Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

Re:Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn? by HWR_14 on Monday December 19, 2022 @01:36PM (#34055759)

The family accepted fire protection from their insurer and claim they forgot to pay the $75 fee, not declined to do so. It's possible they opted out, it's also possible it was an oversight. Certainly, the more human thing would be to make opting in/out more explicit and handle a late payment by sending it to collections (or reminder notifications) instead of just turning service off.

Or do you have any evidence they actively opted out of the $75 payment?

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Re:Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn? by fatbird on Monday December 19, 2022 @01:40PM (#34055825)

A reporter on the scene spoke to the homeowner, who said he didn't pay the fee because he thought he could just pay after, like happened previously. He literally thought he could get away with not paying unless a fire happened. It's a textbook case of moral hazard.

I discussed the case a lot at the time it happened, and it never came out that he "forgot" to pay the fee. It was very clear at the time that he thought he didn't need to and they'd put out the fire anyway.

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Re:Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn? by LorenPechtel on Monday December 19, 2022 @02:16PM (#34056297)

Exactly. There are two separate cases:

1) Insured by another company. The sensible course of action is to fight the fire and bill them. Every company benefits from such cooperation.

2) Uninsured. The moral hazard problem, if too many people are not paying the only sensible approach is to let uninsured buildings burn.

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Re:Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn? by bombcar on Monday December 19, 2022 @02:18PM (#34056332)

People do the same with AAA - don’t pay to renew until you need a tow and pay the renewal over the phone. I think they’re a bit smarter now and make you pay for the years you skipped.

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Re:Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn? by grogenaut on Monday December 19, 2022 @02:28PM (#34056482)

That's hard as I wouldn't back pay but my insurance company goes back and forth on doing roadside depending on if you have comprehensive and has changed the rule and rates to be more or less competitive with AAA. When it's cheaper I use my I aurance, when not AAA. If they made me back pay I wouldn't use them. But I generally don't just do the sign up and tow immediately.

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Re:Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn? by bombcar on Monday December 19, 2022 @02:38PM (#34056591)

I think it’s only when you want a tow same day - renewing a failed account has a three day waiting period if you don’t pay the rush fee.

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Re:Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn? by HWR_14 on Monday December 19, 2022 @02:19PM (#34056344)

I had not heard that. Reports I saw at the time said he "forgot".

At any rate, in response to the story, the county changed it so paying when your house was already ablaze was a punitive but not impossible option. I believe it was $3,500 when they instituted it.

Which, frankly, seems like the proper way to handle the moral hazard.

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Re:Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn? by david422 on Monday December 19, 2022 @02:31PM (#34056513)

That's still the same problem though. If nobody pays the town is still going to be out money even if it's possible to collect $3500. And the reason they don't put out the blaze and then just charge if someone doesn't have insurance is because they won't be able to collect.

How do you deal with freeloaders in society?

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Re:Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn? by tsimionescu on Monday December 19, 2022 @03:01PM (#34056866)

Definitely not by letting them or their belongings burn down.

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Re:Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn? by supertrope on Monday December 19, 2022 @03:37PM (#34057330)

At least with the $35,000 after the fact fire service fee they can attach a lien to the house. Of course if it's a smoking husk there might not be $35,000 in market value at the real estate closing table.

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Re:Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn? by HWR_14 on Tuesday December 20, 2022 @12:36AM (#34061973)

The town was paying for a fire department anyway. The additional fee was for people outside the town.

Meanwhile, governments have excellent was of collecting on low-four figure debts secured by real estate.

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Re:Did Insurance Fire Brigades let uninsured buildings burn? by fatbird on Wednesday December 21, 2022 @04:56PM (#34086909)

The problem is that the municipality is a subordinate gov't within the county. They have no leverage over people outside the municipality, and basically had to have a court fight for every uncollected fee/fine, which rapidly ate all the money that could be collected... if the person living almost tax free on unincorporated land in a mobile home had the money to be collected.

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