Hotel Expense Insurance Claim – Flooded Home

TeaBag2

Hello Experts,

My flat was flooded and have had to move into a hotel while the drying out and repairing process is carried out. I will be moving into rented accommodation but for the mean time I have been placed into a Hotel, with the buildings insurance picking up the cost of the nightly rate ONLY.

My separate contents insurers have taken all of my stuff into storage for restoring / storage.

My question is who should be responsible for all of the extra cost that living in a hotel naturally brings, namely the fact we have pay to eat in pubs and restaurants? Also the car parking charges and small things that over the space of a month could equal a considerable amount by the end.

Andy_L

Whose fault was the flooding?
If it was the flat upstairs then they/their insurers should pay.

If it was your fault (eg leaving your tap on) or nobody's fault (eg river flooding) then you have to pay for anything not covered by your insurance policy.

TeaBag2

Andy_L wrote: »

Whose fault was the flooding?
If it was the flat upstairs then they/their insurers should pay.

If it was your fault (eg leaving your tap on) or nobody's fault (eg river flooding) then you have to pay for anything not covered by your insurance policy.

Wow, that black or white huh?

It was caused by rubbish blown up onto the roof and covered the drain entrance. So the flat bits of roof filled up until a point the water found other ways down.

mattymoo

Are the buildings covered by the landlord? If so, I suspect there alternate accomodation cover will be limited because all they are doing is putting a roof over your head - same as the landlord does when you pay them rent. Hence the agreement to pay the night rate only.

I assume your contents insurance policy is your own. Who is that with? Will then have a look at the policy docs to see what cover there is if any.

TeaBag2

mattymoo wrote: »

Are the buildings covered by the landlord? If so, I suspect there alternate accomodation cover will be limited because all they are doing is putting a roof over your head - same as the landlord does when you pay them rent. Hence the agreement to pay the night rate only.

I assume your contents insurance policy is your own. Who is that with? Will then have a look at the policy docs to see what cover there is if any.

Thats exactly the case with the buildings insurance.

My own contents insurance is with Legal and General. Do you think I may have a chance to get somewhere with them?

Kittian_the_Blue

It will depend on what the wording of your alternative accommodation cover is - usually it will allow for reasonable additional costs, but if you post the wording here we can provide a bit more advice

mattymoo

TeaBag2 wrote: »

Thats exactly the case with the buildings insurance.

My own contents insurance is with Legal and General. Do you think I may have a chance to get somewhere with them?

This is a link to the standard L+G policy available online. They may also sell it through other routes, e.g. brokers / building societies and the wordings may differ.

The link - http://www.legalandgeneral.com/home-insurance/pdfs/HomePolicy.pdf

Contents section starts at page 17 of the PDF. Cover for this seems to be up to 25% of the contents sum insured. Settlement basis is on page 26. This indicates that they will pay up to amount shown in schedule ( I presume that is the 25% of your contents Sum Insured). Deductions will be made for costs you would have incurred.

This then could get tricky. They might argue that the additional parking and food costs are offset by the savings on electricity, gas and water if metered.

Keep a record of your costs incurred and pop them in a spreadsheet. Hopefully you will have something to compare to pre-loss, e.g. bank statements showing debits for Tesco / Sainsburys etc. So, pub meals at £10 x 7 = £70 less £50 typical weekly food shop = £20 claimed.

dacouch

Your Insurers will not pay for food costs as you would have to feed yourself if you were still at home, however as the costs of food at the hotel are likely to be more you can ask them to make a contribution towards the food costs. You can also ask for them to consider paying the car parking costs and other incidentals

TeaBag2

mattymoo wrote: »

This is a link to the standard L+G policy available online. They may also sell it through other routes, e.g. brokers / building societies and the wordings may differ.


Contents section starts at page 17 of the PDF. Cover for this seems to be up to 25% of the contents sum insured. Settlement basis is on page 26. This indicates that they will pay up to amount shown in schedule ( I presume that is the 25% of your contents Sum Insured). Deductions will be made for costs you would have incurred.

This then could get tricky. They might argue that the additional parking and food costs are offset by the savings on electricity, gas and water if metered.

Keep a record of your costs incurred and pop them in a spreadsheet. Hopefully you will have something to compare to pre-loss, e.g. bank statements showing debits for Tesco / Sainsburys etc. So, pub meals at £10 x 7 = £70 less £50 typical weekly food shop = £20 claimed.

Thanks buddy your advise is greatly received and has given me the chance to even out another little downside to this mess.

The extra expense is all im hoping to salvage so ill give them a call in the morning and discuss the sum I have for alternative accomodation which ive just read about.

dacouch

Legal and General are normally very good on claims so you should be ok, their Loss Adjusters can sometimes cause delays / problems, if you have any problems post up here or pick the phone up and ring L&G