A Legacy Built on Honor
My grandfather was not an investigator. He was a man of principle who understood something fundamental about human connection: that hospitality, when offered genuinely, creates bonds that last lifetimes.
For decades, my grandfather received families visiting Hawaii on behalf of business owners and executives across the mainland. It wasn’t a formal service. It was an honor—something he did not for payment, but because it mattered. He would meet these visitors, show them around, welcome them the way you’d welcome family. He did it with love, and people felt it.
What resulted was something valuable: connections. Deep, authentic relationships with people who built businesses, rose to leadership positions, and never forgot the man who welcomed their families to Hawaii. Those connections were passed down to me. Not as business contacts, but as relationships. I’ve known many of these people since childhood. They became like extended family.
As I grew up, something natural happened. These executives—now CEOs and business owners—would stay in touch. And when their families came to Hawaii, they’d call my grandfather. Later, they’d call me. Not as a transaction, but as an extension of family. The tradition continued.
The Moment Everything Changed
One day, a friend—Fred—called me with something different. Fred ran a successful company and had sent one of his employees to Hawaii with his family. But this wasn’t purely a vacation favor. Fred was direct with me: he wanted to treat this employee well, hoped the family would have such a great experience that the employee would reconsider filing a workers’ compensation claim against the company.
I told Fred what my grandfather would have told him: “I’ll treat them warmer than the weather.”
I did. We golfed at Kaanapali Golf Course at 6 AM. We went boating and ocean activities. I treated the family the way my grandfather would have—with genuine care and hospitality.
But then something pulled at my conscience. I called Fred back.
“Fred,” I said. “I need to talk to you about something. This guy you sent here? The one you were hoping would decide not to file? I’ve been with him every day. He’s hang gliding off mountains. He’s golfing at sunrise. He’s out on the water. He’s drinking every night. If this is truly about his welfare, I think you need to look at that claim differently. I’ll be your witness.”
Fred reviewed the file. I provided affidavits documenting what I’d witnessed. And Fred won the case.
That moment was the birth of WCPI.
What I Realized
I realized that my grandfather’s approach—genuine hospitality and authentic human connection—could serve a different purpose. Not to deceive, but to reveal truth. Not to trap, but to document.
When someone travels to Hawaii while maintaining a workers’ compensation claim for a severe injury, how they spend their days tells a story. Do they golf? Do they hike? Do they water ski? Do they participate in strenuous activity? That’s not deception on my part—that’s reality.
What I learned from Fred’s situation, and what drove the creation of WCPI, is this: employers and claims professionals deserve factual visibility into whether a claimant’s activity aligns with their reported restrictions. Not speculation. Not rumor. Facts. Documentation. Evidence.
My grandfather’s gift was making people feel welcomed and secure enough to be themselves. That same gift, applied professionally, reveals functional capacity that contradicts what people claim when seeking compensation.
The Business Model Is Rooted in Genuine Connection
This is critical: WCPI is not a trap. We’re not trying to trick anyone. We’re applying my grandfather’s principle of authentic hospitality to a professional service. When an employer sends their claimant to Hawaii—or Greece, or Bali, or any of our global destinations—we treat them courteously. We’re not aggressive. We’re not confrontational. We simply document what is observable: activity, mobility, functional capacity.
The brilliance of this approach is that it works because it’s genuine. We’re not playing a role. We’re offering the same kind of respectful treatment my grandfather offered to visitors decades ago. But we’re also being honest about what we’re observing.
The Strategic Insight: Know Your People
Here’s the business advice I wish I’d understood earlier, and what I’d recommend to every HR leader and claims manager:
During the hiring process, ask questions that seem casual but carry strategic value. Ask about hobbies. Ask about vacation preferences. Ask about sports they play. Ask about their passions.
“What do you like to do on weekends?”
“Where’s your dream vacation?”
“Do you golf? What’s your handicap?”
“What sports are you into?”
These questions seem like normal conversation. Take notes. But file them away.
Because if that person later files a workers’ compensation claim for a back injury, and then takes a month-long vacation to Bali, those notes matter. If they claimed shoulder limitations and then you discover they’re hang gliding, that matters.
This isn’t about entrapment. It’s about preparation. It’s about creating a factual foundation should verification become necessary.
Why This Matters Now
Workers’ compensation fraud—or at minimum, claim exaggeration—costs the American business system hundreds of millions of dollars annually. But more importantly, it’s unfair. It’s unfair to legitimate claimants who need genuine support. It’s unfair to employers trying to manage costs responsibly. It’s unfair to the injured workers whose claims might be denied because the system is saturated with questionable ones.
What WCPI does is simple: we help employers and claims professionals verify whether the activity patterns of traveling claimants align with their reported functional restrictions. We do it professionally. We do it lawfully. We do it with the same respect my grandfather showed to the families he welcomed to Hawaii.
The Global Evolution
When I founded WCPI, we focused on Hawaii. That was natural—it’s where my grandfather built his legacy, and it’s where the connections were strongest. But as I’ve run this company, I’ve realized that claimants travel everywhere now. They go to Europe. They go to Asia. They go to the Caribbean. They travel globally.
So WCPI evolved. We built a global network of investigators in destinations worldwide. The business model stayed the same: courteous treatment, professional documentation, evidence-based findings. But now we serve employers whose claimants travel anywhere.
The principle my grandfather taught me—that genuine connection and authentic human kindness matter—applies everywhere. You can welcome someone to Hawaii or to a resort in Greece with the same warmth and respect. And you can observe their functional capacity in any setting.
What This Business Teaches Us
Running WCPI has taught me something deeper than investigative strategy. It’s taught me that my grandfather was right: genuine connection matters. It builds loyalty. It creates trust. And paradoxically, it also reveals truth.
When people feel genuinely welcomed and respected, they relax. They be themselves. That’s not manipulation—that’s just human nature. And when people are genuinely themselves, in a vacation environment where they’re trying to enjoy time off, their functional capacity becomes visible.
My grandfather didn’t set out to create a business model for workers’ compensation investigation. He just treated people well and stayed connected. But his principle—that hospitality, integrity, and genuine human connection create value—became the foundation of what WCPI is today.
To Corporate Leaders Reading This
If you’re managing a workers’ compensation portfolio, ask yourself: are you asking the right questions when hiring? Do you know your employees’ vulnerabilities, passions, and preferences? Not to trap them, but to understand them?
And if you have claimants traveling, invest in verification. Not as an adversarial action, but as a professional one. You deserve to know whether someone golfing at sunrise and hang gliding off mountains genuinely can’t work due to the injury they’re claiming.
Treat them courteously. Document what you observe. Let the facts speak.
That’s what my grandfather taught me. That’s what WCPI does.
In Closing
I often think about my grandfather and what he’d think of WCPI. I think he’d understand. Because what we do—and what he did—is ultimately about respect. Respect for truth. Respect for fairness. Respect for the people on both sides of the table: the employers trying to manage legitimate costs, and the employees who deserve a system where their claims are taken seriously because fraudulent ones are taken seriously too.
WCPI exists because my grandfather understood that genuine human connection matters. It still does.
Arthur Damasco is the CEO and Founder of WCPI. He continues to operate from Hawaii, where his grandfather’s legacy of hospitality and connection shaped everything WCPI has become. Arthur can be reached through WCPI’s case intake process or speaking request portal.