There’s a conversation that almost never takes place. Not the one about what policy you need, or how much the premium costs, or what’s covered and what isn’t. The missing conversation is about what you — the business owner or manager — actually do when something goes wrong. When the water is already in. When the fire already happened. When someone already fell in your store.
Nobody has that conversation with you beforehand. And it might be the most important one.
What you do in the first few minutes can determine everything
A loss doesn’t give you a heads-up. And when it happens, the chaos follows its own logic: you need to call someone, check on the people there, assess the damage, figure out whether to open or close, say something to your employees. In the middle of all that, decisions get made poorly — not out of carelessness, but because nobody explained what the right move was.
The most common first mistake is cleaning up before documenting. It’s a natural instinct: you see the mess, you want to get things back in order, you want to reopen as fast as possible. But every photo you didn’t take, every damaged item you threw out, every repair you made without a record is information that no longer exists. When the adjuster arrives, their job is to verify what happened — not to take your word for it.
The second mistake is talking too much, and to the wrong people. Not out of bad intent — it’s just that the moment creates a need to explain, to share what happened. But details given spontaneously, without context, can create complications down the line. Before making any statements about the incident, the right move is to talk to your broker first.
The third — and often the most expensive — mistake is waiting too long to report. Policies have deadlines. They’re not arbitrary; they’re built in. Failing to notify your insurer in time can turn a covered claim into a disputed one.
What you should actually do — and most people don’t know
Document first. Photos, videos, from multiple angles. All visible damage before anything is moved. Damaged inventory — log it. Damage to the space — log it. If a third party is involved, get their information.
Notify early. Calling your broker isn’t a formality — it’s how you activate the process. They know how to report a claim, in what terms, with what information, and to whom. That early call can have a real impact on how the whole thing unfolds.
Don’t make major repairs without authorization. Emergency repairs to prevent further damage or meet safety requirements are generally fine. But a full restoration before the adjuster has seen the original condition can complicate the process. The rule of thumb: urgent repairs, yes. Permanent changes, wait.
Keep everything. Emergency repair invoices, receipts, contractor estimates, communications. Documentation of the recovery process matters just as much as documentation of the damage itself.
Why your relationship with your broker matters before the loss
The relationship with your broker shouldn’t go quiet between renewals. Not because you need to check in every month, but because when a loss happens, that relationship is the first channel you activate.
The most useful thing a business owner can do is make sure their broker understands how the business operates today — not how it operated when the policy was signed. How it operates now. We’ve written before about why periodic reviews matter and how business growth changes your risk exposure in ways that aren’t always obvious. The same logic applies here: if your broker doesn’t have current information about your operation, they can’t guide you effectively when you need it most.
There’s something else worth understanding: your broker knows how to report a claim in terms that the insurance company processes correctly. There’s a real difference between calling a general claims line and following a generic script, and talking to someone who has the context of your specific situation and can walk you through the right steps from the start. For that to work, the information about your business has to be there when it’s needed.
A scenario that happens more than you’d think
A restaurant in Queens has a kitchen fire on a Tuesday night. It wasn’t catastrophic — it stayed contained to the equipment area. But there was real damage: the exhaust hood, part of the wall lining, cooking equipment, and several days of lost operations while the space was inspected.
The owner moved fast: called the fire department, called family, and started talking to employees. What he didn’t do right away was document the condition of the kitchen before the emergency cleaning crew came in. He also didn’t call his broker until the next morning.
By the time the adjuster arrived, part of the evidence was already gone. The claim moved forward — but with complications that stretched the process by several weeks. Not because the policy didn’t cover it. Because the available information was incomplete.
It’s not a story about the wrong policy. It’s a story about how the first few hours set the pace for everything that followed.
Before the loss, not after
Being prepared for a claim isn’t about posting an emergency checklist on the wall. It’s about knowing — before anything happens — who you call first, what you document immediately, what you don’t touch until someone has seen it, and what you don’t say until you’ve spoken to the right person.
Four things. And you can cover all of them in a ten-minute conversation with your broker — not in the middle of a crisis.
If that conversation hasn’t happened yet, now is a good time to have it. Not because something is about to go wrong. But because when it does, you’ll be glad you did.
At Rondon Brokerage, we help our clients make sure their coverage keeps up with their business. If you’d like to talk through how any of this applies to your operation, we’re here.
