Insurers tag all enquiry calls AS A 'CLAIM' to be held against you for 3 Years!

Crotchet

Be careful, unlike me, if you want to call your 'friendly' house,car, building insurer as to advice on extent of policy cover prior to you deciding if you need or would want to make a claim- AS THEY WILL HOLD THIS ON FILE AS A 'CLAIM' which will effect your premiums for 3 years.

I called my insurer today about the cost of my building insurance and to request a new quote. I found out that because I had called them some 5 months earlier to check what cover if any I had if a potential (investigation still to be concluded) water leakage was found to be in my property. As it was no leakage was found to be in the property and so no follow up was made. BUT today I found out that the policy provider logs such a call as a 'claim' even though NO CLAIM was made which indirectly added circa £30 to a new quote and I also find such information is shared with all insurers so affecting any other quotes I may want to get. Seems that nothing can be done as they categorise ALL calls on potential claims as a 'claim' irrespective if you claim or NOT AND hold it on file for 3 years- so 3 years of additional cost.

The insurers seem to have manipulated their systems to misrepresent the 'facts' behind the original call so to increase premiums. So much for customer service and help lines eh!

Phoebe-

This is common practise because whether your proceed with the claim or not, an incident has occured, and your policy needs to be rated on correctly to reflect this.

payless

I called mine in Feb , asked about a potential claim- flat roof-

they confirmed roof was not covered given its age ( as I thought ) and as the excess was roughly the cost of the damage to decour I said I would not bother claiming.

Renewal just came through at exactly the same price as last year .

Crotchet

Understand Phoebe, but how as in my case it was a question raised before we completed further investigation which found no leak within the property and as so no need to make a claim. Why can't they raise it as a call only and NOT tag it as misrepresented 'claim' which it wasn't as no paperwork was completed,, no claim made and NO monies exchanged?