Do you need your own loss adjuster

duasonic

A word of warning about insurance.
Some years ago my wife and I had bought a house and had taken he insurance that came free with the mortgage. At the end f the first 12 month we went to our local broker and gave them all the information and they came bank with a good quote from AXA. As I had a collection of old cinema projectors I asked if they would be covered and I got a definite no. I would have to have a special policy for them.
We sign up with AXA and the policy continued for 6 years until on Sunday afternoon when we had a fire which damaged the side of the house, the utility room, garage, kitchen, back bedroom,loft space and the roof.
We rang AXA they told us to book in to a local hotel for the night and meet the loss adjuster at the house the following day. The loss adjuster was from Crawford s a Mr Clancy he wanted to include all my old cinema projectors in to the claim even when we told him that we had been told that they would not be covered. He said that they were covered and that we were £20,000 under insured. He then left. My wife and I were stood in a house with no electric, gas, water or sanitation and no were to go.
We rang the insurance broker and told them what had happened he said he would sort it out.
I rang my sister how I know had moved in with her boy friend and was going to sell her house and asked if we could stay she said yes so at our expense we moved from Barry south Wales to Whitchurch Shropshire because Mr Clancy did not tell us what we were intitaled to because he was saving money for AXA.
This story goes on and on as Mr Clancy sent a surveyor round who did subsidence not fire. This surveyor sent out a tender that was for to low and so we got the builder from hell who the lied and lied and lied. I could not get back to the house as I had a back injury from the move and my wife was suffering from post tromatic stress mainly from Mr Clancy and AXA. We sent a friend to the house to video the work. We had an ants nest in the living room the patio doors at the back of the house was now a cheep soft wood door which had a 2 inch gap under it so when it rained the whole of the utility room and garage flooded. The builders had steam cleand the laminate floor in the dining room. The new kitchen is said to be from Magnet if it is then it was stolen as is was not fitted by them and the house smelt of fire.
In the end we had a surveyor of our own go in and the 17 page document was damming but in this day and age unless you have £10,000 to put down as deposit a solicitor will not do a thing even if you have all the evidence.
The moral to all this is if you have a fire or are going to make a big claim get your own loss adjuster he will be on your side and tell you things you did not know.
As for us, we still have the report, we sold the house for a loss of £30,000 then we had to move out of my sisters house as she wanted to sell it. We live in a little rented house in Whitchurch with all our thing stored in a garaged as the house is to small.

mara

Sorry to hear you had such a bad experience. Did you raise any of your concerns with the adjuster directly with the insurer/broker? Did you show the adjuster your survey report? If the report did support the poor workmanship, then you should have been able to raise this with the insurers, without the need for solicitors. How long ago did this happen? You still might be able to raise this with your insurers. Personally, I do not usually think loss assessors acting for policyholders add any value to the claims process. They take a hefty proportion of any money you are entitled to and dont really do much that you couldn't do yourself.

id99999uk

A few years ago I would have agreed that the loss assors do not add value HOWEVER the last 2 years has seen a major shift in the insurance market , and I feel a good assessor dores have his place protecting the policy holder. The adjustors are now not the independant beasts they once were and are given work dependant on how many claims they repudiate and copsts they save ... its an ugly world out there (NO I am NOT a loss assessor but run an independant building business specialising in fires and floods, the works we were allowed to carry out for insurers has significantly reduced in the last 2 years )

SlinkyDel

:money:

id99999uk wrote: »

A few years ago I would have agreed that the loss assors do not add value HOWEVER the last 2 years has seen a major shift in the insurance market , and I feel a good assessor dores have his place protecting the policy holder. The adjustors are now not the independant beasts they once were and are given work dependant on how many claims they repudiate and copsts they save ... its an ugly world out there (NO I am NOT a loss assessor but run an independant building business specialising in fires and floods, the works we were allowed to carry out for insurers has significantly reduced in the last 2 years )

:money:Hi would you please recommend a loss assessors or some in the Northwest/merseyside? Coz we sure need them after a burst pipe what happened in dec 2010 and the run around that AXA is putting us thru, nothing has happened at our house since... we need help Please Anyone recommend some Loss Assessors that are not a rip off and do their job for the claimant? send me an e-mail please. thank You.