Seven line items carriers cut on hail claims, and the code behind each
A hail estimate that pays for shingles and nothing else is not an unusual estimate. It is the normal one. The carrier's software prices the roof covering, and the components that have to go back with it get left for the contractor to notice.
Most contractors do notice. They just decide that chasing $280 of starter strip is not worth the afternoon it takes to write the letter, and the carrier keeps the $280. Do that on forty roofs a year and it is real money.
Here is what actually gets cut, what the model code says about each, and what you need to have photographed before you ask.
1. Drip edge
The single most common omission on an asphalt shingle roof, and the easiest to win, because the code is explicit rather than a matter of practice.
IRC R905.2.8.5 requires a drip edge at eaves and rake edges of asphalt shingle roofs, with laps of at least 2 inches. It is not optional, it is not a betterment, and it is not covered by the shingle line item.
Measure eave and rake separately and give the adjuster the total in linear feet. If the estimate pays to tear off and replace the covering, the drip edge comes off with it.
2. Starter strip
Carriers pay for "shingles" and treat the starter course as part of that number. It is not. A starter strip is a different product, installed differently, and every manufacturer requires it.
IRC R905.1 requires roof coverings to be applied in accordance with the applicable provisions of the code and the manufacturer's installation instructions. That second clause is the whole argument. No shingle manufacturer permits a roof without a starter course at the eaves, and several void the wind warranty without it at the rakes too.
Quantify it the same way as drip edge: eave linear footage, plus rake if the manufacturer calls for it.
3. Hip and ridge cap
The same mechanism, and the same section of code. Capping hips and ridges with cut field shingles is not what manufacturers specify, and the hip and ridge product is priced separately in every estimating platform including the carrier's own.
If the estimate shows a ridge vent line but no cap, that is a gap. The vent still has to be capped.
4. Ice and water barrier
Regional, and that is exactly why it gets missed, the adjuster may not be local.
IRC R905.1.2 requires an ice barrier where there is a history of ice forming along the eaves, running from the eave edge to at least 24 inches inside the exterior wall line. On a low-slope section or a complex roof, that 24 inches can mean considerably more material than the adjuster assumed.
The argument is won with the jurisdiction, not the roof. Confirm what your county has adopted and say so in the letter.
5. Steep and high charges
No code backs this one, and you should not pretend otherwise. It is a labour and access item.
The argument is simply that the estimate was written at standard pitch and access when the roof is neither. A photo of a pitch gauge on the slope and a shot showing the storeys is the whole case. Carriers pay this routinely when it is documented and almost never when it is merely asserted.
6. Debris removal and dumpster
Also not a code item. A tear-off produces debris, the debris has to go somewhere, and a line item for haul-off is standard in the carrier's own price list.
This one is usually not a dispute so much as an omission, and it is worth including precisely because it is uncontroversial. A supplement made entirely of contested items reads as a fight. One that opens with two obviously correct items reads as a correction.
7. Underlayment
Where the tear-off goes to deck, underlayment is replaced, and the estimate frequently pays for shingles over an underlayment line that was never added.
Check whether the scope says "remove and replace" or only "replace". If the covering came off, what was under it came off too.
What the letter needs
The items above are the easy part. What decides whether a supplement is paid is whether the adjuster can approve it without doing any work.
That means, for every line: the quantity and how you measured it, the reason it belongs on this loss, and the code section or manufacturer requirement where one exists. Where none exists, steep charge, debris, say what it is instead. An honest "this is an access charge, here is the pitch gauge" is more persuasive than a fabricated code reference, and a single wrong citation gives the adjuster a reason to doubt the items that were right.
Photograph before the tear-off. Eave and rake edges, the existing drip edge or its absence, the pitch gauge, the storeys, and the hip and ridge lines. Nobody has ever regretted taking too many photographs of a roof they are about to remove.
A note on codes
Every section above is from the model International Residential Code. Adoption varies: your jurisdiction may be on a different edition, and local amendments change things. Confirm what has actually been adopted where the property sits before you put a section number in a letter.