Emergency Job SOP

Purpose. How Summit handles the 24/7 emergency line: active leaks, storm damage, fallen-tree strikes, board-ups, and emergency tarping. Emergencies are where reputations are made; the caller is often standing in a wet living room. Speed and calm beat everything else. Pete Sandoval owns emergency operations; the after-hours answering service is the first voice on the line outside business hours.

Trigger. Any call or message describing active water intrusion, structural damage, a tree strike, a security breach needing board-up, or storm damage the caller believes is urgent.

Timing. Emergencies are answered 24/7. Callback from Summit within 30 minutes of the answering service's page, any hour. On-site target: same day, and within 2 to 4 hours for active water intrusion inside the ~45-minute service radius.

The one number that never changes

Emergency dispatch is $450 flat, plus tarping, credited toward the repair if Summit does the permanent work. Everyone quotes it identically: the answering service script, Rosa, reps, crew leads. It is the only firm price anyone at Summit states before a site visit, because it is a dispatch fee, not a repair quote. Repair pricing still follows Pricing and Estimating Rules: ranges only until the site has been assessed.

Steps

1. Answer and triage. (Owner: Rosa in business hours; the answering service after hours.) Script questions: Is anyone in danger? Is water actively coming in right now? Address? Callback number? Occupied or vacant? Insurance claim expected? Life-safety situations get "call 911 first"; we are not first responders.
2. Answering-service handoff. (Owner: answering service. Timing: immediately after the call.) The service pages the on-call lead (rotation set by Pete, posted weekly) with name, callback number, address, and a one-line description, and simultaneously emails the full call log to the office inbox. The answering service quotes the $450 dispatch fee from its script and books nothing; commitment timing comes from Summit's callback. If the on-call lead does not acknowledge the page within 15 minutes, the service escalates to Pete directly.
3. Callback and commitment. (Owner: on-call lead. Timing: within 30 minutes of the page.) Confirm the situation, restate the $450 dispatch-plus-tarping fee and the credit-back rule before rolling, and give an arrival window. Immediate safety coaching where relevant: move valuables, kill power to affected circuits, catch water, stay off the roof.
4. Log it in GHL. (Owner: on-call lead, or Rosa next morning for overnight jobs.) Create the contact and opportunity, tag it emergency, note the fee quoted. After triage, emergency jobs skip to Estimate Scheduled; the tarp visit doubles as the assessment visit.
5. Dispatch and stabilize. (Owner: on-call lead, pulling crew per the on-call rotation.) On site: CompanyCam photos of everything before touching anything, especially for likely insurance claims; then tarp, board up, extract standing water where feasible, and make it safe. Stabilization only. Nobody starts permanent repairs on an emergency visit.
6. Document for the claim. (Owner: crew lead on site.) Wide shots, close-ups of every damage point, the cause if visible (the limb, the missing shingles), and interior damage. If the customer mentions insurance, note carrier and claim status in GHL; claim-savvy handling is a core part of our Insurance Restoration Customer work. Crews never tell a customer what insurance will or will not cover.
7. Collect and set up the follow-on. (Owner: crew lead collects or invoices the $450 plus tarping per Rosa's setup; Rosa books the estimate.) Before leaving: explain in writing on the invoice that the fee is credited if Summit does the permanent repair, and book the full assessment or confirm the tarp visit covered it. Tara delivers the repair estimate within 3 business days per Estimate Scheduling SOP.
8. Next-morning review. (Owner: Pete, with Rosa. Timing: first thing next business day.) Verify every overnight page became a GHL record, the fee was collected or invoiced, photos are in CompanyCam, and the follow-on estimate is booked. Emergencies that stall after stabilization are money and goodwill left on the table.

Storm-surge mode

When a storm produces more pages than the on-call crew can clear, Pete activates surge: both roofing crews on triage, remodel crew holds its schedule, Rosa sequences by severity (active interior water first, then security board-ups, then exterior-only damage), and Rosa sends every waiting caller an honest ETA per the delay rules in Customer Update SOP. We do not promise windows we cannot hit just to hold the lead.

Related

• Emergency Repair
• New Job Intake SOP
• Estimate Scheduling SOP
• Insurance Restoration Customer
• Crew Dispatch SOP