Support & FAQ

After installing the app, tap the Inventory tab and select “Start a Room.” Praepara will guide you room by room — choose a room name, then start adding items. For each item, tap the camera icon to take a photo, then fill in the brand, model, serial number, and estimated replacement value. You don’t have to do it all at once — your progress is saved automatically.

No account required. Praepara stores everything directly on your device. No sign-up, no email, no password — just install and start documenting. If you want cloud backup, you can optionally connect your Google account later, but it’s never required.

Yes — we strongly recommend it. The guided tour is a 30-step walkthrough that shows you every feature in the app and explains key insurance concepts in plain English (like what ACV vs. RCV means, and why it matters). It takes about 5 minutes and makes the rest of the app much easier to use.

When you take a photo inside Praepara, the app automatically embeds your exact GPS location and the verified date and time into the photo file. This creates tamper-evident proof that the item existed at a specific location before the loss. Insurance adjusters and attorneys can verify this metadata, making your claim much harder to dispute.

Home Baseline Photo Mode lets you photograph your entire home in organized zones — Roof, Exterior, Interior, Systems, Garage, and more — before any disaster strikes. These photos are GPS and timestamp tagged just like inventory photos. If your home is damaged later, you’ll have dated, location-verified proof of its pre-loss condition. This is one of the most important things you can do before storm season.

Go to the Inventory tab, tap the export icon in the top right, and select “Export as PDF.” Praepara will compile all your rooms, items, photos, and values into a professionally formatted report. You can then share it directly to email, send it to your adjuster, or save it to your files. The PDF includes a legal disclaimer footer automatically.

At minimum: your insurance policy declarations page, your home deed, and a photo ID. Ideally also: mortgage documents, any appraisals, receipts for high-value items, vehicle titles, and any other documents you’d need to rebuild your life if your home was destroyed. The vault is encrypted and biometric-locked so it’s the safest place on your phone for these.

AES-256 is the encryption standard used by banks, the military, and governments worldwide. It means your data is scrambled using a 256-bit key — effectively unbreakable with current technology. Even if someone physically stole your phone, they could not read your Praepara data without your biometric (fingerprint or face) authentication.

Only for life-threatening alerts — specifically Tornado Warnings and Flash Flood Emergencies at your location. If a tornado is on the ground near your home at 3am, your phone being on silent could cost you your life. Praepara uses Android’s high-priority notification channels to pierce through DND only for these extreme events. Regular weather advisories and watches will not bypass DND.

When you receive a severe weather alert, you can tap “Save to Claim” to attach the official NWS alert directly to your claim’s communication log. This creates a timestamped, official record that the weather event occurred on a specific date at your location. This is legal-grade documentation that can support your claim if the insurer disputes the cause or timing of your loss.

ACV (Actual Cash Value) is what your items are worth today — after depreciation. So a 5-year-old TV might get you $200 even though it costs $600 to replace. RCV (Replacement Cost Value) is what it actually costs to replace the item with a new one. Most policies pay ACV upfront and hold back the depreciation until you actually replace the item — that’s called the “recoverable depreciation.” Praepara’s Depreciation Recovery tracker helps you claim every dollar of it before the deadline.

After your insurer pays the ACV, you typically have a limited window (often 180 days, sometimes less) to actually replace the items and submit your receipts to recover the withheld depreciation. If you miss this deadline, you permanently forfeit that money. Praepara’s Depreciation Recovery tracker lets you set RCV Release Deadlines — the app warns you 30 days out with amber alerts and turns red when it’s critical.

A supplement is an additional payment request when the insurer’s initial estimate missed something — a damaged item they didn’t account for, a scope of work that grew after construction started, or a line item they underpaid. Use the Supplement Tracker to document what’s missing, the dollar amount you’re requesting, and the current status of the request. A documented supplement request is harder for the insurer to ignore.

Insurance bad faith occurs when an insurer unreasonably delays, underpays, or misrepresents your claim. Examples: ignoring your calls for weeks, denying a claim without explanation, offering a settlement far below what the damage warrants, or misrepresenting your policy terms. Use the Bad Faith Log to document every instance with dates, names, and what was said. A documented pattern gives you grounds for a state insurance department complaint or a bad faith lawsuit — both of which can result in penalties against the insurer beyond just your original claim.

If you had cloud backup enabled, install Praepara on your new device, tap “Restore from Backup,” sign into your Google account, and your entire inventory, vault, and claim data will be restored. If you didn’t have backup enabled, the data on the lost phone is gone — which is why we strongly recommend enabling cloud backup. It runs automatically overnight when your phone is on Wi-Fi and charging.

No. Backups go to Google Drive’s private app data folder using the drive.appdata scope — a hidden folder only your copy of Praepara can access. It’s not visible in your Drive file browser, and Praepara’s servers never touch it. The backup is also encrypted before it leaves your device, so even Google cannot read its contents.