.

What exactly is estimating software? What benefits can it bring to my business?

Understanding Estimating Software: An Overview

Residential contents estimating software was developed with the aim of enhancing the accuracy and efficiency of contents estimates. By utilizing this software, your estimation team can significantly improve the quality and speed of their work, leading to greater job satisfaction for all of those involved.

If you are currently using software like iCat to manage contents restoration, we highly recommend it for its comprehensive and restoration-focused features. However, it's important to note that contents estimation is a separate product and not included when paying for their contents restoration software. It comes with its own unique set of challenges, which we will delve into below.

Different estimating tools in the market vary in terms of precision, speed, cost, integrations, and user-friendliness. Before we explore the challenges that estimating software can address, let's first examine the key distinctions between restoration software and contents estimation software.

When it comes to contents estimation, these are the top 4 providers in the market as of 2024. 

What are the Differences Between Restoration Software and Contents Estimation Software?

Restoration Software:

• Designed to capture and manage general inventory and contents that can be restored.

• Used for on-site inventory capture, documentation, and tracking the progress of items throughout the restoration process.

• Billed as a separate product from contents estimation software.

Contents Estimation Software: 

• Specifically designed for assessing the value of contents that cannot be restored and require replacement.

• Used by estimators who work at a desk and specialize in estimating the worth of items.

• Billed separately from restoration software, as they serve different purposes in the claim cycle.

Restoration software and contents estimation software focus on different aspects of the claim cycle, which is why they are billed as separate products. They are often used by people with different roles - inventorying is a step done before contents estimation.

What are the challenges that contents estimation software seek to address?

Estimation Software: Addressing Your Challenges

Manual Estimation Tasks

Many professionals still heavily rely on manual methods for contents estimation, including tasks such as: Conducting Google searches to gather item information and pricing. Using pre-filled Excel workbooks for data entry. Manually categorizing items for pricing and utilizing general pricing sheets. These outdated manual processes often lead to overwhelming workloads and slow turnaround times, resulting in significant delays of days, weeks, or even months when delivering estimates. By implementing high-quality estimating software, these inefficiencies can be effectively addressed through task automation. This automation not only doubles the throughput at a minimum but should also clear item backlogs once implemented. Once you start completing estimates within the day, your clients will no longer need to repeatedly call you for updates on the estimates they have been patiently waiting for.  

Ensuring Replacement Prices are Accurate

Numerous estimating departments still rely on pricing sheets that their companies have developed or gathered over time. These pricing sheets consist of pricing details for frequently encountered products and are intended to streamline the estimation process for estimators when they come across similar items.

However, pricing sheets are highly inaccurate for a variety of reasons:

• Prices are subject to fluctuations due to factors such as inflation, market demand, and seller interests.

• Pricing sheets provide a generalized price for a particular product category, without considering the wide range of variations available (e.g., wooden dresser vs. antique wooden dresser, 30"x60" maple dresser, small children's dresser).

• Keeping pricing sheets up to date can be challenging due to the constantly changing nature of product pricing.

• They may not include a significant number of products, leading to potential inaccuracies in estimates.

The end result is an estimate full of prices that are not current or accurate, which leads to either a client having to fix the estimate themselves or complaining.

Effective estimating software addresses these challenges by utilizing a comprehensive database of up-to-date products that are regularly updated. Moreover, software with a larger product database enhances accuracy by offering a wider range of potential replacement items for your convenience.  

Your Prices Don't Have Basis/Proof

Typically, it's the prices of the more expensive items that often face resistance, whether from the insured or the carrier, as they may argue for higher or lower prices. It's understandable, as each party involved in the settlement negotiation has their own motivations. However, presenting an estimate without any basis for your pricing makes it less defensible during negotiations. In other words, your client may encounter difficulties when advocating for your settlement, which can negatively impact your company's reputation.

Fortunately, modern estimating software enhances the credibility of estimates by directly linking to online retail sites where the listed products are available. To further bolster this, Adjust Square incorporates product screenshots alongside these links. This approach is crucial, as updates to websites will often render source links invalid. The screenshot feature by Adjust Square ensures persistent, verifiable evidence of the product's online availability at the time the estimate was prepared.

Adjust Square's screenshot feature, which documents product details and pricing, significantly enhances the credibility of your estimates.

Prices Have Expired and are No Longer Relevant

Insureds often postpone settling the contents portion of their claim until weeks or even months after an estimate is completed due to their busy schedules with other aspects of the loss recovery process. During this time, market prices for replacement items may change, potentially making the initial estimate outdated. The prices you previously assigned are no longer the accurate replacement costs required to actually replace the items today.

This situation emphasizes the importance of a Price Refresh feature available in some estimating software, which allows for updates to item prices. However, the effectiveness of a price refresh greatly relies on the accuracy of the estimating software. For instance, if the software is inaccurate when refreshing prices, it will again require a significant amount of review after the prices are refreshed.

Therefore, it is crucial to choose software with high accuracy to minimize the additional review work.

The effectiveness of the Refresh Prices feature in estimation software hinges on the software's precision and processing speed.

Insured Shops at Specific Stores

If you want to provide a relevant estimate to your client, it's important to consider the stores they prefer to shop at. If the insured plans to replace their items from specific stores that they trust, it's crucial to provide replacement costs directly from those stores.

Now, let's assume you have obtained a list of the insured's preferred stores. If you're estimating manually, this means putting in extra effort to research and find items exclusively from these specified retailers. On the other hand, if you're using estimating software, you need to verify that each item's price is sourced from a preferred store.

In this regard, Adjust Square's AI Estimator stands out as the only software that offers a unique preferred stores feature. With the AI Estimator, you can upload a preferred stores list, and the software will automatically find replacement prices based on those specific suppliers. This innovative feature not only enhances the accuracy of your estimates but also saves you time when verifying item prices. Ultimately, it ensures utmost satisfaction for the insured individual.

Users of Adjust Square have the ability to customize their preferred suppliers, enabling them to determine which suppliers should be utilized for sourcing replacement costs across various item categories.

Adjuster Wants to Edit Estimate

It is inevitable that when you submit an estimate to a client, they may have revisions that they would like to make. This can become challenging, especially if you have multiple claims to work on and several clients emailing you with revision requests. Managing everyone's expectations and addressing their concerns while also completing new work can be overwhelming.

You might be thinking:

If they know exactly what prices they want for certain items, why can't they just update it themselves?

That's exactly what they can do with Adjust Square. Instead of sending them a PDF report, send them a link to the claim you're working on in Adjust Square's AI Estimator.

Now your clients can:

• View all items, their prices, and other suggested item results, as well as the sources for all these prices.

• Change item pricing with a single click.

• View product screenshots or capture new ones.

• Add custom product pricing for unique items using Adjust Square's chrome extension.

• Download the estimation report.

By utilizing Adjust Square, you empower your clients to take control of revisions, resulting in a reduction of their requests to you. This allows you to concentrate on new tasks that require your attention.

You can now probably understand how contents estimation software can revolutionize your restoration firm.

If you want a comparison of today's top estimation software, navigate over to our article where we explain our findings on the Top Estimation Software of 2024: Which One is the Best Fit for You? or keep reading to learn more about an estimating software that can address all of a restoration company's estimation challenges.

How Robust are Today's Estimating Software? Do they Address All of My Challenges? 

In the realm of residential contents estimation, most modern estimating software has the ability to address numerous challenges. However, it is essential to prioritize specific metrics to optimize work efficiency. Among these metrics, accuracy reigns supreme as it directly impacts speed, cost, and ease of use. While many software solutions offer a range of standard features, few truly prioritize accuracy to its highest degree. This is precisely why manual estimation remains prevalent in today's industry.

On the flip side, newer technologies like Adjust Square's AI Estimator place accuracy at the forefront. By doing so, estimators can automate routine tasks and focus their expertise on complex estimations. This empowers them to deliver more precise and reliable estimates.

Conclusion

Upon completing this article, you should have gained a comprehensive understanding of the significance of estimating software and its ability to greatly enhance the value of your restoration company. The current range of estimating software available is truly remarkable as it effectively eliminates various tedious tasks and estimation backlogs, ultimately enabling firms like yours to expand and thrive.

By now, you should have a comprehensive grasp of:

• The unique challenges that restoration companies face when it comes to contents estimation.

• The distinctions between restoration software and contents estimation software.

• How estimation software effectively tackles your estimation challenges.

• The key features of estimation software and why Adjust Square's AI Estimator stands as the most comprehensive solution.

This year, streamline your contents backlog. Open up more work opportunities. Expand your team and grow your business. Leverage technology to take charge of your scalability and growth.

Take the first step by utilizing Adjust Square to generate top-notch contents estimates today.