Frequently Asked Questions

Yes. United Water Restoration Group of Ascension Parish answers the phone and dispatches crews 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, including holidays. Water, fire, and sewage emergencies get worse by the hour, so we never make you wait for morning.

Call us first at (225) 350-5400 - we will walk you through the immediate steps. If it is safe: shut off the water source, keep people away from the damage, and take a few photos. Avoid running fans over sewage or mold.

It is how the restoration standard, ANSI/IICRC S500, sorts water by how contaminated it is. Category 1 comes from a sanitary source, Category 2 carries enough contamination to make someone ill, and Category 3 is grossly contaminated. The category - not the amount of water - decides what can be dried and what has to be removed.

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No, but the window is short. EPA guidance is that wet material dried inside the first 24 to 48 hours will in most cases not grow mold. What matters is how quickly everything wet is found and dried, including the parts you cannot see.

Yes. We photograph and document all damage, prepare the reports your insurance company needs, and communicate directly with your adjuster. We work with every insurance provider.

Wide shots of each affected room, close-ups of damaged materials and belongings, and the source if you can see it safely. Take them before anything is moved or thrown away. We document everything ourselves as well, but your photos of the scene before work started are worth having.

Pricing follows the same industry-standard estimating software insurance companies use, so our scope and their expectations line up. You see the estimate before work begins - no surprises.

Yes. United Water Restoration Group of Ascension Parish is fully licensed and insured, and our technicians hold IICRC certifications - the industry standard for restoration work.

Usually not. For most water and mold jobs we contain the work area so your family can stay home. For major fire damage or large-scale work, we will tell you honestly if temporary relocation is safer.

Small water losses often dry in 3-5 days. Larger jobs with reconstruction can take several weeks. After our first assessment you get a clear timeline, and we update you as work progresses.

Yes - that is exactly why fast, professional drying matters. We dry structures to verified standards and apply antimicrobial treatment where needed, which stops mold before it starts.

By measuring, not by looking. Materials can feel dry on the surface while the cavity behind them is still wet, so we take moisture readings against a dry standard elsewhere in the building and keep drying until the wet materials match it. The readings are logged, which is also what your adjuster wants to see.

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Air movers lift moisture out of materials and into the air; the dehumidifier pulls it out of the air. That exchange only works while both are running. Switching them off early leaves water inside the walls and floor, which is the situation that grows mold.

Having someone come out and look at the damage carries no charge in most cases. That visit is what sets the scope: which of the three water categories in ANSI/IICRC S500 applies, how far it migrated, and what has to be dried. A written estimate is separate work, and depending on the office, preparing one may carry a fee. You are told what is chargeable before anything is charged.

Photos and a report you already have are genuinely useful — bring them, they shorten the visit. What they cannot do is produce a number, because what drives the scope is moisture inside material you cannot photograph. ANSI/IICRC S500 works from meter readings against a dry standard in the same building, and from the water category: Category 1 can often be dried in place, while Category 3 means contaminated material comes out instead. A range quoted sight-unseen is a guess, and guesses move.

On an insurance claim the usual pattern is that your deductible is collected and the carrier's payments cover the rest as work is approved, which usually means no large sum is due before mitigation begins. Self-pay jobs are structured differently and often staged between drying and repairs. Card, check and ACH are normally accepted, some offices can arrange terms, and any processing fee is disclosed before you pay. What applies to you is in writing before you sign.

Self-pay customers are welcome, and plenty of people choose that route deliberately when the likely scope sits near or under their deductible or they would rather not have a claim on record. The work itself does not change — the same ANSI/IICRC S500 drying standard, the same readings, the same verification. What changes is the paperwork and the payment arrangement, which the office walks you through, including how the scope can be staged if that helps.

The phone is answered around the clock, and on that call you are given an honest arrival window for your specific address rather than a stock answer. The visit is not a sales appointment — crews carry extraction and drying equipment, so when the situation calls for it emergency work can begin on the first visit: standing water pulled out, air movers and dehumidifiers set, and the wet area mapped against a dry standard under ANSI/IICRC S500.

The phone is answered around the clock, including nights, weekends and holidays, because a loss found at night only gets worse while it sits, and on that call you are given an honest arrival window for your address. After-hours labor is a recognized line item in Xactimate, the pricing data carriers settle against, so where it applies it shows on the estimate like everything else rather than as a surprise. Whether it applies to your situation at all is said plainly up front.

Either order works, and many people do both back to back. What should not happen is drying waiting on a claim decision. EPA guidance puts the mold window at 24 to 48 hours for wet material, and most policies place a duty on the homeowner to prevent further damage, which is why emergency mitigation proceeds on your own authorization while the claim is still being opened. The readings and photos taken at the start are what the adjuster reviews later.

Water damage is the bulk of the work, across all three categories ANSI/IICRC S500 defines — clean supply water, gray water, and sewage. Fire and smoke work covers soot, char and odor. Mold remediation follows IICRC S520. Storm and wind damage, contents cleaning for furniture and belongings, and the reconstruction that puts drywall, flooring and cabinetry back are all in scope, though what each office handles in-house varies. Plumbing, roofing and electrical repairs are separate trades.

Turning the water off at the main comes first, if you can reach it safely, because that is what stops the loss from growing. Repairing the failed pipe, fixture or roof is plumbing or roofing work and usually a separate trade. Mitigation does not have to wait on that repair: ANSI/IICRC S500 treats source control and structural drying as distinct steps, so extraction and drying can start while the plumbing is still being scheduled.

Direct billing to the carrier is common on covered losses, arranged once the claim number and adjuster are in hand, so you are not fronting the whole job. Carriers generally review water losses as Xactimate line items rather than a lump sum. How it runs depends on your policy — some issue payment to you and your mortgage holder rather than the contractor, which changes the paperwork but not the scope. You are told which arrangement applies before work starts.

Most policies cover sudden, accidental water damage and exclude damage that developed gradually, and the wording varies from policy to policy — read your own and ask your adjuster directly rather than assuming it either way. Your deductible applies regardless and cannot be waived, discounted or absorbed into the invoice. Anyone offering to do that is describing insurance fraud.

Emergency mitigation usually starts on a signed work authorization covering extraction and drying, because waiting on paperwork while water sits makes the loss bigger. The line-item estimate follows, and when it lands depends on the size of the loss and whether a carrier is reviewing it; the office can give you a realistic date on the call. The daily moisture readings ANSI/IICRC S500 requires are what justify each line, and a scope that grows gets a revised estimate.

The basics are the address and how to get in, a callback number that reaches you, what you know about the source and when it started, and whether power and water are still on. If a claim is open, add the carrier, policy and claim number and the adjuster's details. Photos taken before anything was moved matter more than they look: ANSI/IICRC S500 scoping rests on documented conditions, and the earliest record cannot be recreated later.

Documentation is part of the job, not homework for you. Moisture readings, photographs, affected material measurements and daily drying logs are produced as the work goes, because ANSI/IICRC S500 expects drying to be verified against a dry standard rather than declared. You can ask for copies of all of it. Discussing scope with an adjuster who is limiting it is normal, though the carrier makes the coverage decision and the policy sets the limits.

Ask on the call and you will get a direction rather than a dial tone. Some work genuinely belongs elsewhere: a plumber for the pipe itself, a roofer for the roof, an HVAC contractor for a condensate or duct problem, and for mold an independent indoor environmental professional, since IICRC S520 flags the conflict of interest when the same firm both assesses and remediates. Saying so plainly is more use to you than a visit that goes nowhere.

That depends on what the water is and what it reached, and it is assessed first. ANSI/IICRC S500 sorts water into three categories, and Category 3 — sewage or heavily contaminated water — is treated as a containment job with restricted entry. The EPA and CDC describe mold and sewage exposure as a greater concern for infants, older adults and people with asthma or weakened immune systems. Clean-water losses confined to one area often allow normal occupancy; ask about your own rooms.