A Good Tailor

The happiness of the customer is the number one priority for Nova Scotia-based Marsh Adjustment Bureau Ltd.

While customers change and the needs and demands of the customers might change, remaining first-in-class for providing customer service is paramount for this independent adjusting firm.

“We aim to please,” Brian Gough, president of Marsh Adjustment Bureau, says. “That’s not a difficult thing to do, but one of the unique points to this business is that when you have multiple customers, [it means] staying on top of the unique way Company A wants something done with Company B wanting it done totally differently.”

But, just like a good tailor that can make any suit fit, Marsh Adjustment Bureau can create the perfect service for any customer.

Harry Marsh founded the company in 1956, and since that time, the company has seen its fair share of changes. Through acquisitions and hirings, the company has gone from being a one-office firm, to a multi-branched provincial adjusting firm. The company operates under the Marsh Group of Companies (MGC) banner, which also includes Fastfair Claims Services, GE Morgan Adjusters Limited and Maritime Investigation Services, Inc. The organizations under the MGC banner all remain individual companies.

Things are changing

“Change is about the only constant in this business,” Gough muses. “We’ve seen everything from legislative changes, licensing changes, technological changes, customer changes, market contractions, [changes in the] independent adjusting fraternity and through mergers and/or acquisitions, the number if adjusting firms generally is down.”

There has been some challenges over the years, including market contractions where you can lose a customer literally overnight due to a merger or an acquisition.

One key to sustainability is to remain proactive. For Marsh Adjustment Bureau, this meant implementing a claims management system. The company now has a solid automated system which is very user-friendly.

“Our clients can access our claims management system 24/7 and are able to see the disposition of the file, statements, documents and photographs in a secure and protected system. We’ve had compliments on the ease of access and the use of the system,” Gough says.

The claims management system is a main way the company is able to cater to the varying needs of its customers.

Furthermore, the company is a 24/7/365 operation, which means there is always somebody ready and willing to assist a client.

“We are able to do work for various insurers and we feel very fortunate that we are getting our fair share of business,” Gough says. “We like to think the reason our customers keep using us is because they are happy with the product.”

Adding adjusters

As Gough looks to the future, the continuation of the company is a top priority at Marsh Adjustment Bureau. In order to achieve that, new blood is needed.

Adequately staffing a company can be a difficult task due to business fluctuations — a task not made any easier by a shortage of independent adjusters in the Maritimes.

“As everybody should understand, there is always some degree of pain associated with growth,” Gough points out.

But Marsh Adjustment Bureau is a well-established company that is tried, tested and true in many ways. The company’s solid reputation and good connection throughout the industry are things that will serve them well when recruiting new talent and when soldiering through the rough times.

In recent past, this independent adjusting firm has been successful in attracting several new and very keen individuals, Gough notes.

“We’ve had the good fortune of bringing on some new younger members who are still in the learning curve, but they are all licensed,” he adds. “At some point, you never know, they could end up being one of the owners of the company.”

Marsh Adjustment Bureau is looking to ensure a viable operation for the years ahead and is certainly not planning to rest on its laurels.

Respect for staff

“Without our staff we’d be dead in the water” Gough points out. “We value and very much appreciate our staff. We think, as employers, we treat them well, we respect them, we have realistic expectations of our staff and they of management as well.”

This mutual respect and understanding is likely the reason that a tenure of 25 years at Marsh Adjustment Bureau is not uncommon for many staff. The company currently has eight branches and a head office in Bedford, NS, within the Halifax Regional Municipality. Between the nine locations, there are 46 staff, including 22 licensed adjusters. The company has adjusters who not only work in a community, but live in them as well. This often means an adjuster is aware of a claim before the broker or the insurance company. Marsh Adjustment Bureau has the ability, in normal weather conditions, to have an adjuster on the site of a claim anywhere in the province within two hours.

“Our people are known quite well to the brokers and we think our service, because of the spread of our offices and our abilities as a multi-branch operation, is a bit unique,” Gough says. “The one thing that sets us apart is the number of offices and the people who work in those offices; we do know our communities very well.”

Furthermore, weather has become such a large part of the business for every independent adjuster, and something nobody can control. However, because Marsh Adjustment Bureau has multiple branches and a fairly significant number of adjusters, the company has the ability to adapt and put adjusters into an area, which may sustain a significant number of property damage claims due to inclement weather.

“We can send people from Halifax to Sydney if need be and vice versa and it does work.” Gough explains.

While the business itself is small, it is a larger firm in respect to structure and number of adjusters and support staff.

Captain of the sea

“We’re the masters of our ship,” Gough says without any detriment to the national firms. “We have the ability to run our business, to control it as best as we can. We have the ability to treat our staff in a way that we feel they deserve to be treated as people and as compatriots.”

Though they hold the title of being the largest adjusting firm in Nova Scotia, the company remains a truly independent privately-owned business. The company has working relationships with other similar-sized firms in Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick, in addition to being part of the Canadian Independent Adjusters’ Association (CIAA) and the Canadian Adjuster Network (CAN), which provides the company access to unique claims ability and significant resources.

The company has been a member of the CIAA since day one, producing three national presidents. “There’s no question the benefits of being a member of CIAA are very visible to the membership,” Gough says.

Being a member provides access to education, resources, input into legislative matters and licensing reciprocity and a hoped for move towards self-regulation.

“CIAA is a very well-run organization and one of the many nice things about it, is that while it comprises a bunch of competitors — nationals down to one-person shops — the executive is changing yearly and it’s reflective of a good mix of our fraternity,” Gough says. “That’s one of the things that I like about it — even the little guys have a voice in our professional association.”