What Should I Do In The Event Of A Flood?

As we’re sure you’ve seen in the media, severe weather continues to have a real impact on homes and businesses across the country. If you have been affected by the ongoing floods and storms, we’re on hand to get things sorted as soon as possible.

Risk Surveyors from Aviva Insurance have been busy visiting the impacted areas across the UK and shared some useful advice:

• Move all equipment off the lower floors.
• Make use of any sandbags, there are also barriers that can be fixed into the door ways to stop water from getting in. If you need advice on how these can be obtained, please call the Environment Agency. Failing that, a contractor can fix supports to the door ways which can stop or slow down the water.
• Seal the soil drainage to stop any water from getting into the buildings drainage system, thus preventing contaminated water from entering the building.
• Turn off all the electrics to the floors that are likely to be affected.
• If there is a lower area such as a basement, try and route the water flow into these areas and pump out. For example, if any man hole covers can be opened which would send the water to the basement area, it is better to flood a basement and actively man a pump to pump it all out rather than having the water travel through the ground floor of the building.
• Take up carpets and remove anything that can be moved to higher floors.
• Call drying companies and put them on standby in order to get them to set up large industrial dehumidifiers to start the drying process ASAP after the flood. This will prevent any water from penetrating into the foundations of the building, causing further problems.

Useful Documents

• Business flood leaflet
• Repairing after a flood leaflet

Useful Contacts

If you are a client of John Heath Insurance and need to make a claim please do not hesitate to contact us and we will be happy to help.