Two Miami, Fla., adjusters thought they could get away with bloating a claim.

According to Florida's Division of Insurance Fraud, licensed public adjusters Jose Soler and Ariel Fernandez fraudulently collected more than $400,000 by allegedly submitting 75 phony contractor agreements, which stemmed from real claims for water pipe damage. The contractor agreements resulted in an overpayment by one insurance company for approximately $314,596.54; and detectives said an additional 29 documents were submitted to another insurance firm, which resulted in a loss of approximately $125,281.81.

Detectives said the bogus documents were submitted in order to obtain an additional 20 percent of the estimated claim for overhead and profit. Following each storm in 2004 and 2005, Florida's CFO Tom Gallagher capped public adjusters' fees that could be charged to storm victims and implemented a 14-day day period for victims to cancel public adjuster contracts without a penalty.

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