25th Annual IASIU Conference was a Success
Thank you to everyone who helped put on an outstanding conference at the JW Marriott in Orlando. It was wonderful to see so many people so committed to fighting fraud. The people, the vendors, the classes were all incredibly useful and timely. If you were one of the people who attended our seminar, Restoring Reason to Fire Investigations, please click the "read more" button below and fill out a quick survey. We need your input to make our presentations as effective as possible.
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The conference was very well organized. Every day they put out a newspaper which included and article about the days events. Here is what they posted about our talk:
"Restoring Reason to Fire Claims” seems like a pretty tall order for one session to fill, but presenter Stephen Willison might just be the man to do it during his workshop this afternoon, which begins at 1 p.m. in Mediterranean 6. “The industry is at a crossroads where fraud is becoming more socially acceptable,” said Willison. “We have to find ways to make catching fraud more accurate and more realistic.” With the number of “undetermined” fire causes rising at unprecedented rates, arson could be costing carriers all over the country undetermined amounts of money.
It has certainly become a hot topic as the number of fires with unclear causes continues to grow. In order to cool the climbing numbers of undetermined causes, Willison plans on starting with the basics. “We have to start looking at the fire as a whole,” he explained. “There are limitations to technology and forensic evidence, but losing that piece of the investigation is not a death sentence as everyone seems to think it is.”
Instead of limiting the focus of an investigation to the data collected by various technological tools, Willison suggests using a wider lens with which to view the situation, which allows the investigator a little more freedom. In other words, the cause of a fire may be more obvious when it’s seen as a whole, instead of in pieces of data. That is not to say that data should be forgotten, though, as Willison will also feature the benefits of using that information in determining cause. The role of technology is not to be ignored, but the program will suggest the best ways to utilize the information gathered in order to create a strong argument for fraud.
One of the goals of the workshop is to show participants that arson cases can still be proven, and fraud cases can still be won. Though the legal standards for proving the cause of a fire have become hazy, the information provided will help attendees to find their way through the smoke and mirrors. Fire claims may be difficult to deal with, but armed with the knowledge you’ll gain in today’s workshop, they certainly won’t be too hot to handle.
