CA AB 1795: Smoke Now Presumed Fire-Related, Contractor Compliance Guide

AB 1795 shifts the presumption on California wildfire smoke claims. If a property sits inside a declared wildfire perimeter and the homeowner reports soot, ash intrusion, or smoke odor within the claims window, the loss is now treated as presumptively fire-related. The insurer has to produce evidence to rebut that, not the other way around. For your crew, that means the scope of loss you write needs to hold up as the primary record an adjuster works from, not a supporting document to a causation argument you used to have to win first. Your documentation standard just got more important, not less.

The burden of proof shift, and why your documentation now carries more weight

Before this change, a lot of smoke-only claims got argued to a standstill before anyone authorized a walkthrough. Adjusters would push back on causation, contractors would get asked for lab testing nobody budgeted for, and the file would sit while the homeowner lived with HVAC contamination and off-gassing.

Under the new presumption, that argument mostly goes away for claims inside a declared perimeter. What replaces it is a documentation standard. If the insurer wants to rebut the presumption, they need affirmative evidence the smoke wasn't from a covered event. Your scope of loss, your moisture logs, and your photo record become the file the adjuster and the carrier's internal reviewers will actually read. Sloppy scoping used to get covered by a slow, contentious causation fight. Now a thin scope just gets challenged on its own merits, and there's less cover for it.

Write your scope like it's going in front of an appraiser, because on contested files it probably is.

Why water categories still matter on a smoke-only fire claim

A lot of contractors treat smoke claims as a separate animal from water claims. On the ground they rarely are. Suppression activity, sprinkler discharge, and hose stream runoff during firefighting operations routinely create secondary water intrusion even in structures that never saw flame contact. That water needs its own category and class assessment under IICRC S500, independent of the smoke and soot documentation you're doing under S500 fire and smoke guidance.

Category 1 water from a sprinkler head or a clean hose line overnight is a different drying protocol, different equipment count, and different line-item set than Category 3 water that picked up contaminants moving across a burned yard or through a compromised sewer lateral during suppression. If you scope the smoke and skip the water categorization because "it's a fire job," you're leaving documentation gaps that a carrier reviewer will flag, and you're underscoping drying equipment the loss actually needs.

• Category 1: clean source, shorter drying protocol, standard air mover and dehu placement.
• Category 2: gray water, requires antimicrobial application and closer moisture monitoring.
• Category 3: grossly contaminated, drives containment, PPE, and often demo instead of clean-and-dry.

Class of loss (1 through 4) still governs how much affected square footage and how many drying days you're going to need, and that number is what your equipment count and line items should trace back to.

Building a carrier-ready scope: IICRC S500, S520, and Xactimate line items

Your scope needs to speak the same technical language the adjuster's training references. That means citing IICRC S500 for water and S520 for mold conditions where applicable, and writing your Xactimate line items so they map directly to documented conditions, not generic categories.

Practical structure that holds up under review:

• Affected square footage broken out by room and by category/class, not a single blended total.
• Moisture readings logged per room with meter type and reading, not just "elevated moisture noted."
• Thermal imaging captures for hidden moisture behind assemblies, especially where suppression water tracked into wall cavities.
• Containment line items justified by category (Category 3 water or heavy soot load typically drives containment, Category 1 usually doesn't).
• Demo versus clean decision documented with a reason, porous material saturated past a defensible drying window gets demo'd, non-porous or lightly affected material gets cleaned and encapsulated.

Carriers push back hardest on line items that look like they were pulled from a template. A scope that ties every line to a moisture reading, a photo, or a category determination is much harder to challenge, presumption or no presumption.

One line item that draws pushback constantly: "Seal/treat framing/subfloor for odor control" applied across an entire affected area instead of specific assemblies. A reviewer will cut that line to the rooms with documented soot deposition or a positive odor reading, unless you've logged which studs, joists, or subfloor sections actually tested positive for particulate or showed visible char/soot at the material level. Defend it by keying the treatment line to your room-by-room photo log and moisture/particulate notes, not a blanket call for the whole structure. The same logic applies to antimicrobial application line items on Category 2 water, tie each application to the specific room and category call, not a global rate across the loss.

Job site scenario: overnight Category 1 water versus Category 3 after suppression

Picture two calls in the same wildfire perimeter the same week. First house: no flame contact, HVAC ran during the smoke event and pulled particulate through the whole duct system, minor Category 1 water from a hose test at the neighbor's structure that wet down one exterior wall overnight. Second house: fire crews knocked down a spot fire at the property line, hose streams ran through a broken window into the living room, and runoff picked up ash, debris, and yard contaminants before pooling on the subfloor. House one is a smoke and duct remediation job with a short, clean water mitigation add-on. Class 1 or 2, short drying window, standard equipment. House two is a Category 3 water loss layered on top of the smoke scope, which changes your containment plan, your PPE requirements, and probably your demo line for the affected subfloor and baseboard.

Both fall under the AB 1795 presumption if they're inside the perimeter and reported in the window. But they are not the same scope, and writing them as if they were is exactly the kind of thing that draws a rebuttal from the carrier.

Adjuster walkthrough: what to document before they arrive

Get ahead of the walkthrough instead of reacting to it. Before the adjuster is on site you want:

• Moisture meter readings logged by room, with a baseline dry standard noted for comparison.
• Photos of soot deposition patterns, HVAC filter condition, and any visible ash intrusion points.
• A preliminary category/class call on any water involved, with the reasoning written out, not just a number.
• Thermal imaging stills where you suspect moisture behind drywall or under flooring.

When the adjuster walks the property with you, you're confirming a documented position, not building one on the fly. That difference matters more now because the presumption puts pressure on the carrier to justify pushback, and they'll look for gaps in your file before they look for gaps in the homeowner's claim.

Supplementing the claim: photo logs, moisture logs, drying and equipment days

Supplements get denied when the documentation trail has holes, not usually because the work wasn't needed. Every supplement request should carry:

• A dated photo log showing conditions at initial scope and at the point the supplement need became apparent.
• Moisture logs showing readings over time, not a single snapshot, so the drying curve supports the equipment days you're billing.
• A clear equipment day count tied to the class of loss and affected square footage, not a flat number that doesn't change with room size.
• Notes on any category change, water that started Category 2 and trended toward Category 3 because of dwell time needs to be flagged the day you see it, not retroactively at supplement time.

If you're keeping that photo log, moisture log, and category timeline in a notebook or scattered phone folders, it's worth knowing RestoreWright handles that automatically, every reading, photo, and category call time stamped from the first walkthrough so it's already organized when you sit down to write the supplement. Worth a look if you want to see it on your own jobs: start a free trial at restorewright.pro.

Frequently asked questions

Does AB 1795 apply to smoke damage outside a declared wildfire perimeter?

The presumption is tied to declared wildfire incident areas. Smoke damage claims outside a declared perimeter still go through the standard causation review process, so your scope documentation needs to carry the causation argument the same way it did before.

Do I still need lab testing for particulate or VOC levels on a presumption claim?

Lab testing can still support a contested scope, especially on higher end contents or HVAC remediation disputes, but it's no longer the gatekeeper for getting a walkthrough authorized inside a declared perimeter. Your field documentation, moisture logs, and photo record carry more of that weight now.

How do I categorize water damage that's mixed with fire suppression runoff and ash?

Treat it on contamination level, not on the fact that it's fire-adjacent. Runoff carrying ash, debris, or sewage backflow typically reads as Category 2 or 3 depending on dwell time and source. Document the source and appearance at time of discovery so the category call holds up if it's challenged later.

What changes in my Xactimate scope for a presumption claim versus a standard smoke claim?

The line items themselves don't change based on the legal presumption, they still need to reflect actual conditions, category/class, and affected square footage. What changes is how much weight your documentation carries if the carrier tries to narrow the scope, so make sure every line traces back to a photo or a reading.

Should I still get an adjuster on site quickly even with the presumption in place?

Yes. Faster walkthroughs mean fresher moisture readings and less argument later about whether conditions changed between loss date and inspection. The presumption shifts the burden of proof, it doesn't remove the value of getting eyes on the property early.