It has been another busy year, which has seen our seventh office open in Reigate and our Leeds office become fully established. "The opening of our Reigate office enables us to provide a better service to the busy South East and overcomes the travel problems sometimes caused by working out of our London office" said Richard Fletcher. "Clients have already responded well to the opening of the new office and I encourage anyone in the area to drop by and meet the team for themselves."

The Regional Office Head at Reigate is Dr Andrew Prickett who is a material scientist. Andrew joined us in 2001 working out of our London office. He specialises in fires, water leaks and materials failures. Andrew commented, "I am pleased to have the opportunity to manage my own office and to lead our team of investigators. We look forward to meeting and working with clients, old and new, and will be holding a reception in the summer in order to get to know local clients better."

The second member of the team is Ian Giddings who joined Hawkins in 2006, initially working with Andrew in London. Ian holds a degree in mechanical engineering with electronic systems and specialises in fires, explosions and engineering failures. Ian was an associate engineer at Satchwell Control Systems and then worked for seven years as a forensic scientist before joining Hawkins. He will soon conduct his 500th investigation.

Office Manager Helen Child ensures the smooth running of an extremely busy office. Helen joined Hawkins in 2006 and worked in the London office for the first few months. "No two days are the same", says Helen "and we all need a flexible approach to give clients exactly what they need". It is an unusual job. Not many normal offices also house a laboratory and an exhibit store or regularly take delivery of mangled or fire damaged objects such as the remains of the fridge freezer shown left.

Claire Forryan, the third investigator in Reigate, joined us straight from University in the autumn of 2006 having achieved her Doctorate in Physical and Theoretical Chemistry at Oxford and a Masters Degree in Forensic Science from King's College, London. Claire is currently dealing mainly with suspected fraudulent claims, which are becoming an increasing part of our work. Losses within this category that might be fraudulent include paint spills on carpets and furniture, TVs that hit the floor for little apparent reason and staged burglaries. "It is surprising just how much evidence we can gather from the, sometimes limited, information provided", says Claire and she finds great satisfaction in "...discounting some of the more fanciful accounts of how damage is alleged to have occurred".