Am I covered if burgled when windows left open whilst asleep at night

Janine_2

A friend of mine was burgled sometime during the early hours of this morning. She had left her ground floor window open, whilst asleep upstairs.
She only realised she had been burgled when she was about to leave for work this morning and couldn't find the car keys and when the next door neighbour had posted her half emptied wallet trough the door. The car is now gone and I am trying to find out if she is protected through her car or home insurance even if she had left the window open.

I have searched the web but can only find info relating to leaving windows open whilst no one is in the house.

Any info greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Janine

LeeSouthEast

Check the policy terms and conditions document. Only that will provide the definitive answer.

mattymoo

Will depend on the wording of the policy security condition.
some will say something like "All locks to be utilised when the premises are unoccupied" in which case, your friend will be okay.

More onerous conditions will say "All locks to be utilised when the premises are unoccupied or when the family retires to bed".

Usually by all locks they will mean doors and ground floor windows. If the latter condition applies, there could be problems.

dacouch

There is normally not a security warranty about using the locks at home on vehicle policies which you will be claiming from for the car. However if it is an expensive car the Insurers may initially decline the claim on the basis they were Reckless due to the value of the car. If they do this then there may be a chance you can argue against this

student_84

Some policies like our will accept a window being open but only if its a small window upstairs while sleeping, most policies will state that windows must be locked if no-one in/at night if asleep.

cogito

Is it a household as well as a motor claim ?

The motor policy will only exclude theft if the key is in the vehicle.

If it's a household claim, there is no requirement that there should be forcible entry but there may be a minimum security condition which will determine whether the insurers will pay or not. Read the policy to check.

Janine_2

cogito wrote: »

Is it a household as well as a motor claim ?

The motor policy will only exclude theft if the key is in the vehicle.

If it's a household claim, there is no requirement that there should be forcible entry but there may be a minimum security condition which will determine whether the insurers will pay or not. Read the policy to check.

Thanks everyone for your info.

She will claim on the car insurance, I do think she may have a valid claim as she had not e.g. left the keys in the car, not locked the doors (car) or left the windows open (car). She is looking into what the policies state.

samcantcope

This happened to us, we left a window open and didnt put the alarm on as we were looking after an Alsation dog and it was really warm. we got broke into and the insurance did pay out but we had to pay out £300 excess instead of £50.
:beer:

FH_Brit

A window is a window, if they were going to break in then closed or open they are going to break in. You could argue the point that your claim is less the value of the window they did not break!!!

Probably not! (AI jest) but I won a similar thing with my old 2.8 Granada that "joy riders" stole 6 times in a year. After replacing windows & locks 3 times i started leaving it open. After it was stolen and abandoned another 2 times (the police told e where it was when I reported it stolen - they did not even come round to say they had found it!), the 6th time it was burned out and my ins co denied as I had not locked it. Then (with the police reports) I pointed out that they would have anothe 2 claims they woould have had to pay for they wrote me a check! I never bought another Granada!

dacouch

FH Brit the reason Insurers like key operated windows is if someone breaks into your house if you have your windows locked it means they cannot open a nice big window. This often means they are limited to stealing fewer items and generally smaller items. When you combine this with a deadlocked door it also means they cannot open the door to get the big items out.

You also have the benefits of making it more difficult for them to get into the house in the first place