GANGTOK, 16 Oct: The exercise of assessing earthquake damages by insurance companies has revealed the disconcerting lack of independent earthquake surveyors in Sikkim. For a State which sits on seismic zone-IV of the earthquake-prone areas and where house-owners pay among the highest premiums in the country, this is indeed a startling lack of accredited experts.
With more than 500 claims for damages amounting to around Rs. 15 crore filed with the three nationalised insurance companies of Oriental Insurance, New India Insurance and National Insurance in Gangtok, the companies are vying with each other to get surveyors to conduct the earthquake damage assessment for their respective claimants here in Sikkim. For this, they have to contact their respective regional offices in Kolkata which then contacts the independent surveyors. These independent surveyors are all technical experts in such assessment and are licensed by the IRDA (Insurance Regulatory Development Authority).
All claims made by individuals have to be verified by these surveyors and one stark reality which this entire exercise of assessing insurance claims has exposed is that Sikkim does not have a single IRDA-licensed (earthquake) surveyor.
As RN Banerjee of Oriental Insurance points out, there is a scarcity of such surveyors as all the insurance companies have engaged them to conduct their respective earthquake damage assessments. Some of the surveyors, in fact most of them, would be working for all the insurance companies conducting damage assessments.
The problem this poses is that with every late or new damage claim landing with a company, the surveyors have to be contacted and brought to Sikkim again for another round of damage assessment. It is this which is proving to be a bit tedious for the companies and more so for the surveyors as they are being deputed from Siliguri and Kolkata.
Had there been some independent IRDA-licensed surveyors in Sikkim, this would not have been much of a problem some of the companies have voiced. New India Insurance had so far engaged 4 surveyors, New India engaged 3 and Oriental Insurance had engaged 8 surveyors from Siliguri and Kolkata.
With more than 500 claims for damages amounting to around Rs. 15 crore filed with the three nationalised insurance companies of Oriental Insurance, New India Insurance and National Insurance in Gangtok, the companies are vying with each other to get surveyors to conduct the earthquake damage assessment for their respective claimants here in Sikkim. For this, they have to contact their respective regional offices in Kolkata which then contacts the independent surveyors. These independent surveyors are all technical experts in such assessment and are licensed by the IRDA (Insurance Regulatory Development Authority).
All claims made by individuals have to be verified by these surveyors and one stark reality which this entire exercise of assessing insurance claims has exposed is that Sikkim does not have a single IRDA-licensed (earthquake) surveyor.
As RN Banerjee of Oriental Insurance points out, there is a scarcity of such surveyors as all the insurance companies have engaged them to conduct their respective earthquake damage assessments. Some of the surveyors, in fact most of them, would be working for all the insurance companies conducting damage assessments.
The problem this poses is that with every late or new damage claim landing with a company, the surveyors have to be contacted and brought to Sikkim again for another round of damage assessment. It is this which is proving to be a bit tedious for the companies and more so for the surveyors as they are being deputed from Siliguri and Kolkata.
Had there been some independent IRDA-licensed surveyors in Sikkim, this would not have been much of a problem some of the companies have voiced. New India Insurance had so far engaged 4 surveyors, New India engaged 3 and Oriental Insurance had engaged 8 surveyors from Siliguri and Kolkata.
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