The full report (PDF) begins with a letter to shareholders that acknowledges the April 20, 2010, event, before going on to absolve Transocean of any liability in connection to the Deepwater Horizon explosion and subsequent gush of oil that resulted in 11 deaths and 205.8 million gallons of oil in the waters off the Gulf Coast.. The report states:

It remains our view that Transocean is contractually indemnified against all claims stemming from the environmental and economic impacts of the hydrocarbons spilled into the Gulf of Mexico from the Macondo well after the sinking of the Deepwater Horizon.

The report goes on to detail the “bonus targets” made available to its executive officers in part to honor the company’s “exemplary statistical safety record as measured by our total recordable incident rate and total potential severity rate.”

Based on bonus percentages and salary figures given in the report, a breakdown of executive bonuses follows:

The executives were also awarded stock options, adding to the millions in stocks that each holds in the company. The report goes on to detail $380,000 in raises for the executives that went into effect in February of this year.

The news that Transocean higher-ups are doing just fine for themselves comes on the heels of reports that BP is set to restart drilling on its 10 Gulf of Mexico deepwater oil rigs. The drilling will begin under stricter safety regulations this summer.

We are a charter fishing/eco-tour company in Naples, Fla. While we received four claim checks through our local BP Claims office beginning in May, the experience to date under the Feinberg regime has been a disaster. We submitted paperwork under the GCCF guidelines in September and 57 days later our claim is still under review. It has been escalated no less than six times due to the tentative nature of our business. Still no sense of urgency on their behalf.

Meanwhile, charter captains fishing out of the same marina where we have our 3 boats have been paid. Fishing businesses located 25 minutes from where we are were paid last week, one guide received a check for $40,000. These people submitted their paperwork after we did.

I had NBC and ABC come down and do a feature on us yesterday which aired three times on the evening news broadcasts. Ironically, I received a phone call from a GCCF Supervisor not 60 seconds after the first one aired at 5:00. Even with that she could only tell me that our claim was under review and she couldn’t give me a date when it would be completed. Same story, different day. It has turned into a case of cruel and unusual punishment.

A friend of mine owns a restaurant on Sanibel Island which is a gorgeous barrier island about an hour north of Naples. Although her employess have had claims paid along with neighboring restaurants and a jewelry store, she is being denied.

The cruelest part of her story is that she received a phone call from a GCCF Supervisor last Friday stating that her claim had been approved. They called back on Saturday to tell her that she was on a priority list to have funds wired to her account on Monday. At noon on Monday, after the funds had not been received she called the supervisor and was told that her claim had been DENIED. She is being evicted from her restaurant property at 5:00 today.

This process is the worst experience of my business life. Out of control, inept and run with no rhyme or reason. Zero transparency, cannot speak with anyone to discuss the specifics of our case.

Perry was told that he was ineligible to receive compensation through the Gulf Coast Claims Facility and should seek relief from a separate pool of money compensation fund administrator Kenneth Feinberg has set aside for real estate agents. But Perry says some of his colleagues, who also sell timeshares, were paid by the GCCF. The GCCF is inconsistent about who it does and doesn’t pay, Perry alleges.

Here is what he told me in an email:

As suspected, my claim was ruled inelgible under the GCCF and was informed to contact the Emerald Coast Association of Realtors to file under that fund since I was declared a Realtor or a Broker even though I am neither.  In fact, many others on the sales force received the same notification; however, the strange twist in this is that while many on the sales force received the same correspondence – just as many were paid claims by the GCCF.  We do not understand how the GCCF can errantly claim that 1/2 the room is considered either a broker or a realtor and the other 1/2 of the room is not and elgible.

While many of us do have a real estate license, we are not affiliated with the Emerald Coast Association of Realtors and do not pay membership dues to them.  Additionally, I tried to explain to the GCCF that I also have a fishing license, but that does not make me eligible to file for loss of revenue as a commercial fisherman.

When I went up to the claims office to inquire how that is possible, I received a letter from the GCCF advising me that my claim had been ruled inelgible and that was it.  Since there is no formal appeals process in place by the GCCF, I have personally asked the law firm that I had contacted in the beginning of this whole mess and asked them represent me with the final claims process as that word “final” has some serious repurcussions in my mind.

When I spoke to the lady at the law firm that is my contact there, she informed me that they have already represented many individuals in my exact position and that had already received claims AND that they are representing one of the timeshare developers in the area that run numerous resorts in the area and that they had received a rather large claim due to loss of revenue due to the oil spill.

It almost seems like they’re flipping coins to decide who’s eligible and who’s not.

If you’ve discovered inconsistencies in the claims process or would like to alert me to other issues related to the GCCF, send me an email at arestuccia@washingtonindependent.com.

While BP is legally considered the responsible part for the oil spill, the revelation is certain to raise questions about what role Halliburton played in the disaster and how liable the company should be for the resulting damages.

The cement casing in question, according to an Oct. 28 letter from spill commission staff to the spill commissioners, “should have prevented hydrocarbons from entering the well.” But testing by Halliburton, the company responsible for cementing the well, of the nitrogen foam cement used in the well indicated that the foam was unstable, according to internal Halliburton documents provided to the commission.

Two tests conducted in February 2010, using different parameters than were used in the Macondo well, found that the foam was unstable. Another test, conducted in April using the exact same foam that would be used at the Macondo well, also indicated that the foam was unstable. A fourth test conducted in April found that the foam was stable.

Here are the findings from the letter:

(1) Only one of the four tests discussed above that Halliburton ran on the various slurry designs for the final cement job at the Macondo well indicated that the slurry design would be stable;

(2) Halliburton may not have had—and BP did not have—the results of that test before the evening of April 19, meaning that the cement job may have been pumped without any lab results indicating that the foam cement slurry would be stable;

(3) Halliburton and BP both had results in March showing that a very similar foam slurry design to the one actually pumped at the Macondo well would be unstable, but neither acted upon that data; and

(4) Halliburton (and perhaps BP) should have considered redesigning the foam slurry before pumping it at the Macondo well.

The letter also says that poor cementing may not necessarily be the only reason for the well blowout. “Finally, we want to emphasize that even if our concerns regarding the foam slurry design at Macondo are well founded, the story of the blowout does not turn solely on the quality of the Macondo cement job,” the letter says.

The commission will discuss the new information at a hearing on Nov. 9.

Much of the documentary focuses on BP’s corporate culture, which appears to have privileged profit and massive growth over safety. “This is a story about ambition and its consequences,” the documentary says.

One of the things that stuck out to me most about the documentary is a comment by White House climate and energy policy adviser Carol Browner. Browner, in an interview with Frontline, said that BP’s shoddy safety record was not taken into consideration in the Obama administration’s decision to expand offshore drilling. Frontline points out that the decision affected BP more than any other oil company, as it holds the most leases in the Gulf of Mexico.

My post yesterday elicited a number of responses, but one in particular got my attention. A Florida woman, who asked not to be named, told me she went to Gov. Charlie Crist after waiting more than a month with her claim “under review.” After being told in recent weeks that her claim had been “escalated,” she has still not received any payment.

The GCCF became more responsive when Crist got involved, but the woman has yet to be paid. Here’s what the woman had to say, in an email:

A Representative from governor Crist’s office responded and forwarded my email to GCCF and I finally received a call on Friday. Tracy from the escalation department said my claim was in the final stage. I asked how long that would be and she said, “You have my name, I can’t tell you when it will be done because you will write another letter to Governor Crist if it’s not done in that amount of time.”

Here’s an excerpt that sums the story up nicely:

The investigation found that as BP transformed itself into the world’s third largest private oil company it methodically emphasized a culture of austerity in pursuit of corporate efficiency, lean budgets and shareholder profits. It acquired large companies that it could not integrate smoothly. Current and former workers and executives said the company repeatedly cut corners, let alarm and safety systems languish and skipped essential maintenance that could have prevented a number of explosions and spills. Internal BP documents support these claims.

A ProPublica analysis of state and federal records revealed that BP has fared far worse in the United States than the rest of the industry in terms of spills and serious safety violations.

In Alaska, home to one of BP’s longest-standing and most important business units, the company produced nearly twice as much oil as ConocoPhillips, the other major company operating there, but since 2000 it has also recorded nearly four times as many large spills of oil, chemicals or waste. In the Gulf of Mexico, BP had more spills than Shell between 2000 and 2009, even though Shell produced more oil there.

BP’s workers also appear to be more at risk. In Alaska, it has had 52 worker-safety violations since 1990, compared with ConocoPhillips’ seven. Nationally, according to an extensive analysis of data from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, BP had 518 safety violations over the last two decades, compared with 240 for Chevron and even fewer for its other competitors. Since those statistics were compiled, in 2009, OSA has announced 745 more violations at two BP refineries, one near Toledo, Ohio, and the other in Texas City, Texas, where 15 people were killed and 170 injured in a 2005 explosion.

PBS’ Frontline, which partnered with ProPublica on the investigation, will premiere a documentary tonight based on the reporting.

I reported the same thing last week, highlighting the story of Nicole Bolano, a Gulf Coast resident who was told twice that her claim had been escalated, only to continue waiting for payment (ProPublica referred to my item in its story). A handful of other claimants have told me similar stories.

Here’s one powerful example from ProPublica’s story today:

Nick Athens, who filed a claim for lost income from vacation rentals in Destin and Pensacola Beach, Fla., said that he has fallen behind on the mortgage payments for vacation rental properties he owns. In previous years, he used rental income from the spring and summer to cover the mortgage for the rest of year, but this year rentals dropped off following the spill.

Athens has received one check for a fraction of his claim on one property, but the majority of his claim is still pending. He said his case was escalated on Sept. 28 and that he was told he could expect a decision within a week.

On Oct. 7, he had not yet received a response, and he e-mailed Feinberg’s operation to try to speed up the process. “I have until October 16 to make the mortgage payment, after which I risk damage to my credit rating for late payments and possibly going into foreclosure,” Athens wrote.

His claim has still not received a response. “It’s just incredibly, incredibly frustrating,” Athens said.

Kenneth Feinberg, the independent administrator of the GCCF, told ProPublica that escalated claims are “immediately prioritized.” But ProPublica notes, “Feinberg has never promised a specific timeframe for deciding on escalated claims, and he said that the amount of time needed for a decision depends on the contents of the application.”

The announcement comes a little more than a week after the Obama administration announced that it is overturning the moratorium on deepwater drilling. Though environmentalists still have concerns with the practice, deepwater drilling stands to yield massive quantities of oil. The administration has established new deepwater drilling safety rules that companies must comply with before drilling.

The Jack and St. Malo oil fields are in about 7,000 feet of water, while the Deepwater Horizon oil rig was in about 5,000 feet of water. Chevron is investing $7.5 billion to develop the fields. The project is expected to start producing in 2014. Chevron says it can produce 170,000 barrels of oil and 42.5 million cubic feet of natural gas per day.

The oil fields are potentially very lucrative. Chevron says they have the capacity to produce 500 million barrels of oil.

The Gulf oil spill is continuing to devastate Gulf Coast industries, like the boating industry. (Marianna Day Massey/ZUMA Press)

For more than seven weeks, Jeannie Mathis has been waiting for a check from the Gulf Coast Claims Facility, the independent entity charged with doling out the money BP set aside to compensate victims of the Gulf oil spill. And for seven weeks, her claim has been “under review.”

[Economy1] Shortly after the oil spill, sales at her Steinhatchee, Fla., nursery, which specializes in selling palm trees to beach-front hotels, plummeted more than 50 percent. Tourists, spooked by the prospect of oil-soaked beaches, stayed away from Florida’s Gulf coast. In turn, hotel owners and other tourism-driven businesses lost money and sacrifices had to be made. As it turns out, one of the first things businesses cut was their landscaping budget.

“The oil spill hit at the heart of our nursery season,” Mathis said. “My clients in Panama City Beach bought eight loads of trees before the spill and they haven’t bought a single load of trees since the spill. They all said things slowed way down because of the oil spill.”

Mathis, who filed more than 300 pages of documentation to prove her claim, says she’s struggling to pay her bills and she’s over-drafted on her bank account. “I’ve had the same bank account since I was 18 years old,” she said. “I shouldn’t be in overdraft. I should have money in the bank.”

Like many others in the Gulf, Mathis says she’s been able to get very little information about her claim. The GCCF has noted no problems with her claim, nor has it asked for more documentation. Every time she calls to check on the status of her claim, she gets the same vague response: “It’s under review.”

“I know that the priorities have to go to the fisherman,” Mathis says. “They have to have help first because they live from one paycheck to the next. But at some point, you have to get to the other people.”

****

As of Oct. 16, there were more than 48,700 claims marked “under review” by the GCCF, according to the latest statistics. Kenneth Feinberg, the independent administrator of the oil spill claims process, has said that the majority of these claims have recently been filed and are being processed, pushing back against suggestions that people have been waiting more than a month for their claims to be reviewed.

But interviews conducted by The Washington Independent with claimants — some who spoke on the record and some who asked not to be named — indicate that at least some claims have been lingering since late August, when Feinberg took over as claims administrator, without a response from the GCCF. They also show that the lines of communication between the claimant and the GCCF are often nonexistent, leaving oil spill victims with little information about when they will receive a decision on their claim.

Amy Weiss, a spokeswoman for Feinberg, said about 8,000 of the 48,700 claims still under review were filed before Oct. 1. “There are only a small number of problematic claims going back to August or September,” she said. Weiss also said the GCCF has not assigned extra staff members to look into claims that have been under review for weeks, though Feinberg has said he is considering hiring staff to answer Gulf residents’ claims questions.

Debra DeShong Reed, another Feinberg spokeswoman, added that most claims filed in August and September that are still under review lack documentation, may be fraudulent or are being reconsidered based on new, less stringent rules Feinberg established in recent weeks.

****

Zade Marcrie, who owns a fishing charter business in Little Sarasota Bay, Fla., says his claim has been under review since Aug. 28. Marcrie, whose business lost money as spill-wary tourists canceled plans for fishing trips, says his interactions with the GCCF were often confusing and counterproductive.

Unclear about Feinberg’s claims protocol, Marcrie initially filed for a final, rather than an emergency claim. (Oil spill victims have until Thanksgiving to file for interim, emergency payments. After Thanksgiving, they have until November 2012 to file for final payments. If claimants accept a final payment, they must agree not to sue BP for further damages.)

It took three weeks to change his claim from a final to an emergency payment. During that time, Marcrie received conflicting information from GCCF staff. Even after reapplying for an emergency payment and being told the GCCF has received his updated paperwork, Marcrie says he still got letters indicating he hadn’t yet filled out the necessary forms.

“It’s obvious the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing,” Marcrie said in an email. “But when you consider how much better off myself and untold numbers of others would be had our claims been handled within a week it’s actually pathetic.”

****

Darlene Gay-Allen, of Mobile, Ala., is about to get evicted from her home. She hasn’t been able to pay the rent since she lost her job as an administrative assistant at a subcontractor that was working with BP to clean up the oil spilled across the Gulf. She was also promised work helping to clean up the spill, and later as a claims administrator at the GCCF. Neither of those jobs panned out, she said, even after she paid for the necessary equipment and a training course.

Gay-Allen’s case is unusual because her losses came as a result of work she was doing to clean up the oil spill. But she says the GCCF has continued to assure her that her claim is under review without giving her specific information about when she can expect a decision.

She filed with the GCCF in late August, days after Feinberg took over the claims process, and says her claim has been under review ever since. “I am to be evicted in a matter of days if I do not come up with the money,” said Gay-Allen, who is surviving on $118 a week in unemployment payments. “I’m 51 years old and I’ve been working since I was 17. I’ve never experienced anything like this.”

Gay-Allen says the GCCF told her that it would expedite her claim because she is facing eviction. But another eviction notice came yesterday, and Gay-Allen says she doesn’t have much time. “I’ve only got a matter days to get out of the house,” she said. “I don’t have the money to move to another place. I don’t have any money to put my stuff in storage.”

****

Andy (he asked that his last name not be used so as not to jeopardize his claim) lost his job as an oil rig engineer in Louisiana after the Obama administration imposed a temporary moratorium on deepwater drilling. As his savings dwindled (at one point he couldn’t pay rent or afford groceries), he spent days trying to figure out the status of his claim, only to be given mixed messages from GCCF staff.

After being told he was ineligible for to receive payments under the GCCF, Andy applied for relief under a separate compensation fund for rig workers. He was told by staff at the rig workers fund that he is not eligible because he worked as a contractor. The GCCF then told him that the staff was mistaken, and his claim was reinstated as of Sept. 25. Since then, he’s been told, it remains under review, but the status has not yet been officially changed in the GCCF database.

“So whenever I call the GCCF, the first thing they tell me is that on Sept. 16 I was sent a letter informing me that I was ineligible,” he said. “I then tell them to look further in the notes as the claim was reinstated. So after talking to the person for about 15 minutes or so they will then tell me that my claim is under review and they do not know when it will be further reviewed.”

After struggling with the GCCF for more than a month, Andy is considering giving up. He’s moved to Oklahoma City, Okla., where he’s found work on an onshore oil drilling project. And he’s begun to save some money again.

His only other option, he said, is to hire an attorney, which could cost even more money and result in a lengthy court battle.

“I’d almost rather just drop the claim rather than give 40 percent of what they give me to an attorney,” he said.