Great 'How to ensure your insurer pays claims' Hunt: How to assure a payout

pedro123456

Well the chances are they had no idea it was a "seperate risk" and neither would anyone else except for you Insurance bods.

I'll bet diamonds they wern't informed verbally it was a seperate risk, and asked if they wanted cover.

I reckon you Insurance bods could sell sand to the Arabs

Katie-Kat-Kins

As I said earlier pedro, last time I hired a car I was asked if I would like to take out cover for this, the major car rental companies offer this type of thing fairly routinely.

I'd also bet diamonds that it wasn't terribly hard to determine by reading the policy booklet that they got with their policy (or the FAQ if bought online) that whilst your bags are covered for theft this only applies in a locked hotel room.

The salespeople at insurers aren't mind readers they don't know what you need cover for. For all they know, she wasn't even planning to drive whilst on holiday, never mind planning to cart the cases around with them. If it is something that you are concerned about you only have to ask a direct question. If they mis inform you then it will be recorded and you will have recourse in future.

Oh and for the record I am not employed by an insurance company, and don't sell anything at work!!

poet123

Thanks, you are both correct.

We didnt ask if the cover was included because I made an assumption that a travel policy covered you for loss whilst travelling. It was my fault, but I dont think it was an unreasonable assumption under the circumstances.

We were offered windscreen insurance on the hire car(which we took) but no other add ons.

The hard part was finding all the receipts, who keeps receipts for every item they buy? We had them for the Camera, PsP but not for the designer clothing, shoes etc teenage kids wear. Fortunately we do keep Credit card/bank statements so the details of lots of stuff were on there.

When I bought the policy I did explain we were going on driving holiday, and I wasnt offered any addtional cover for that type of loss. We had driven up from France and had been on the road for 8/9 hourswhen we reached Barcelona, and obviously needed a break.

Because there were so many of us we had a lot of stuff, but our biggest worry was that although all our hand luggage had gone, they had also rifled through our main bags, and we were really worried they had the opportunity to put something in there as well as take items out. I told the clerk at the airport we had been robbed, but he was disinterested, he didnt seem to understand the possible implications.

It was a hard lesson to learn. I wonder if it is too late to claim on the hire car insurance for the extra uncovered losses?

Katie-Kat-Kins

You have six years to make a claim under a contract. However if you didn't report it at the time or if you settled a claim relating to the break in on a full and final basis you may be in difficulty.

You may find that it isn't covered anyway, often this cover is only obtained via an extension to the policy which you pay extra for.

Worth checking out, but I wouldn't get your hopes up!

poet123

We did report it, it was obvious anyway, the car had no side passenger window!! They just said we were covered for the damage to that, and we were late for our flight at that point, and just wanted to get home, so we just left it with them and ran!

Might dig the paperwork out and have a look.

We arrived back in the UK and our min bus driver picke dus up at the airport, loading our luggage into the car he said " didn't you have more luggage than this on the way out"? I could have cried!!

cogito

pedro123456 wrote: »

You left all your things in an unattended car for 45 minutes in a foreign country and were surprised that it wasn't covered. You were lucky that your contents policy didn' have a similar exclusion as many of them do.

What on earth is unfair about it? The policy was perfectly clear and it's your own fault if you didn't bother to read it.

Cogito.
So because they needed to stretch their legs for 45 mins they were at fault?, what were they supposed to do to please the IC, empty their car and put it in a locked room?, Or stay with the car and risk being robbed personally?, or don’t thieves attack individuals, do they just rob unattended cars?.............berk

Victims of the small print loopholes produced by the IC for the IC

If they had read the policy they would have known that they weren't covered and either chosen to take action to protect their property or to take the risk. Barcelona does have a certain reputation for street crime.

Do you ever see vans with signs reading 'no tools left in this vehicle'? Why do you think this is? I'll tell you.

It's because vans are forever having tools stolen from them and insurance companies don't cover the risk.

LadyIndecisive

Virtually everyone I know who's been to Barcelona has been the vicitim of pick-pocketing, a mugging or some kind of attempted scam on the street. But then hindsight is a wonderful thing as they say.

poet123

LadyIndecisive wrote: »

Virtually everyone I know who's been to Barcelona has been the vicitim of pick-pocketing, a mugging or some kind of attempted scam on the street. But then hindsight is a wonderful thing as they say.

That is because the police are rude, disinterested, and incapable/unwilling to attempt to sort out the crime problems, atleast in my experience.

CharlotteD

pedro123456 wrote: »

Well the chances are they had no idea it was a "seperate risk" and neither would anyone else except for you Insurance bods.

I'll bet diamonds they wern't informed verbally it was a seperate risk, and asked if they wanted cover.

I reckon you Insurance bods could sell sand to the Arabs

Do you really expect someone to sit on the phone with a client and tell them exactly what is and isn't covered???? This would take hours and you would end up moaning more after having to listen to it!! The companies have to give you a 'key facts' sheet before you take out a policy if you request which will give you the main inclusions and exclusions but if you want to know more you have to read the policy documents.

And yes I do work for an IC claims department in motor claims. I would be happy to go through all the terms and conditions of our policy but I would be here all day. Every aspect of our policy is readily available to our policy holders and if they are unsure of their cover we are only a phone call away.

There are so many people who think insurance covers everything - had someone asking me to come and collect their car ecause it wouldn't start. Now to most of us that would mean we would call our breakdown cover...

People really just need to get used to reading things before they buy them.

Cromwell405a

dinesh17 wrote: »

Can I just add that some policies use such vague wording that the insurer can interpret it to suit any situation so as to not pay out - I know for a fact that one of the large banking groups of this country (clue is in the name) had a home emergency cover for which they would use their loosely worded terms to say that any situation is not covered under the policy.
I agree that people should read the T&Cs but not everyone has the ability nor the foresight to know how the wording will come back to bite them in a particular situation.

Just to comment on this in insurance law if a term is vague or ill-defined the judgement will generally come down on the side of the person who didn't write the contract (in at least 99.9% of cases the policy holder).

Also there is talk about the insurance policies being clearer, "clear" is very ill-defined, what one person sees as a clear term will seem confusing to another and vice versa. Insurers write the policy wording as an offer of contract for the policy holder to sign, generally I would view reading a contract a pretty important thing to do before you sign it.