House insurance how to pick?
10 January 2020, 07:33 AM
#1
House insurance how to pick?
Just wondering how you pick your house insurance company?
We have had buildings and contents insurance since owning our houses and remember our financial adviser saying make sure you change every year and claim ever other.
until recently we used to change every year but for the last 3yrs the same company have given us the best price.
We have claimed on content insurance once in that time and once for a window (buildings?)
We recentlrecently had a new boiler installed and the plumber went into the loft to clean the tanks out. When he came down he said it's a little wet up there and once finished I went to have a look.
To my horror all the felt right at the top join / point is all ripped with signs of water marks further down the roof so I assumed a large animal has done this and called the insurance.
Their first question was: what made you go in the loft.
So I replied the plumber went to clean a tank out and mentioned it.
Short story was the surveyor came out and said its wear and tear and as we are having work down to our garage a roofer agreed.
Suspect not having a lid on the tanks caused the condensation which has now been resolved.
Shortly after we get a really snotty letter from the insurance stating the following. We will not be covering your claim because:
1. You Said the fault was there before you insurance started.
(we renewed on the 9th, new boiler on the 6th - same insurer but handed down to a new broker! (Something like this) so we were not a new claim
2. You said the plumber went in the loft. He clearly damaged the felt and you're trying to falsely claim. This actually angers me as unless he uses a 10ft plus pole he would never reach it. Also WHY?
3. The survey came back as wear and tear which we don't cover for, also don't cover for wild life damaging property.
I accept its wear tear and learned something new hear but even on the phone our insurer said we have the level that covers some wildlife (not vermin).
So after a really snotty letter from the people my insurance passed my claim to I want to move when it comes to renew.
The wife normally takes care of this but I figured I'd ask hows the best way to pick an insurer.
They have really peed me off with trying to blame the plumber, lie saying we tried to claim before the policy started when it didn't. We renewed.
Rant over
We have had buildings and contents insurance since owning our houses and remember our financial adviser saying make sure you change every year and claim ever other.
until recently we used to change every year but for the last 3yrs the same company have given us the best price.
We have claimed on content insurance once in that time and once for a window (buildings?)
We recentlrecently had a new boiler installed and the plumber went into the loft to clean the tanks out. When he came down he said it's a little wet up there and once finished I went to have a look.
To my horror all the felt right at the top join / point is all ripped with signs of water marks further down the roof so I assumed a large animal has done this and called the insurance.
Their first question was: what made you go in the loft.
So I replied the plumber went to clean a tank out and mentioned it.
Short story was the surveyor came out and said its wear and tear and as we are having work down to our garage a roofer agreed.
Suspect not having a lid on the tanks caused the condensation which has now been resolved.
Shortly after we get a really snotty letter from the insurance stating the following. We will not be covering your claim because:
1. You Said the fault was there before you insurance started.
(we renewed on the 9th, new boiler on the 6th - same insurer but handed down to a new broker! (Something like this) so we were not a new claim
2. You said the plumber went in the loft. He clearly damaged the felt and you're trying to falsely claim. This actually angers me as unless he uses a 10ft plus pole he would never reach it. Also WHY?
3. The survey came back as wear and tear which we don't cover for, also don't cover for wild life damaging property.
I accept its wear tear and learned something new hear but even on the phone our insurer said we have the level that covers some wildlife (not vermin).
So after a really snotty letter from the people my insurance passed my claim to I want to move when it comes to renew.
The wife normally takes care of this but I figured I'd ask hows the best way to pick an insurer.
They have really peed me off with trying to blame the plumber, lie saying we tried to claim before the policy started when it didn't. We renewed.
Rant over
10 January 2020, 11:00 AM
#2
I stayed with the same company that was recommended by our IFA when we took out our mortgage back in 2008. We came back from holiday 2 years ago to a damp kitchen ceiling and a small puddle on the kitchen floor. The cause was traced to a hot water storage tank in the bathroom cupboard upstairs which had leaked at the back. I suspect it had been doing so for many years, as it was little more than a couple of drips per minute. Claims team were exceptional - told them my preference was to take down the whole ceiling and replace it rather than patch it which they agreed to without any argument. Only thing the claim didn't cover was replacement of the hot water storage tank - I was OK with that, as I had plans to change that a few years down the line, I just brought those plans forward.
I had to make a second claim about 18 months later - I work from home, and a power cut resulted in a lot of tech equipment in my office being damaged. Initially they claimed that because the cause was power related they wouldn't cover it an dI should claim from the power company, they then said as good will they would cover up to £1,000, I told them that wouldn't come anywhere near covering it, which is why I paid to have £10,000 office equipment cover on my policy. I challenged them on the policy wording, they advised it would need to go to a technical team. The call from the technical team came up on my phone as being from "the cotswold group" the number was in my phone as I used them in a work context several years ago. They are a specialist fraud investigation and private surveillance company. Basically they were internally inferring that my claim was fraudulent and was being investigating accordingly. They dressed it up to me that the specialist nature of the equipment prevented them from pricing it up from their suppliers, and they needed specialist input to agree a price. When I spoke with the specialist from the cotswold group, he knew nothing about hardware firewalls, security appliances, NAS storage appliances, Network video recorders etc. It was the usual thing, the same questions presented in different ways to ensure the answers were consistent. One of the items was £1,200 to replace at todays prices, despite telling the guy that if I were replacing it because it had failed of its own accord I wouldn't spend £1,200 and suggested an alternative equivalent that would have saved half that cost they were still adamant they had to pay £1,200 for that item as the policy stated like for like item replacement or cash equivalent.
Based on how efficiently they handled the first claim, I couldn't have recommended them highly enough, from reporting the claim to receiving a cash payment was less than 2 weeks - based on the second experience, I am tempted to move away - however the nagging doubt is that they did pay out on both occasions, both were absolutely genuine claims - would an alternative provider do more to wriggle off the hook?
Advice would be to choose wisely, you do get what you pay for, but make sure you know exactly what you are getting, read the policy document in detail and read the terms of business in even more detail, do it every year on renewal don't assume everything stays the same; also make sure you have the right level of cover, especially for contents - if you insure all your contents for £50K when in reality their value is closer to £100K, your insurer may only pay out half of any claim you make because of the initial under valuation, it is a common pitfall.
I had to make a second claim about 18 months later - I work from home, and a power cut resulted in a lot of tech equipment in my office being damaged. Initially they claimed that because the cause was power related they wouldn't cover it an dI should claim from the power company, they then said as good will they would cover up to £1,000, I told them that wouldn't come anywhere near covering it, which is why I paid to have £10,000 office equipment cover on my policy. I challenged them on the policy wording, they advised it would need to go to a technical team. The call from the technical team came up on my phone as being from "the cotswold group" the number was in my phone as I used them in a work context several years ago. They are a specialist fraud investigation and private surveillance company. Basically they were internally inferring that my claim was fraudulent and was being investigating accordingly. They dressed it up to me that the specialist nature of the equipment prevented them from pricing it up from their suppliers, and they needed specialist input to agree a price. When I spoke with the specialist from the cotswold group, he knew nothing about hardware firewalls, security appliances, NAS storage appliances, Network video recorders etc. It was the usual thing, the same questions presented in different ways to ensure the answers were consistent. One of the items was £1,200 to replace at todays prices, despite telling the guy that if I were replacing it because it had failed of its own accord I wouldn't spend £1,200 and suggested an alternative equivalent that would have saved half that cost they were still adamant they had to pay £1,200 for that item as the policy stated like for like item replacement or cash equivalent.
Based on how efficiently they handled the first claim, I couldn't have recommended them highly enough, from reporting the claim to receiving a cash payment was less than 2 weeks - based on the second experience, I am tempted to move away - however the nagging doubt is that they did pay out on both occasions, both were absolutely genuine claims - would an alternative provider do more to wriggle off the hook?
Advice would be to choose wisely, you do get what you pay for, but make sure you know exactly what you are getting, read the policy document in detail and read the terms of business in even more detail, do it every year on renewal don't assume everything stays the same; also make sure you have the right level of cover, especially for contents - if you insure all your contents for £50K when in reality their value is closer to £100K, your insurer may only pay out half of any claim you make because of the initial under valuation, it is a common pitfall.
Last edited by tarmac terror; 10 January 2020 at 11:02 AM.
10 January 2020, 09:35 PM
#3
Some bedtime reading about my experience with Legal & General
Similar situation but an uglier outcome, where it was incorrectly assumed I was negligent and was verbally goaded in a interrogation technique to try and trick or catch me out by trying to infer that I was committing fraud. They also changed policy clauses AFTER renewal and without informing me of those changes.
https://www.scoobynet.com/non-scooby...-rejected.html
https://www.scoobynet.com/non-scooby...ance-moan.html
I wouldn’t wish this experience on my worst enemy; Except my ‘claims handler’ who did his best to block everything and cover his **** rather than just do the right thing.
Read every bit of small print... be aware that renewals ‘may’ change that small print without properly informing you (although that is bad practice and if you can prove it the ombudsman should be on your side, but you will still have a long drawn out fight).
Log and record every communication you have with them.
Doesn't matter who; They are all crooks IMHO (and that’s putting it politely), so just go with the cheapest.
Similar situation but an uglier outcome, where it was incorrectly assumed I was negligent and was verbally goaded in a interrogation technique to try and trick or catch me out by trying to infer that I was committing fraud. They also changed policy clauses AFTER renewal and without informing me of those changes.
https://www.scoobynet.com/non-scooby...-rejected.html
https://www.scoobynet.com/non-scooby...ance-moan.html
I wouldn’t wish this experience on my worst enemy; Except my ‘claims handler’ who did his best to block everything and cover his **** rather than just do the right thing.
Read every bit of small print... be aware that renewals ‘may’ change that small print without properly informing you (although that is bad practice and if you can prove it the ombudsman should be on your side, but you will still have a long drawn out fight).
Log and record every communication you have with them.
Doesn't matter who; They are all crooks IMHO (and that’s putting it politely), so just go with the cheapest.
Last edited by ALi-B; 10 January 2020 at 10:26 PM.
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