Water leak from flat above

aj9648

Hi

Last night I was woken up by a torrent of water coming through my ceiling. After a bit of investigation we found that a flat 2 floors above us had a major water leak problem and no one was in. About 12 flats are affected in total.

In my place water has been seeping through most of the day but now has stopped. The ceiling is wrecked in the bedroom and feel it is unsafe for me to sleep there so camping in the living room I managed to salvage most of my stuff (including the £1200 mattress) and covered all areas where water was coming from. But there are huge dark patches where water has been. Plus more frustrating as I painted the whole place only 2 weeks ago !!!

Anyway I know that repair to ceiling will be done through building insurance but as its paid by all tenants to managing company (who dont work weekend) nothing can be done till Monday. Also I have asked my contents insurer to get place cleaned (carpets, floor boards pantry etc). But he is saying I will need to pay excess. Is this correct? I guess the management co will ask the same. But the root cause of the problem was nothing to do with me so why should I foot the bill? It is frustarting that they are asking for this as I could have easily let the water wreck all my contents (laptops, bed, goods under bed, jewellery etc) but I made a really good job of salavaging all of this :mad:

Any advice on what to do about the excess and if I should be paying it?

huckster

Yes you will have to pay the excess for a claim under your own policy. This is why sometimes, people don't bother unless they have to. You also need to consider future premium increases due to the claim.

You could try to reclaim your excess from the owner of the flat where the leak occured, but if the leak was not their fault ie. they did nothing to cause the leak, then you will have difficulty in this. The owner of the relevant flat would pass on any such claim from you to their Insurers.

aj9648

huckster wrote: »

Yes you will have to pay the excess for a claim under your own policy. This is why sometimes, people don't bother unless they have to. You also need to consider future premium increases due to the claim.

You could try to reclaim your excess from the owner of the flat where the leak occured, but if the leak was not their fault ie. they did nothing to cause the leak, then you will have difficulty in this. The owner of the relevant flat would pass on any such claim from you to their Insurers.

Well according to his next door neighnour he left the tap on before he left and he was out for a few days. Does this change anything? What if he does not have contents insurance?

huckster

If this were the case, it would be negligent behaviour and could enable you to reclaim your excess from them. If they have not got Contents Insurance and therefore no personal liability cover, they would have to pay the excess to you themselves. But you might have to take them to the small claims court first and then there is no guarantee you would receive the money.

Wait until you have incurred the excess loss, obtain confirmation from your Insurer of you being responsible for this and then send the information of the damage/costs you sustained to the neighbour responsible. Ask them to pass onto their Contents Insurers claims department or if no Insurance held to advise you of this and confirm the cause of the escape of water. If they come back saying no Insurance held and it was the tap being left on, then you would send them a letter before action, giving them say 21 days to pay or you will arrange to issue a court claim against them. You would then file an online claim against them.

If you do get a letter of admission from the neighbour, also pass on a copy to your Insurers, so they can reclaim the other claim costs.

aj9648

The tenant does not have contents insurance!!! Bloody hell!! Tenant now claiming that tap was not on and boiler burst...and the problem is with the building and not her and she is claiming she has nothing to do with it

Any further advice on what to do? Should I even bother putting a claim in?

aj9648

Hi

Wonder if anyone could help out with this - getting really frustrating and currently living/sleeping/eating out of the living room !!!

Basically the latest is that tenant did not have contents insurance, but the landlord has some sort of insurance meaning that she can claim under that. All other 20 flats that were affected will have to claim with their contents insurer and them put a liability claim into with the landlords insurer.

So I rang up my insurer and they sent someone round. They basically said that the cost of clean up and replacement is less than the excess of £250 so the insurer would not start a claim on this. This is the first issue and need some guidance on this and what I could do.

The second issue is that the insurer and broker is saying that the excess is £250. All the emails and documents I have say £150. If its £150 I could get the work done under my insurance as the cost is around £200, but the broker is saying this is a mistake and they have to listen to the call I made when buying the insurance!!!! (All frustrating and with a little one on the way not that helpful)

Any ideas of my next steps?

Annisele

Do you agree that the cost of clean up/replacement is likely to be in the region of £200? If you do, then it might not be worth the hassle of making a claim for the sake of £50 - especially if you can do some/all of the work yourself.

If you think it is likely to cost more - how much more?

aj9648

I agree with the £200 - but why should I pay for the cost of the clean up given the water came from the flat above. The annoying and ironic thing about is that the tenant lost £8k worth of goods all of which will be replaced even though she did not have contents insurance!!!

huckster

No point claiming. This is the joy of living in a flat. You get leaked upon and you end up paying for the damage, as you can't get anyone else to pay for it.

If the boiler burst, it would be very difficult to prove any negligence on the part of the flat owner above, so I can't see you getting anywhere in pursuing them.