Insurance not renewed - how big a risk?

barfer

We had a bit of subsidence recently and the insurance company's builders have finished the repairs. No underpinning was needed, just putting in helibars and redecoration. Looking at their work, we can see they didn't do everything that was in their quotation, like not putting helibars in everywhere they were supposed to, not making good properly. These guys work for the insurers so they have to do it cheaply and they did.

My OH wants to make a complaint to the insurance company, to get the repairs finished properly, but then we'd have a dispute with them and the builders. I'm a bit scared it would mean the insurance company would blacklist us as troublemakers and we'd never get insurance again. But my OH says if we don't complain, it might cost us £2-3K to get all the work done privately, because we'd never get the cheap quotes the insurance company gets.

What to do? Could we really get blacklisted if we make a complaint?

Badger_Lady

As far as I'm aware this is extremely unlikely - and every insurance company has to provide a complaints process so use it!

cattie

To my knowledge, if a property has needed strucural work done to it under an insurance claim, then the insurance company in question is honour bound to continue to offer insurance on said property, even when sold.

It's some kind of code that Insurance companies have agreed to to ensure that the property can continue to have insurance cover in the future. The premiums can go up by quite a bit of course, but at least it means that insurance cover is available for properties that have suffered subsidence & the like & had remedial works carried out under a claim.

lisyloo

Complain !!
There is no way you should accept a poor job that will cost you thousands through fear (and you won't get blacklisted).
Get their official complaints procedure and start making a complaint.
Don't just write in, make sure you follow their documented procedure to get it to the right department.
Sometime "customer relations" have more discretion than other depts and if you want to take it further e.g. insurance ombudsman, then you must do things correctly.
If you get no joy, there is a free independent service for you to use which you will be advised of.

dacouch

If you have used the company the Insurers advised then you do not have to complain to the builders, it is the Insurers responsibility to get the builders to do the correct work.

What the best thing to do is ring the claims department and speak to a superviser, be very polite but state the facts. In most cases this will get the problem sorted out with minimal fuss. If this does not work then do an executive complaint (The details of how to do this are normally near the back of your policy). If this fails then you can go to the Ombudsman.

Insurers do not balcklist you for making a genuine complaint.

One thing to remember that you should ideally keep renewing with the same Insurer as otherwise you can get problems if there is further damage or when you try and sell the property

barfer

Thanks, everyone! :beer:

dogbot

I agree very much with dacouch and others above.

If you have a genuine complaint make it and quickly. It certainly appears you do if the builders have failed to do all the work they said they would. Even the fact they failed to make good proppery is a major reason to complain.

No you will not get blacklisted at all. Any such sharing of information would be inpractical at best and of course highly illegal.

In fact you are probably helping your insurer here too. You say all the work done on the quote hasn't been done? I wouldn't be surprised if an invoice for all that work is what gets sent in to the insurer. If they are a volume supplier they are getting paid in big lump sums for lots of jobs at a time.

Insurers want to keep an eye on their suppliers to make sure they are providing the right level of service for their clients and not getting ripped off in the process. Those suppliers have to compete to get onto any insurers pannel so the insurer should have a fair bit of leverage with them.

Good luck.

ALIBOBSY

I worked with a lady whose family had a simular story. They had a quote from a local builder they knew personnally and had used for other work, but the insurance said they had their own company who would do the job for less. They were a right bunch of cowboys and the insurance company ended up letting the local guy fix the work and paying twice for the job as well as rental on a property for the family to live in twice over.

As far as I remember there was no problems with insurance after that, although they had some kind of letter/cert they had to send to the insurance to confirm the work had been done correctly (building inspector?) can't remember exactly.

They were told the insurance company would be claiming against the original builders and their contract would be reviewed. But if that happened they would never have found out anyway.

Defo complain otherwise the insurance company will never know what the company they are using is like.

good luck
ali x