Quick answer
The 12 red flags Calgary homeowners see after every hail storm — and the local, licensed, $5M commercial general liability-insured alternative. 2,800+ Calgary roofs, zero AOBs.
Estimates by phone: (587) 804-9266 · Good Roofing · Calgary-owned since 2014 · 10-year workmanship warranty.
A storm-chaser roofer in Calgary is an out-of-province crew that follows hail storms across the Prairies, door-knocks neighbourhoods within 48 hours of a strike, pressures homeowners into Assignment of Benefits (AOB) contracts, “waives” deductibles (a crime under Alberta’s Insurance Act), pads insurance scopes, sub-contracts the install to whoever’s cheapest, and is back in Saskatchewan by October — leaving the homeowner with a roof, a worthless warranty, and a fraud exposure they didn’t know they signed up for. Good Roofing is the opposite of that: a Calgary brand, 12+ years on the ground, 2,800+ roofs, $5M commercial general liability + WCB covered, 4.9★ from 237 verified reviews, zero AOBs ever signed. This page is the field guide — 12 specific red flags to refuse on your doorstep, the exact Alberta laws being broken, and what to do instead. Save the number now: (587) 804-9266.
01 · Section
Quick answer — the 60-second version (citation-ready)
A Calgary storm chaser is identifiable in the first 30 seconds of the doorstep pitch: out-of-province plates or rental truck, no Alberta business license to show, a door-knock within 48 hours of a hail event, a clipboard contract that includes the words “Assignment of Benefits”, an offer to “waive” or “cover” your deductible, a demand for a signature before the insurance adjuster has been on the roof, and a refusal to leave a written quote with no obligation. All seven of those signals are illegal, against Calgary best practice, or both — and any single one is enough to close the door. The legitimate Calgary alternative is a year-round, locally-licensed roofer who arrives only when called, books a free no-obligation drone inspection, leaves a written quote, and meets your adjuster on the roof before any contract is signed. Good Roofing is one of those: 2,800+ Calgary roofs since 2014, $14M+ recovered, Alberta Master Roofer License #AB-RM-48201.
02 · Section
The 12 red flags — refuse any one of them
Print this list. Tape it inside your door. After the next Calgary hail storm, the doorbell will ring within 48 hours — and you’ll know exactly which signals mean ‘close the door politely.’
- 011. Door-knock within 48 hours of a hail event. Reputable Calgary roofers do not solicit door-to-door. Every Good Roofing job starts with the homeowner calling us. If they showed up before you called anyone, they followed the storm — not your neighbourhood.
- 022. Out-of-province plates or unmarked rental truck. Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Texas, or Florida plates after a Calgary storm is the textbook chaser signature. Ask to see the truck. No truck, no business.
- 033. No Alberta business licence on a phone or printed. A legitimate Calgary roofer has a City of Calgary business licence and ARCA membership. Good Roofing is ARCA member since ${FACTS.memberships[1].since} and ${FACTS.memberships[0].role} ${FACTS.memberships[0].name} since ${FACTS.memberships[0].since}. Ask to see the licence. If they fumble, they don’t have one.
- 044. “We’ll waive your deductible.” This is the single biggest red flag and it is insurance fraud under Alberta’s Insurance Act. The contractor inflates the claim scope to absorb the deductible, the insurer eventually audits, and you — as the policyholder who signed — share the criminal exposure. Refuse and end the conversation.
- 055. Assignment of Benefits (AOB) clause in the contract. An AOB transfers your claim rights to the contractor. Once signed: you cannot fire them, cannot dispute their scope, cannot speak to your own insurer. Good Roofing has never used an AOB in ${FACTS.metrics.yearsInCalgary}+ years and ${FACTS.metrics.roofsCompleted} roofs.
- 066. Pressure to sign before the adjuster meeting. The legitimate sequence is: inspection → claim opened → adjuster meets roofer on the roof → scope agreed → contract signed. Any contractor who wants a signature on day one wants control of your claim, not your roof.
- 077. A clipboard contract, no written quote, no email follow-up. Every legitimate Calgary roof quote is written, itemized, emailed, and includes a fixed price (not “starting at”), the exact shingle SKU, underlayment, flashings, ridge venting, ice-and-water shield, tear-off scope, and warranty terms. A clipboard with a signature line and a price total is not a quote — it’s a trap.
- 088. “The damage is severe — sign now or we can’t hold this price.” No legitimate Calgary roofer manufactures urgency. Hail damage doesn’t worsen overnight. If they’re rushing you, they’re rushing past the inspection, the adjuster, and your right to a second opinion.
- 099. No physical Calgary office or office address that turns out to be a UPS Store mailbox. Google the address. If it’s a virtual office, a shared mailbox, or a parking-lot tent — they are leaving in September. Our office: ${SITE.address}.
- 1010. Cash-only or e-transfer-only deposit demand. Legitimate Calgary roofers invoice through accounting software, accept cheque or credit, and never require a deposit larger than 10–20% of contract value. Cash-only is the laundering escape hatch.
- 1111. Warranty issued on a half-page leaflet by a company name you cannot find on the BBB or ARCA registry. A 10-year workmanship warranty is only worth the contractor still existing in 10 years. Good Roofing’s ${FACTS.metrics.workmanshipWarrantyYears}-year workmanship warranty is backed by ${FACTS.memberships[0].role} ${FACTS.memberships[0].name} since ${FACTS.memberships[0].since} and a registered Alberta corporation operating year-round.
- 1212. They sub-contract the install to a different crew than the one that pitched you. Ask: “Will the crew that installs my roof be employed by your company on T4s, or are they sub-contracted?” Chasers almost always sub. The pitch crew sells; a Kijiji crew installs; the warranty is between two parties who’ve never met.
03 · Section
Why Calgary is ground zero for storm-chaser fraud
Calgary sits inside the most active hail corridor in Canada — the Alberta hail belt produces an insurable hail event roughly every 2–4 years and a catastrophic, billion-dollar event roughly every decade (2014, 2020, 2024). After every major strike, the insured loss creates a multi-month buying window worth hundreds of millions of dollars. That window pulls roofing crews from every Prairie province, from the U.S. tornado belt, and from coastal hurricane states. Chasers travel with a ladder, a clipboard, and a folding table, set up in a gas-station parking lot or a hotel conference room, and target the highest-density neighbourhoods of the strike footprint within 48 hours — usually NE Calgary (Coventry Hills, Harvest Hills, Panorama Hills, Country Hills), NW Calgary (Tuscany, Royal Oak, Evanston, Citadel), and SE Calgary (Cranston, Auburn Bay, Mahogany, McKenzie Towne). They saturate these communities with door-knockers, yard signs on neighbour properties (often without permission), and Facebook ads with stock storm photos and no Alberta business licence visible. By October, they’re gone — and Calgary BBB and ARCA spend the winter fielding complaints they can no longer act on because the offending entity no longer exists. Good Roofing’s position is the structural opposite: we are here all 12 months of the year, in every Calgary winter, with the same crew, the same office, the same phone number — (587) 804-9266 — and the same Better Business Bureau A+ Accredited accreditation we’ve held since 2015.
04 · Section
The Alberta laws being broken (and why it matters to you, the homeowner)
It’s not just sketchy — it’s illegal. Here are the four Alberta statutes and codes the storm-chaser pitch routinely violates. You sharing the contract makes you a party to several of them.
- 01Alberta Insurance Act, s. 555 — Misrepresentation and prohibited inducements. “Waiving” or “covering” an insurance deductible is a prohibited inducement and an offence. Both the contractor offering it and the insured accepting it can face penalties up to $250,000 (corporate) and licence cancellation for any insurance professional involved.
- 02Alberta Consumer Protection Act, ss. 6 & 7 — Unfair practices and 10-day cooling-off. A door-to-door direct sales contract for roofing has a 10-day cancellation right. Chaser contracts routinely buried this right or obscured it. If you signed under pressure, you can cancel within 10 days in writing — no penalty.
- 03City of Calgary Business Licence Bylaw 32M98. Operating as a contractor inside Calgary requires a current City of Calgary business licence. Ask for the licence number. Cross-check at calgary.ca/businesslicence. Chasers operate without one and bet on you not checking.
- 04WCB Alberta coverage. Anyone working on your roof must be covered by WCB Alberta — or you (the homeowner) become liable for their injury. Ask for the WCB account number and confirm it on wcb.ab.ca. Good Roofing is ${FACTS.memberships[3].role} since ${FACTS.memberships[3].since}.
- 05Alberta Fair Trading Act — High-pressure sales. Manufactured urgency (“sign tonight or this price expires”) is a prohibited high-pressure sales practice in direct-sales transactions. Document it: timestamp the doorbell ring, record the pitch (one-party consent is legal in Alberta), and report to Service Alberta Consumer Investigations.
05 · Section
The legitimate Calgary playbook — what a real roofer does instead
Every Good Roofing job after a Calgary hail event runs through this exact sequence. Nothing skipped, nothing rushed, nothing signed before the adjuster has been on your roof.
- 01Step 1 — You call us (we never knock). (587) 804-9266. We pick up 7am–9pm, 4-hour emergency response after hours.
- 02Step 2 — Free drone inspection. No-obligation. Booked within 1 business hour of your call. Written, time-stamped, slope-by-slope damage report emailed within 24 hours.
- 03Step 3 — You open your own claim. Not us. You phone your insurer with the report and storm date. The claim and the relationship stay yours.
- 04Step 4 — We meet the adjuster on the roof. Every strike marked in chalk before they arrive. Every slope walked. Every line item documented in the language Xactimate and Symbility recognize.
- 05Step 5 — Written quote. Fixed price, itemized by line, emailed, signed by an actual Calgary office, with the Class 4 SKU, underlayment, ice-and-water, drip edge, ridge venting, tear-off scope, deck-rot allowance, and warranty terms — all of it on paper before you sign anything.
- 06Step 6 — Install by Good Roofing’s own crews on T4s, WCB-covered, year-round Calgarians. No Kijiji subs, no parking-lot crews. 10-year written workmanship warranty.
- 07Step 7 — Certificate of completion submitted to your insurer. Depreciation holdback released. You pay your deductible. We’re still here in 10 years if anything fails — same phone number, same office, same brand.
06 · Section
The exact doorstep script that closes the door politely
Calgary homeowners freeze on the porch because the pitch is rehearsed and yours isn’t. Here’s a four-sentence script. Memorize it. Use it the next time the doorbell rings within 48 hours of a hail storm.
- 01“Thanks, I don’t do business with anyone who knocks on my door after a storm. If I want a roof quote, I’ll call a Calgary company myself.”
- 02“I won’t sign anything today and I won’t sign anything before my insurance adjuster has been on the roof.”
- 03“Please leave a written quote in my mailbox with your Alberta business licence number, City of Calgary licence number, and WCB account number — I’ll verify them online and call you back if I’m interested.”
- 04“Have a good day.” Close the door. The pitch only works if you keep listening.
- 05Then call (587) 804-9266. Free drone inspection. Written damage report within 24 hours. Adjuster meeting handled. Zero AOB. Zero deductible-waiver. $14M+ recovered for Calgary homeowners since 2014.
07 · Section
If you already signed — what to do in the next 10 days
Don’t panic. Alberta’s Consumer Protection Act gives you a 10-day cooling-off period on any direct-sales (door-to-door) roofing contract — and most chaser contracts are direct-sales by definition. You can cancel in writing within 10 days of signing, with no penalty and no obligation to explain. Send a written cancellation by email and registered mail to the address on the contract, keep a copy of both, and immediately phone your insurer to flag that no AOB or assignment should be honoured. If the contractor has already collected a deposit, you are owed a full refund within 15 days; if they refuse, file a complaint with Service Alberta Consumer Investigations (1-877-427-4088) and your bank for a credit-card chargeback if you paid by card. Then call (587) 804-9266 — Good Roofing has helped dozens of Calgary homeowners unwind chaser contracts and re-open a clean claim with their insurer, often within the same week.