Car insurance cancelled? What to do now

Beatle_Ray

Hi There,

Firstly thank you to everyone who had responded to my earlier question, for the record the wife ploughed into the back of some one, her fault of course, both cars a write off. Rather foolishly the wife had told the insurance company she was a dog walker, they questioned why there was a load of dog hairs in her car, anyway as of yesterday they have put her claim on hold whilst the underwriters consider she was using it for work when she only has a social domestic and pleasure type of insurance.

If they cancel her insurance what then happens, i assume that we lose any claim to use the loss of our car, we pay for the damage/repair of the car she hit and all their other claims bogus or not, if she has no means of paying for this what happens then and will she get points on her licence, do her insurers have a duty to report this to the Police, i assume if so it will mean points on the licence also for not having any insurance - all seems very unfair.

Answers please and thanks in advance

Quentin

She won't get points a as direct result of this "non-disclosure"!

Your assumptions about what will happen if the policy is cancelled are mainly correct, though your insurer will still deal with the third party claim, but then come after the policyholder to reimburse them. If they cannot pay, they can't, but then expect all the credit file issues etc that come with unpaid debts.

Hopefully she can convince them this was an unintentional slip up, and the claim will progress - though her premium may be increased, with the increase being backdated to the start of her job (or policy, if she had the job when taking it out)

InsideInsurance

Has she ever used it for work? If she has then whats unfair about it? That she intentionally miss stated the use to get a lower premium and now they wont pay?

If they void the policy then they will not inform the police nor will there be any points on the license. They will not pay for your repairs either. As there was a certificate of insurance on the vehicle at the time they are the RTA insurers for the purposes of the third party's claim against you. Depending on the insurer they will either get you to sign a declaration that you will reimburse them, they then settle the TP claim and then try and get the money back from you, through the courts if needs be. Alternatively other insurers will force the TP to prove they are the RTA insurer which means they sue you first and go back to court a few times. Once they are proven the RTA they pay the TP and then pursue the money from you.

Presumably during this time you complain and contest the cancellation of the policy on the basis of either the vehicle never having been used for work, or not being used for work at the time etc and so the materiality of the non-disclosure.

Beatle_Ray

Thanks for the replies, at the time of the crash the car was not being used for work however on occasion it has been, i'd estimate about one week during the summer when a dog stays with us and gets taken out with our dog for walks, the core part of her bsuiness is training dogs/behaviorual work and her policy allows her to travel to one place of work and back, the training always happens in the persons home, thats the part i consider unfair.

Would it be fair to say that once the insurer suspects it might have been for a non disclosed use they wont let go of it, what lengths would they go to prove she was using it for work.

What do you mean by the term RTA Insurers please?

mikey72

If it's un-intential non disclosure, they should take the cost of the additional premium off the pay out. As my buiness use actually cost nothing extra, I would not expect them to refuse to pay out.

Do a dummy quote, online, with a dummy name, close address, generic car, and get prices for the cover you have, and for business use as a dog trainer (or what your business is).

Do a print out of the two costs, and see how much the insurer would charge for the full cover.

Post back if you need further advice.

edit - have a read of

http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/publications/ombudsman-news/46/46_non_disclosure_insurance.htm

the insurer can't argue they would never have insured you, if you have a valid quote in front of you, and the rest of the link is fairly clearcut.

Beatle_Ray

Hi There,

Thanks for the advice, one question, does it look if we have something to hide if we keep ringing the insurers, last time she phoned was yesterday, i know thats sounds a little wierd but we are a two car family and its costing money daily and i personally would like to know one way or the other

Thanks

JimmyTheWig

Beatle_Ray wrote: »

what lengths would they go to prove she was using it for work.

If you mean that she used it for work at all, I think they've got an admission on that. They asked why it was full of dog hairs and she said because she's a dog walker.

If you mean that she was using it for work at the time, it should be fairly easy to establish the truth on that one. There will be at least one other witness (the driver of the other car). Did she have a dog in the car with her at the time? If so, was it her dog?
If a dog walker, who has admitted to using her car for work, had someone else's dog in their car then it's going to be pretty hard for her to argue that she wasn't using it for work at the time. If not, it's going to be pretty hard for the insurance company to argue that she was using it for work at the time.


In terms of what to do now, mikey72's suggestions sound very sensible to me.

mikey72

Beatle_Ray wrote: »

Hi There,

Thanks for the advice, one question, does it look if we have something to hide if we keep ringing the insurers, last time she phoned was yesterday, i know thats sounds a little wierd but we are a two car family and its costing money daily and i personally would like to know one way or the other

Thanks

You need to know if they would have insured you, if you had declared everything correctly.
Then you can push for a quick resolution.

Quentin

Beatle_Ray wrote: »

Thanks for the replies, at the time of the crash the car was not being used for work however on occasion it has been, i'd estimate about one week during the summer when a dog stays with us and gets taken out with our dog for walks, the core part of her bsuiness is training dogs/behaviorual work and her policy allows her to travel to one place of work and back, the training always happens in the persons home, thats the part i consider unfair.

Would it be fair to say that once the insurer suspects it might have been for a non disclosed use they wont let go of it, what lengths would they go to prove she was using it for work.

There may be 2 issues they are investigating:

1) Did she accurately put down her occupation on her application.

2) Is the car used for business use rather than commuting (commuting only allows you to drive to and from your regular place of employment, not to client's houses)

does it look if we have something to hide if we keep ringing the insurers

Both "sides" know the reason behind the delay, so you phoning won't look "fishy". You could contact them to see if they need any more info from you to help them reach a quicker decision.

InsideInsurance

The problem is that presumably she is transporting the clients dogs in the vehicle? I don't know how an underwriter would view this as it could arguably be more akin to a courier who is carrying other peoples goods and they have to buy a different class of insurance and not just add business use to their vehicle. If this is the case you cannot just go online and cross compare SDPC and Business Class 1

The road traffic act (RTA) define a series of circumstances where an insurer must deal with third party claims despite the incident not being under the terms of the policy. In almost all these cases whilst the insurer is forced to pay the third party claim they have a right to recover the money afterwards from another party (eg the policyholder or the driver at the time of the incident). When they are acting in this form they are referred to as the RTA insurer.

mikey72

InsideInsurance wrote: »

The problem is that presumably she is transporting the clients dogs in the vehicle? I don't know how an underwriter would view this as it could arguably be more akin to a courier who is carrying other peoples goods and they have to buy a different class of insurance and not just add business use to their vehicle. If this is the case you cannot just go online and cross compare SDPC and Business Class 1

The road traffic act (RTA) define a series of circumstances where an insurer must deal with third party claims despite the incident not being under the terms of the policy. In almost all these cases whilst the insurer is forced to pay the third party claim they have a right to recover the money afterwards from another party (eg the policyholder or the driver at the time of the incident). When they are acting in this form they are referred to as the RTA insurer.

I would be surprised at that view.
If the business if travelling to peoples homes, to train dogs in their own home, that part of the business doesn't need it.

As to the occasional taking a dog out in the back with the family dog for walks, the dog will not be covered if the owner needs to claim, but that's covered by the business' liabilty insurance.
I can't see the FOS likening it to a parcel delivery service running door to door every day, or taxi driver insurance.
I certainly don't have anything other than normal business use for myself, even if I collect customers goods and take them for repair, and return them later.