AA Home Insurance - burst water pipe

DazminC

Hi all,

First off, I hope I'm in the right place! I really need some advice so hoping any of you wise MSE's can help! also, sorry for the long and technical post!

We recently moved into our first home and woke up on sunday morning to discover that we had a burst water pipe - this was outside of the house and to the side of our property, it was a pretty bad leak with water overflowing onto next doors property so we had to knock off the external stop tap to stop any further damage to our property and next doors. The leak is midway between the external mains in the street and our internal stoptap so definitely within private boundaries.

We took our home insurance policy with AA home insurance (underwriters seem to be AXA insurance) so we called the emergency homecare number and they sent out an engineer promptly. The engineer was here from midday to 9pm in the evening and unable to repair the leak after numerous attempts to fix the connectors - his report stated that the cast iron supply pipe had corroded and everytime he fitted the connector, it would split the pipe further, he attempted to repair 3m's worth of pipe that night but was unable to but has excavated and removed some of the pipework. He then said that he would have to send a costing report back to AA stating that the whole pipe would have to be renewed which would involve 15m's of new pipe being laid plus excavation and filling it in. He said he would contact AA the following day (mon) with his report, we heard nothing until later that evening when someone from AA contacted us advising that because our basic home insurance covers us up to £250, then we would have to pay for the remaining £2500 to repair the problem!

We thought there is no way that we can afford to pay that so would have to take a hit and claim on the insurance. So after numerous phone calls back and forth between AA home insurance and AXA (all of which we have had to initiate!) and still no water to the property! AXA have flat out refused to help us in any way whatsoever stating that there is a clause in the policy that prevents us from claiming.

This clause is "Loss or damage arising from gradually operating causes including deterioration, wear and tear, corrosion, rot or similar causes."

We understand that the pipework to the property may be old (house built 1930's) but its not something that we can maintain/ service/ see as the pipework is all underground.

When we initially spoke with AA home insurance, 3 of their representatives (including a manager!) completely agreed with us stating that because the leak was on our supply pipe within our boundaries, then we would be eligible to claim but AXA are flat out refusing based on the grounds of this clause.

We are now on day 3 without water with no one prepared to help us, it has been so stressful and really didn't envisage this type of disaster in our first home.

Can anyone offer any advice at all? Can I take this complaint further to the financial ombudsmen? or is this a harsh lesson learnt? We are completely disgusted with the treatment that we have received and question if we are even protected by anything in that policy because that clause could apply to anything internally as well??

So sorry for the long post, its just been such a frustrating and upsetting experience

Faith177

This is a standard clause on most insurance policies.

You can try taking it to the FOS they will give the company 8 weeks to deal with your complaint first and then proceed from there.

Don't forget you will have to pay your excess and also suffer a load on your next 5 years of premiums

dacouch

Home Insurance does not include repairing pipes that have failed due to age or wear and tear

luci

Try contacting your local water authority as some may do a one off repair to mains pipework.

mara

Do you have accidental damage cover? Looking at the AA policy wording on line, this section covers underground pipes. The FOS had a previous ruling that if any damage happens to an underground pipe, it should be covered by AD as people cannot see the damage

kingstreet

luci wrote: »

Try contacting your local water authority as some may do a one off repair to mains pipework.

I agree. Many water companies will carry out one free repair to the water supply pipes on the property.

Other than that I always recommend buildings insurance with the "trace and access" add-on.