Let's Go Blues

I'm looking for advice on an insurance claim I have.
I had a neighbor who's truck was put in neutral (by kids he was watching), roll down the street and knock out a 30 year old Japanese maple tree. His insurance of course will cover it, but they want me to get a quote. Part of the quote should be my time spent on replacing my mailbox and shopping for a new tree.

Anyone have an idea of cost per hour for my time spent shopping and replacing a mailbox? $15/hour....$20/hour?

Thanks--

Were you emotionally attached to the mailbox?

cprice12 wrote:Were you emotionally attached to the mailbox?

It was passed down through 8 generations of his family and was encrusted with diamonds.

cprice12 wrote:Were you emotionally attached to the mailbox?

No, but a rare 30 year-old Japanese maple is about $2500 without installation. Plus the time it is taking me to deal with the bullshit to get quotes to have my landscaping fixed.

Luckily the kids were ok...we think.

northwest dave wrote:

cprice12 wrote:Were you emotionally attached to the mailbox?

No, but a rare 30 year-old Japanese maple is about $2500 without installation. Plus the time it is taking me to deal with the bullshit to get quotes to have my landscaping fixed.

Luckily the kids were ok...we think.

I don't know how much mailboxes run...but tack on a couple hundred dollars for effort in getting a new one and the time involved in putting it in. That's time you could have been doing something else. It's worth more than just your time, it's worth your time plus the lost time of doing whatever else you could have been doing instead of putting a new mailbox in. That sounds fair to me.

cprice12 wrote:

northwest dave wrote:

cprice12 wrote:Were you emotionally attached to the mailbox?

No, but a rare 30 year-old Japanese maple is about $2500 without installation. Plus the time it is taking me to deal with the bullshit to get quotes to have my landscaping fixed.

Luckily the kids were ok...we think.

I don't know how much mailboxes run...but tack on a couple hundred dollars for effort in getting a new one and the time involved in putting it in. That's time you could have been doing something else. It's worth more than just your time, it's worth your time plus the lost time of doing whatever else you could have been doing instead of putting a new mailbox in. That sounds fair to me.

Yeah, add in your opportunity cost..

I work for an insurance company, and it's possible that they might reimburse you for the time you spent, but it depends on the insurance company and it depends on how you substantiate the value of your time. For example, if you are an hourly worker, and you can prove that you missed time off work, then it would be easy to come up with a value. You can also do this if you earn a salary, just do the math. If you didn't actually miss work I don't see them paying you just for your otherwise "free" time. That's getting a little ridiculous. Shit happens, don't get worked up over a couple hours, life is too short. We have paid for claims that included payment for people's time, but were talking about taking full days off work to take care of issues related to the loss, not a couple hours of shopping.

WindyCityBluesFan wrote:I work for an insurance company, and it's possible that they might reimburse you for the time you spent, but it depends on the insurance company and it depends on how you substantiate the value of your time. For example, if you are an hourly worker, and you can prove that you missed time off work, then it would be easy to come up with a value. You can also do this if you earn a salary, just do the math. If you didn't actually miss work I don't see them paying you just for your otherwise "free" time. That's getting a little ridiculous. Shit happens, don't get worked up over a couple hours, life is too short. We have paid for claims that included payment for people's time, but were talking about taking full days off work to take care of issues related to the loss, not a couple hours of shopping.

I understand where you are coming from, but it's not just two hours shopping. It's two hours spent doing something he doesn't want to do that is taking up his free time because of someone else's negligence. And that two hours could have been spent doing something he actually wanted to do, but now can't. PLUS, he has the actual labor of physically installing a new mailbox.
I think a couple hundred bucks on top of the actual cost of the mailbox, is extremely reasonable.

Or.... just get a quote to have someone do the whole shit and be done with it.

There's your cost.

Now whether or not you actually have that someone install your mailbox I guess is entirely up to you.