# Do You Have to Use Your Insurer's Preferred Contractor in DC?

**Restoration Doctor of Washington DC** (VA Water Damage LLC dba Restoration Doctor)
Phone: (202) 922-1444 ((202) 922-1444) · office@restorationdoctors.com
Address: 4315 50th St NW Suite 100 #7112, Washington, DC 20016
Category: Insurance · Published: September 21, 2026 · Updated: September 21, 2026
Author: Steve Jafari, General Manager — https://restorationdoctordc.com/authors/steve-jafari

> TL;DR: An insurance preferred vendor program is a commercial arrangement between an insurance company and a contractor, and a property owner is not a party to it. The District's insurance regulator publishes consumer guidance saying a homeowner may select a contractor suggested by the insurance company but is not required to do so. We could locate no District statute or regulation creating a right of contractor choice, so that sentence is published guidance rather than a statutory right.

![A squared stack of unmarked pages on bare floorboards below a row-house wall cut back to wood lath](https://restorationdoctordc.com/images/blog/insurer-preferred-contractor-choice-dc/insurer-preferred-contractor-choice-dc-printed-list-on-floor-1600w.jpg)
*Illustrative only. A preferred-vendor list is one page among the paperwork a homeowner is handed, not a requirement by itself.*

## Do you have to use your insurer's preferred contractor in DC?

Short answer first, then the paperwork behind it. The District of Columbia Department of Insurance, Securities and Banking publishes a consumer guide for property owners. People search this question as an insurance preferred vendor program, or as whether they must use an insurer preferred contractor. The regulator's published answer is the place to start: a homeowner "may select a contractor suggested by the insurance company but he or she is not required to do so," and "The homeowner can choose any contractor to make the repairs."

Guidance is guidance, though, and the distinction matters if the question becomes contested. We also looked for a District statute or regulation granting a right to choose a contractor, or barring an insurance company from directing repair work to a particular firm. We did not locate one. What we read, and where, is set out below.

- The regulator's consumer guide says a homeowner can choose any contractor to make the repairs
- The insurance company's obligation, as the regulator describes it, is to provide the funds needed rather than to perform the repairs
- No District statute or regulation creating a right of contractor choice was located in this pass, and that absence is a finding rather than an oversight
- Your own policy decides what your insurance company owes, and reading it is a question for you, your agent, a licensed public adjuster or an attorney

## What is an insurance preferred vendor program?

A preferred vendor program, sometimes called a managed repair program, is a commercial arrangement between an insurance company and a contractor. The contractor agrees to terms: a rate structure, a documentation format, a response window, a review process. In exchange it receives referrals. The regulator's guide describes the visible end of it, saying that "Many insurance companies will provide policyholders a list of contractors with whom the insurance company is familiar. The insurance company may even suggest a contractor."

Its terms sit between the two parties to it, and a property owner is not one of them. A program is also neither a credential nor a disqualification. Membership tells you that a contractor and an insurance company reached terms. On its own that says nothing about who is licensed to work in the District, who carries the right coverage, or who has opened a plaster wall in a hundred-year-old row house.

The word program covers a wide range in practice. On some claims the arrangement extends no further than a referral. On others the insurance company manages the repair end to end and the contractor works to a scope the company's estimator wrote. Which version you are looking at is a fair thing to ask in writing.

![A narrow row-house hallway with plaster cut away at the base, exposing wood lath and brick behind it](https://restorationdoctordc.com/images/blog/insurer-preferred-contractor-choice-dc/insurer-preferred-contractor-choice-dc-row-house-hallway-plaster-cut-1600w.jpg)
*Illustrative only. The physical work behind any program membership still happens inside the home under a separate work agreement.*

## Who holds the contract for the work, and who holds the policy?

Two documents govern a restoration job, and confusing them is where most of this goes wrong. The policy is a contract between you and your insurance company. The work agreement is a contract between you and whichever contractor you hire. The guide puts the second one flatly, and the word always is the regulator's: "In either case, the contract for the work will always be between the homeowner and the contractor."

The same guide draws out what follows. The homeowner selects the contractor, signs the contract and manages the work. On money, the company is "not responsible for making the repairs, only providing the funds needed to make the repairs," and the guide states its legal obligation as paying the homeowner enough to restore the home to its pre-loss condition. The guide is blunter still about supervision: the insurance company "has no responsibility for providing oversight of the contractor or the work."

Emergency work does not change that, and who pays whom is set out in [who pays the restoration company on a District loss](/blog/who-pays-restoration-company-dc). An authorization signed at two in the morning is still your agreement, worth reading before you sign and worth keeping. The guide notes that an adjuster will sometimes call in contractors to secure a property and limit further loss, then adds that "Even in these cases the contractor will have the homeowner sign the authorization for the work and agree to pay the contractor."

## Does any District law give a property owner the right to choose the contractor?

Not one that we could locate, and saying so plainly is more useful than implying otherwise. What we searched for was the kind of provision sometimes called an anti-steering rule, meaning one that bars an insurance company from requiring an insured to use a named repair firm. We did not find one in the District. What the District has instead is published regulator guidance, which answers the practical question without creating a right.

Here is exactly how we looked. We read the section list of the District's unfair insurance trade practices chapter, [Chapter 22A of Title 31 of the D.C. Code](https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/titles/31/chapters/22A). It runs to twenty-six sections, and no section title names repair work, contractor selection or a vendor list. We then read the full text of the four nearest by title: its claim settlement section, its [boycott-and-coercion section](https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-2231.06), its [favored-agent section](https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-2231.20), and its [unfair discrimination section for property and casualty insurance](https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-2231.13). None of the four decides who repairs a building. They govern claim handling; concerted acts that restrain the business of insurance; lenders and the insurance a borrower buys; and premiums and rating. We finished with the regulator's published pages of insurance laws and consumer guides, where the right-of-choice sentence turned up.

The District's municipal regulations for insurance sit in a viewer that returns nothing to an automated request, and the mirror we tried was down, so we did not read them end to end and this post cites none of them. A sentence in a consumer guide is the regulator telling residents how the relationship works, and it is reasonable to quote back in writing. It is not the same instrument as a statute a court would apply.

## What does the District's insurance regulator tell homeowners about a contractor list?

The guide gives the question its own heading, asking whether insurance companies have their own contractors. Then it repeats the line quoted at the top of this post: a homeowner "may select a contractor suggested by the insurance company but he or she is not required to do so."

It then does something unusual for a consumer page, which is to argue the other side. It sets out a practical advantage of hiring from the list, worth reading even though it cuts against any contractor's interest. Many repairs turn up something nobody could see on day one, and a change may require an adjustment to the payout. A contractor the company has worked with before is likely to get that change approved with minimum delay, the guide reasons, while an unfamiliar one may prompt a site visit. Its summary line is that homeowners "can always select their own contractor but it's usually better to select a contractor that has a working relationship with the insurance company."

The guide's checklist is where the screening questions are, and none is about a list. Check that the contractor is licensed in the District, through the District's licensing and consumer protection agency. Check for liability and workers compensation coverage, and ask for a Certificate of Insurance. Check the permits. The guide also says the adjuster prepares an itemized scope of loss, and that the homeowner "should ensure that the contractor uses the scope of loss as the work plan for repairing the damage."

![A small stack of unmarked pages on a bare stair tread in a row-house stairwell stripped back to lath](https://restorationdoctordc.com/images/blog/insurer-preferred-contractor-choice-dc/insurer-preferred-contractor-choice-dc-pages-on-stair-tread-1600w.jpg)
*Illustrative only. The regulator's checklist asks about license, coverage and permits, and every answer arrives on paper.*

## What does the District's unfair claim settlement practices statute actually cover?

[D.C. Code § 31-2231.17](https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-2231.17) is the section people reach for on a claim dispute. It sets out two lists of conduct. The threshold in its opening words is part of the rule rather than a footnote, so the section describes a pattern of business conduct rather than one decision on one claim. Both lists open the same way: "No person shall commit or perform with such frequency as to indicate a general business practice any of the following."

What the section does not contain matters just as much. Read end to end, it has no provision about repair work, no provision about a contractor list, and none requiring or forbidding a particular firm. The conduct it names is claim handling conduct. Two entries give the flavor: refusing to pay a claim "for a reason that is arbitrary or capricious based on all available information," and failing "promptly upon request to provide a reasonable explanation of the basis for a denial of a claim."

So this statute is not a contractor choice provision, and presenting it as one would not survive scrutiny from the other side of a file. Its relevance here is narrower and real. If you have asked in writing for a reasonable explanation of the basis for a denial of your claim and nothing has come back, that is the conduct subsection (a)(6) names, and only where it is done with the frequency the section requires. The District's insurance regulator accepts consumer complaints. How long the earlier steps take is covered in [the District water damage claim timeline](/blog/dc-water-damage-claim-timeline).

## What do industry position statements say about a third party directing scope or price?

A referral list decides who might do the work. A review arrangement decides who gets an opinion about the scope and the price after it is written. Third-party administrators and outside estimate reviewers are ordinary parts of how property claims get processed, and describing what one does is not an accusation about motives.

The Restoration Industry Association, the trade body for this industry, published a series of position statements on precisely this point. Its first statement says that "third parties cannot unilaterally dictate restoration procedures, scope, price, or billing," while a qualified third party engaged to do so may offer opinions about those things. It adds that "Absent a direct contract with an insurer, restoration contractors are under no legal obligation to an insurer, its adjuster, or a third party," and that a consultant's opinions "are not binding on the restorer."

Read that for what it is: a trade association's position rather than a law, binding nobody. What it explains is the structure. Where a contractor has a contract with an insurance company, it has agreed to that company's terms, which is what a program membership is. Without such a contract, the relationship runs through the property owner instead. The estimate line most often argued over is the coordination line, covered on its own in [overhead and profit on a District insurance estimate](/blog/overhead-and-profit-water-mitigation-dc).

## What can you ask in writing before a list becomes a decision?

Asking is not arguing, and a written question costs nothing but the time to send it. What follows is questions and documents rather than a letter to copy, because drafting your letter would cross the line described below.

- Whether the insurance company's position is that a firm from its list is required, stated in writing rather than over the phone
- Who wrote the scope of loss, and whether an outside reviewer has been engaged on the claim

| What you are handed | What it usually is | What to request in writing |
| --- | --- | --- |
| A list of contractor names | A referral list of firms the company knows | Whether the claim requires a firm from the list, or the list is a referral |
| One name and a scheduled visit | A referral to one firm, sometimes a managed repair arrangement | What that arrangement covers, and who writes the scope of the work |
| An itemized scope of loss | The company's own estimate of the materials and labor | The current version in full, plus any earlier version revised |
| A revised estimate, a line changed | A reviewer did not accept an activity as scoped or priced | The reason recorded for the change, and whether a reviewer was involved |
| An authorization to sign on site | A work agreement between you and that contractor | A copy of what you signed, and the cancellation terms in it |

*Illustrative only. What an insurance company owes is decided by the policy and the facts of the loss.*

![A closed black ring binder stands upright beside a folded canvas drop cloth on bare row-house floorboards](https://restorationdoctordc.com/images/blog/insurer-preferred-contractor-choice-dc/insurer-preferred-contractor-choice-dc-binder-and-drop-cloth-1600w.jpg)
*Illustrative only. A written record is the practical answer to most of what a list leaves unclear.*

## What can a restoration contractor in the District not do for you?

The boundary here is statutory rather than a matter of preference, and it turns on first party claims, meaning a claim on your own property under your own policy. [Section 31-1631.02(5)(A)](https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-1631.02) defines a public insurance adjuster to include a person who acts for compensation or any other thing of value. The definition reaches one who acts or aids on behalf of an insured individual "in negotiating for, or effecting the settlement of, a claim for loss or damage covered by an insurance contract."

[Section 31-1631.03](https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-1631.03) provides that "No person shall, directly or indirectly, act as a public insurance adjuster without first procuring a license from the Commissioner to act as a public insurance adjuster."

Restoration Doctor is a restoration contractor, and nothing in this post is legal advice or insurance advice. Those provisions are why this post quotes rules and documents and then stops. A restoration contractor can scope the work, price it, record what was done and hand the file over. Without that license it cannot negotiate or settle your claim. Reading your policy for you is not something we do either, whatever the licensing line permits: what it covers and what it asks of you are questions for you, for your agent, for a licensed public adjuster, or for an attorney. What a District contractor may and may not do on a claim is set out at length in [what a DC restoration contractor cannot do](/blog/what-a-restoration-contractor-cannot-do-dc).

This post makes no prediction and no recommendation about which contractor to hire, and it does not say that any insurance company requires a firm from its list or may not ask.

## Where can a District owner read these rules firsthand?

Every quotation above comes from a document anyone can open, including the consumer guide that is guidance rather than law and the association statement that is a trade position.

Sources referenced in this article:

- District of Columbia Department of Insurance, Securities and Banking, consumer guide on [things you should know when selecting a contractor](https://disb.dc.gov/page/things-you-should-know-when-selecting-contractor)
- Code of the District of Columbia, [Chapter 22A section list, unfair insurance trade practices](https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/titles/31/chapters/22A), twenty-six section titles, none on contractor selection
- Code of the District of Columbia, [§ 31-2231.17 on unfair claim settlement practices](https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-2231.17)
- Code of the District of Columbia, [§ 31-1631.02](https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-1631.02) and [§ 31-1631.03](https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-1631.03), public insurance adjuster licensing
- Restoration Industry Association, [position statements on third party direction of procedures, scope and price](https://www.restorationindustry.org/restoration-blog/restoration-industry-association-announces-release-position-statements)
- District of Columbia Department of Licensing and Consumer Protection, [contractor license verification](https://dlcp.dc.gov/)
- Restoration Doctor's Virginia site, on [the same question under Virginia law](https://restorationdoctors.com/blog/preferred-vendor-program-and-steering-virginia)


## Frequently asked questions

### Do I have to use insurance approved repairers?

The District's insurance regulator publishes a consumer guide saying a homeowner may select a contractor suggested by the insurance company "but he or she is not required to do so," and can choose any contractor to make the repairs. That is guidance rather than a statute, and what your own policy says about repairs is a question for you, your agent, a licensed public adjuster or an attorney.

### What is an insurance preferred vendor program?

It is a commercial arrangement between an insurance company and a contractor. The contractor agrees to terms such as a rate structure, a documentation format and a review process, and in exchange it receives referrals. A property owner is not a party to that arrangement. Membership tells you the two companies reached terms, and on its own nothing more.

### Does the District of Columbia have a law giving me the right to choose my own contractor?

We could locate none. We read the section list of the District's unfair insurance trade practices chapter section by section, then the full text of the four nearest by title. Those four include its claim settlement section, its boycott-and-coercion section and its favored-agent section, and none names repair work or contractor selection. The right-of-choice sentence we did find sits in the insurance regulator's consumer guide, which is guidance and not a statute.

### Who signs the contract if the insurance company sent the contractor?

You do. The regulator's consumer guide says that "the contract for the work will always be between the homeowner and the contractor," and that the insurance company is not responsible for performing repairs or for overseeing the work. The guide adds that even where an adjuster calls in a contractor for emergency work, that contractor still has the homeowner sign the authorization.

### Is a contractor on an insurance company's list better than one that is not?

The regulator's guide argues both sides. It says homeowners can always select their own contractor, then adds that it is usually better to pick one with a working relationship with the insurance company, because an unforeseen change is likely to be approved with less delay. Its screening checklist is about District licensing, liability and workers compensation coverage, and permits.

## Related reading

- Water Damage Restoration in Washington, DC — https://restorationdoctordc.com/services/water-damage-restoration
- Reconstruction and Rebuild Services — https://restorationdoctordc.com/services/reconstruction
- Who Pays the Restoration Company in DC — https://restorationdoctordc.com/blog/who-pays-restoration-company-dc
- What a DC Restoration Contractor Cannot Do — https://restorationdoctordc.com/blog/what-a-restoration-contractor-cannot-do-dc
- Overhead and Profit on a DC Insurance Estimate — https://restorationdoctordc.com/blog/overhead-and-profit-water-mitigation-dc
- Restoration Company in Washington, DC — https://restorationdoctordc.com/washington-dc-restoration-company

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