Thus ends another business day where this fucking smoke damage problem in my apartment isn’t resolved. It’s amazing how badly people seem to want to pass the buck here. I appreciate that there’s a process involved with getting these things done, but it’s been almost a week since it happened and I’ve still got no damn definitive answer. Here’s how today went:

Tuesday, June 25, 2002 9:38a - Doug Jones from Crawford and Company, an affiliate of Zurich Insurance, called and left a message on our home phone. He wanted to schedule an appointment to come look at the damage.

9:55a - I called Doug back and explained the situation to him. I explained how we are trying to go through HSC for damages because we’re their tenants and had nothing to do with hiring All-Ways Warm Inc. for fireplace cleaning services. Doug agreed that normally what would happen is exactly that - we, the tenants, would pursue HSC for damages, and HSC would pursue All-Ways Warm and their respective insurance company. He found it odd that we, the tenants, should be caught in the middle of all of this. I provided the contact information for Joe Adrian (of HSC) to Doug and Doug said he’d call Joe and get things moving.

11:42a - I called Horizon Restoration and left a message for Kitty over there to let me know if she’s heard the go-ahead from anyone yet.

12:09p - Doug left a message at our home phone. He requested a time when he could come down from Seattle and view the damages firsthand.

12:43p - Kitty called me back. All-Ways Warm Inc. contacted Horizon Restoration with Zurich’s information. Kitty provided the estimate to everyone involved and now everyone - me, Doug, Kitty, and Joe (or Joe’s representative) have to meet and re-examine the damages. Unbelievable.

1:15p - Jenn called Doug, then called me to let me know: Doug and Kitty and the gang will all be at our apartment tomorrow morning at 9:00a. I called Doug immediately after I found this out to verify he has sign-off authority to get this thing moving. He wasn’t there, so I left a message.

2:00p - Attempted another call to Doug. Still no answer. Didn’t leave a second message.

2:20p - I called Doug again. Doug spoke with Joe. Apparently, Doug will do an inspection and report back to Zurich, but he does not have the sign-off authority to get things moving. That authority resides with Joe. If Joe says “go,” then the cleaning commences and I’d be out of the loop. The fate of my apartment rests with Joe.

2:25p - I called Joe. Joe told he he was working with their insurance to get things resolved. Joe confirmed that Doug will not be holding up Horizon getting going on things and told me that the only thing he (Joe) is waiting on is a final blessing from HSC’s insurance company. Joe said it was basically just a formality, and once that blessing is in, Horizon can start their job. Joe said the blessing should be in “shortly.”

4:30p - I called Joe again, since the end of the business day was looming near and I still hadn’t heard any final confirmation. Joe, of course, was not answering the phone or wasn’t at his desk, so I left a message to have him call me with the confirmation.

That’s it. As of now, I’m waiting, albeit impatiently, to hear back from Joe. I swore to myself that something would get moving today, but as you can see, people are still too concerned with processes and not fucking concerned enough about my apartment. Someone’s gonna pay on this one.