Eat, Sleep, Breathe

Our insurance gives us 360 days, not quite a full year, to wrap up our claims for our dwelling and our personal property. We've been granted an extension of about forty five more days, but those forty five extra days happen to fall during Thanksgiving and Christmas. And as we all know those two holidays  require their own amount of attention and preparation. Our goal is to get our receipts turned in before the holiday hustle and bustle but it's nice to know we have a little time in case we need it. In our experience we've found that it takes a considerable amount of time for the insurance company to do their part after they get our packet, so we're trying to allow time for that. For the past couple of weeks D has been emailing and calling the new person (having a new person to deal with is another topic for another time) who been assigned our claim. He hadn't heard from her until yesterday and she said she hadn't even opened the two packets of receipts and dwelling claims we sent her almost two months ago. Oy! She's totally swamped. I would not want to be in her shoes!

As we are locating our receipts we need to recall where we bought the item. Did we make that purchase in a store or online? If we bought it in a store we have to think about where we were living at the time. If we bought that thing while living in the hotel we put the receipts in one designated spot. If we were living in the rental house it was in a certain spot and if it was purchased after moving back home it can be found in a new spot. Our receipts have some miles on them. They've been packed up and moved with each new place we lived. We feel like we've made every possible effort to keep things organized, but there inevitably is the missing receipt. Once we've dug through boxes and baskets to find that missing little piece of paper it's like winning the lottery to find it!! But before we unfold that paper we say a tiny little prayer that the ink is still legible. Online receipts are a Godsend! We can search through email and store accounts to find the receipt or order history and print a fresh new receipt.

Yesterday I planned my day around insurance work. I planned to exercise early in the morning so I could work on personal property claims while L was at preschool. When he got home we ate lunch and played a little. Then a friend (who had the day off for parent teacher conference asked to play) knocked on the door and asked to play. I said if it was okay with his mom he could play inside our house while I work on claims. It was okay with her, so L and P played really well in the basement while found receipts, made copies, identified their claim line item number and  calculated their totals. Soon it was time to send our friend home and get N off the bus. My boys had a snack and while they played I continued with more receipts. D got home from work and we talked about insurance while I cooked. We talked over a few things while we ate and while we put dishes away. After dinner the boys played well again so we continued our conversation. We played with the boys, got them to bed and continued to work on receipts. By about eight o'clock I was burnt out on receipts so I took a break from them to take advantage of a good sale on Christmas cards. We dream about receipts and we wake up early thinking about them. Come to think of it, we eat, sleep and breathe insurance these days.

We are beginning to see the light at the end of the insurance tunnel, but we've also come to a realization. And that realization came to light yesterday after talking to the insurance agent. She was  nice but, because she is new to our claim, D had to start at the beginning of this whole ordeal and walk her through emails and conversations we've had over the history of the account to catch her up to speed. Just when we think we are done and we've buttoned things up and handed them in, we have to revisit the details. It's exhausting but I can honestly say that overall our insurance has been really good to us. We're just so ready to be done with all of this.