Water restoration is the work that returns your water damaged property to its original state.

Disaster Emergency Services may suggest any of the following types of work depending on the assessment:

• Demolition
• Professional Drying of the Area with Dehumidifiers and Air Movers (fans)
• Cleaning the Area
• Cleaning the Air for Mold with Air Scrubbers.
• Mold Treatment and Encapsulation
• Reconstruction

It is impossible for Disaster Emergency Services to provide an accurate estimate for you over the phone. The complexity and severity of damage from water as well as identifying what areas were affected is not something that can be done remotely. DES will need to visit your property and do an assessment to provide cost estimates. 

DES does provide free estimates utilizing sophisticated technological instruments. While a mold inspection or odor assessment is typically less than this amount, DES does have a minimum of $1,500 on all work performed. 

Disaster Emergency Services first meets with a client at their home or business property. We assess the damage utilizing our advanced technological instruments in alignment with industry and professional standards and we then provide a written assessment report and estimate of the costs of mitigation. It is difficult to provide a reconstruction estimate until after the   mitigation is complete as more damage may be found during the remediation process.

After a client executes a legal agreement they are onboarded and told what to expect along with best practices for full reimbursement from insurance. DES then begins the work as soon as possible. We minimize the disruptions to you and your life or work needs as much as possible. DES documents all assessment work and work performed along the way including the use of all equipment. This is important for insurance reimbursement. Upon completion of the mitigation, DES bills the client providing all documentation and the client provides the paid invoice copy and documentation to insurance for reimbursement. Then a reconstruction estimate can be provided and the same process happens all over again with the client and insurance reimbursement. 

If a client is paying themselves, the process is the same without insurance. 

Assuming your policy covers your water damage claim, something you want to confirm with your insurance agent, it is your choice whether to pay a deductible and utilize insurance for a water claim or not. Most water restoration companies have a minimum cost on service and most water restoration projects will exceed the cost of a low deposit like say $500 but it is possible that a project is less than your insurance deductible if you have a high deductible.

DES’ minimum for service costs is $1,500 but this excluded mold inspections and odor inspections which depending on the size of a property could be less.

The best thing to do to see if your insurance policy covers your water damage or not is to call your insurance agent and request a certified copy of your insurance policy. This document definitely exists as it must by law but you may face a run around attempting to get it as they know it is a client advocating for their contractual rights with an insurance company.

If your agent does not know, ask them to ask the underwriting department. If you do not have an agent, go directly to the underwriting department of an insurance carrier. They have been known to tell clients things that are egregiously untrue so do not consider the insurance carrier the final say on anything. Remember that avoiding paying you or reducing your claim is their first goal always.

Disaster Emergency Services as a part of its assessment points towards a hypothesis of what may have caused the water damage and provides suggestions for how to address the hypothesized source of the water damage. This is our opinion based on experience but is not being provided as a portion of the DES service and is provided simply as a courtesy to our clients. Taking DES’ advice does not guarantee that water damage does not recur. 

The vast majority of cleaning products that Disaster Emergency Services utilizes are natural or no different than the cleaning products utilized in household cleaning. However, when there is serious damage there may be cause for using more aggressive cleaning components in which case the property owner will be consulted on the option, informed of the positives and negatives of using the chemical, and asked to sign a disclosure statement acknowledging that they were informed of the risks of using the chemical.

It’s your choice when working with DES but please realize that there are limitations to cleaning if the substances used are limited by the client. 

Excluding weather events that cause mass water damage to the St. Louis area, greater Missouri, or greater Illinois, DES can typically get a technician out to assess your water damage within 24 hours of a call. If it is an emergency, and please realize that an emergency is more expensive and we are not able to provide a detailed estimate before beginning work with an emergency, we are able to get to you typically within four hours or less of a call.

The best thing to do is to discuss with your insurance agent if you are covered and confirm, in writing, that you are indeed covered for the loss.

Disaster Emergency Services will help you with all aspects of the water damage when we arrive. If we are backed up and not able to get there quickly or you do want to do something, we recommend that you keep the area with air flowing and keep heat down at least initially to prevent the growth of mold.

Our drying equipment can be considered “loud” by some clients. It is comparable to having a very large industrial fan running. Some clients sleep with a fan so it does not bother them. Others are bothered by it. In most cases, it will only be utilized for 2-3 days of drying.

Unfortunately, there is no better method for drying out an area after water damage than using professional industrial dehumidifiers and air movers so our process will include this equipment. Air scrubbers are utilized as well if and when mold is suspected or known to exist in connection with a water mitigation project.

None of our equipment is harmful to human health and in some cases its intent as with air scrubbers is an improvement of air quality and therefore of human health. 

We handle residential and commercial water losses. We handle all types of water losses including floods, backups, appliance leaks, plumbing leaks, basement flooding, flash flooding, overflows, and any other type of water damage. We accept clients whether they are paying out of pocket or being reimbursed by insurance as our process remains the same either way.