What Your GLR Should Say — and What Most Actually Say

The GLR is the single most important document in your claim file. It's the narrative that ties your photos, your scope, and your recommendation together into something a reviewer can follow. And most of them are written wrong.

Not wrong as in factually incorrect — wrong as in structurally incomplete. The information is there, somewhere, but it's buried in paragraphs that don't follow the order a reviewer expects, missing context that forces them to flip back to the photos, or written so generically it could apply to any property on the block.

What Reviewers Actually Scan For

A carrier reviewer doesn't read your GLR like a novel. They scan it. They're looking for specific things in a specific order, and when those things aren't where they expect them, the file slows down — or gets kicked back for clarification.

Here's the order they're looking for:

• Property identification. Insured name, claim number, policy number, date of loss, cause of loss, loss location. This should be at the top, clearly formatted, not buried in a paragraph.
• Risk description. What kind of property is this? When was it built? What's the construction type? Foundation? Cladding? The reviewer needs to picture the property before they look at damage.
• Inspection narrative. Who was present? What was the scope of the inspection? This is where you establish that you were thorough — that you inspected every slope, every elevation, the interior if applicable.
• Roof details. Material, layers, pitch, valley style, condition. Then damage findings by slope — what you found, what you didn't find, and your test square results.
• Elevation details. Each elevation documented with findings. Soffit, fascia, gutters, downspouts, windows, doors, AC units, meter boxes — every component addressed.
• Interior. Inspected or declined, with the reason documented.
• Recommendation. Your professional assessment based on what you found.

The Three Mistakes That Get Files Kicked

1. Writing from memory instead of field data

This is the most common and the most damaging. You finish your inspections for the day, sit down at 9pm, and try to reconstruct what you saw at 11am. Was it the front slope or the right slope that had the two damaged shingles? Was the pitch 6/12 or 8/12? Did the insured say the leak started in March or April?

When you write from memory, you introduce errors. Small ones that individually don't matter, but collectively make a reviewer question the reliability of the entire file. The GLR should be assembled from structured data captured in the field, not reconstructed from recall.

2. Generic language that doesn't match the property

Reviewers can tell when a GLR was written from a template that wasn't customized. "Inspection of the dwelling revealed..." followed by boilerplate that could describe any house in any state. The risk description says "wood frame construction" but doesn't mention the brick veneer that's visible in every photo.

Your GLR should read like it was written about one specific property — because it was. The details matter. Architectural shingles, not just "shingles." Closed cut valleys, not just "valleys present." 8/12 pitch, not "steep pitch." Specificity is credibility.

3. Missing the negative findings

New adjusters document what they found. Experienced adjusters document what they found and what they didn't find. "No claim related damage was observed" on the right slope is just as important as "2 wind damaged shingles" on the front slope. It tells the reviewer you looked. You inspected. You made a professional determination.

A file that only documents damage leaves the reviewer wondering about every undocumented area. Did you skip it? Did you not notice? Or was there genuinely nothing there? Don't make them guess.

What a Clean GLR Actually Looks Like

A clean GLR follows the property from the outside in, from the top down. It starts with the roof — material, condition, damage findings by slope with test square results. It moves to elevations — each one addressed, each component documented. It covers the interior or documents the declination. And it closes with a clear recommendation supported by everything above it.

Every statement in the GLR should be verifiable from the photo report. Every photo in the report should connect back to something in the GLR. They're two halves of the same file, and when they align, the file moves through review without friction.

A GLR isn't a summary of what happened. It's a structured argument for your recommendation, backed by documented evidence.