Insurance disputes and assessments
Mould, Meth, Bushfire & More

Damage to Plant and Equipment

Structural fires or bushfires, flooding, and other contamination events have the potential to damage buildings, equipment, and other business items. Documentation of the extent of contamination can assist in processing claims. Prezant is experienced in designing protocols for assessing a wide variety of contamination to document the impact or lack of impact of the insured event on a business. Prezant’s credibility is based on fair representation of the professional knowledge and expertise of recognized health and engineering professionals. For this reason, both plaintiff and defendants engage Prezant as an independent expert: we are routinely retained by both insurance companies and insureds to address the scope of damage and consequent required remediation.

Flooding, Mould, Bushfire Residue & The Strange and Unusual

From palytoxin from handling poisonous sea anemones to deposition of brown staining on walls and other indoor surfaces after a new gas heater installation, Prezant has investigated many puzzling claims where our scientific, evidence-based approach and forensic sampling can identify and quantify damage, and permit resolution of a claim.

Distinguishing structural fire damage from bushfire damage, or bushfire damage from kitchen fires, log burner backdrafts, or even printer toner indoors can be challenging. Simply identifying black particulate on surfaces as is done with “soot and char analysis” can result in incorrect conclusions and costly mistakes. Our exclusive methodologies provide the greatest discrimination when smoke damage is evident, identifying settled particulate sources and rendering an appropriate attribution of the source of the damage.

Assessing indoor moisture and mould, whether visible or hidden, is essential for a comprehensive moisture and mould assessment. When required, Prezant will conduct sampling of settled dusts, air, and investigate hidden mould through destructive access of wall cavities. Since 2014, Brad Prezant has trained hundreds of Australian occupational hygienists, building biologists, and others in conducting assessments of buildings for moisture, mould, and conducting destructive assessments for hidden mould.