Kinetik Consulting provides specialised consultancy and mechanical engineering services to a range of customers across multiple industries. Director Brett Woolford has a strong background in the crane industry and explains how his business has diversified to include insurance assessment services for UAA.
Brett started his career as a light vehicle mechanic and quickly progressed to heavy diesel mechanic, with Max Cranes, now Max Services, in South Australia. During his 12 years with the business, he progressed to Workshop Supervisor and then Workshop Manager. After five years, he moved into the role of Group Operations Manager managing all facets of the now large business. This included operations, mechanical services, project management and service delivery.Brett takes up his story.
“I had 12 terrific years with Mark and the team at Max Services, but I always had the ambition to work for myself. Back in June 2021 I saw an opportunity in regional South Australia in particular, for a business that included my skills in project management, mechanical support and services within the crane and heavy industrial sector. That’s when I started Kinetik Consulting.
“Shortly after starting the business, I completed the CraneSafe endorsement process and became an approved assessor through the CICA CraneSafe scheme. Crane assessing is now a fair portion of the business. And since then, we have been working with companies like UAA and Mecon with incident causation reports and loss adjusting, specifically around cranes and heavy vehicle equipment,” Brett says.
“We also work on smaller capital projects – specifically project management and supervision. We have a team of four guys which provided project management on site, including mine sites in regional South Australia. We also provide services in the hydraulics and automation space. providing fault finding, general mechanical, breakdown support and hydraulic component retail across regional South Australia,” he says.
Brett goes on to discuss the relationship with UAA and Mecon and how the companies came to work together.
“George Grasso, Group Chief Claims & Services Officer at UAA, called knowing I was out on my own and doing some mechanical consulting and inspection work. He was looking for more people with specific crane experience and who had relationships with both repairers and crane OEMs.
“He was looking for people in the market to help facilitate recoveries, repairs to help get customers back up and running as quickly, efficiently and as cost effectively as possible,” Brett says.
“We started off slowly with some smaller claims, basically to support my growth and understanding in the insurance space.”
“Working with UAA has now developed into a significant element of our business and we have been working on several bigger claims involving larger and newer machines which have been involved in significant events – anywhere from the East Coast to
the West Coast,” he said.
Brett explains how the service from Kinetik Consulting works in terms of insurance claims.
“Usually, a claims consultant within UAA will notify me of an event, whatever that might be, and that an insured party has put a claim forward. They’ll give me a brief regarding the information they have received and provide us with the insureds and the brokers details. I contact both the insured and the broker and ascertain any details that they have regarding specific asset information, maintenance and service histories, CraneSafes or third party inspections and importantly any investigation reports, or any third-party reports from the authorities involved,” he said.
“Depending on how significant the event is, determines if I need to be on site or not. From there, we’ll generate a causation report which covers details about how the event occurred, whether it was a failure of a specific component or an accident based on employees or environmental impacts”.
“Through that process, we help with the recovery of the asset via engaging third parties to support the recovery, have repairers quote on the repairs and arrange to have the asset delivered to the repairer. The repairer and I will then workshop the repair process, examine the best, quickest and most cost effective options to get the machine repaired. If is deemed a total loss, we’ll go through the process of working out market values of the asset,” Brett says.
From there, Brett compiles a report with all recommendations – based on whether it’s a total loss of settlement or a repair. And if it becomes a repair, he works with the repairer, ensuring the insured gets their machine back as per working order prior to the event. And if it turns into a total loss or a salvage option, then he obtains salvage quotes to on sell the machine as per his recommendations to UAA.
Brett explains how the insurance assessing aspect of the Kinetik Consulting benefits the aspects of the business.
“The insurance assessing for UAA adds value to the business as it’s very much within the crane industry and fits very well with our inspection side of the business with CraneSafe assessing,” he says.
“It really complements the rest of the business. It’s not a full-time job and probably accounts for 15 hours a week of loss adjusting.”
“The CraneSafe assessing, third party endorsements and UAA loss adjusting all complement each other perfectly”.
Brett explains how the relationship with UAA and the loss adjusting has evolved and why he now assesses claims interstate.
“The loss adjusting has evolved through relationships. Our role is designed to support the claims consultants because they aren’t necessarily subject matter experts when it comes to cranes and lifting. There’s a handful of experts like myself in Australia that support UAA from a technical space.
“The main reason I have been going interstate is because other companies have been busy as well. Unfortunately for many businesses, It’s been a busy six months in the crane industry with several significant events. It’s really pushed everyone a bit.
“I certainly like to stick to my own patch, there’s no doubt about that. But obviously, if UAA or someone asks us to support interstate customers, I’m absolutely willing to do so, anything to help get a client back up and running as soon as possible,” he says.