Contents insurance for old people

bromptonbob

Saga market themselves as best for senior citizens. However, they actually have the same exemptions as other insurers.
As an example, my 92 year old mum-in-law, very bright but only 20% sight, had an accident just after new year, and spent a week in hospital. On return home, she was given six weeks of care by the hospital. The carers came into her home 3 or 4 times a day. Near the end of the care, a different carer came, and acted oddly. During the visit she appears to have removed a valuable item of jewellery.
A police investigation is ongoing.
Saga have rejected a claim under the contents policy because the carer was allowed into her home. This apparently is a standard exemption in insurance policies, to prevent fraud.
However, Saga market to old people. Why cannot they make adjustments for situations like this?
Does anyone know of a more suitable policy?

huckster

Think this is pretty standard. Can't think of an Insurers who would not have this type of exclusion in their policy.

It may be worth enquiring with Age UK ( Age Concern).

rs65

bromptonbob wrote: »

Saga have rejected a claim under the contents policy because the carer was allowed into her home. This apparently is a standard exemption in insurance policies, to prevent fraud.

What is the actual wording in the policy that they are relying on?

TSx

rs65 wrote: »

What is the actual wording in the policy that they are relying on?

From their current policy I suspect they are relying on the general exclusion

This policy does not insure the following:
1. Any loss or damage caused deliberately by you or any person who you have given permission to be in your home.

The company I work for underwrites Saga policies, and I'm sure we still deal with theft by carers (but I have to admit, I haven't dealt with one in a while, and we deal with a lot of other policies so I may be getting the wordings mixed up).

I'll try and check how we interpret it - I've got a feeling that terms like that may be considered unfair to the insured, but that may be our own internal legal advice, and not how every underwriter will deal with it.

edit: I just checked our own open market wording and (we can't have been the only ones to do this), we changed the exclusion to just apply to any member of your family, rather than to anyone with permission to be in the property.

rs65

TSx wrote: »

From their current policy I suspect they are relying on the general exclusion

Ah, I was looking for 'lawfully in your home' - which was only against the MD peril.

Bearing in mind they feel they need to exclude 'Caused by you, or any persons lawfully in your home' specifically against MD, I wonder why they don't have a more specific exclusion for theft.

TSx

rs65 wrote: »

Ah, I was looking for 'lawfully in your home' - which was only against the MD peril.

Bearing in mind they feel they need to exclude 'Caused by you, or any persons lawfully in your home' specifically against MD, I wonder why they don't have a more specific exclusion for theft.

Also, from what I can recall, lawfully is a bit of a difficult term to hold up any way - if the carer is stealing items from you, they are not lawfully in your home - they may have been when they were doing their job, but once they steal something from you, their purpose is not lawful.

McKneff

I found Saga expensive. Try Rias...for the over fifties, I have my car, contents and buildings with them

l0u1se

Company I work for also underwrites SAGA policies, and we don't apply that exclusion to builders, care workers, etc

huckster

l0u1se wrote: »

Company I work for also underwrites SAGA policies, and we don't apply that exclusion to builders, care workers, etc

Guess each claim on its own merits, as the first exclusion relates to losses caused by authorised persons in your home. If you are saying that Saga don't apply this to carers, then I would have thought the claims handler or loss adjuster would know this ?

TSx

But in some cases it's down to the underwriters claims philosophy - there are many cases where we ignore an exclusion (pitch fibre deterioration as an example where the FOS approach is documented) because we have to ensure we are treating customers fairly. As I said earlier about most policies having wording which suggests theft by someone lawfully in the home isn't covered, the FOS take the view that as soon as they steal something they are no longer lawfully in the home.

Whilst Saga have a single policy wording, different underwriters will certainly treat exclusions differently depending on how far they take the 'treating customers fairly' principle. Some underwriters are much more cautious about complaints than others.

rs65

TSx wrote: »

But in some cases it's down to the underwriters claims philosophy - there are many cases where we ignore an exclusion (pitch fibre deterioration as an example where the FOS approach is documented) because we have to ensure we are treating customers fairly.

Surely, treating customers fairly would be to amend the exclusion. What about the customers who don't try to claim because they see something is excluded.

By claims handlers applying discretion like this, you aren't really treating customers fairly. TCF should be applying the policy wording consistently and amending it where necessary.