Flat Flooded - No Contents Insurance. What Can I Do?

carefullycautious

Bantex wrote: »

Unless you can prove that the HA caused the leak to happen due to negligence or similar, they have no liability.

Sorry missed this. Spot on

thequant

But if you had your own contents insurance, wouldn't your insurance company subrogate the claim anyway ?


I have seen the OP's scenario before where someone was able to claim against the premises above due to an escape of water, although that was a commercial premises.


regarding the negligence angle, I'm not 100% convinced that you need to prove negligence. If a tile comes off your roof and injures a passer by, you may not have been negligent but you sure do have to pay.

Freecall

thequant wrote: »

If a tile comes off your roof and injures a passer by, you may not have been negligent but you sure do have to pay.

I think that you may have misunderstood things a little here.

If a tile comes off a roof and injures a passer-by then that person would have to prove negligence in order for a claim to be successful. This is a basic principle of English law, if the person responsible for the roof was not negligent then they would not be liable for the tile.

However (and this bit is really important) in civil law a court would look at the balance of probabilities based on the evidence available.

Since a properly constructed and maintained roof should not have tiles fall off then it would be reasonable to reach the conclusion that the person responsible for the roof did not do what was required to ensure that tiles remained securely fastened. Therefore showing negligence in a case such as this would be relatively straightforward.

In practice, insurance companies would consider it a given and pay up.

Tygermoth

Freecall - Nope. Not at all. As a ex claims handler 'default negligence' would be defended till the insurance companies money ran out. I kid you not. It would open the doors to WAY to many claims.

You may get some wind in the small claims but i have only seen one succeed and that was due to the lady in question having dementia and leaving taps on and there had been a president set as they had paid off previous damages to the flat below therefore in the courts eyes agreeing a responsibility. (Thought the lady didn't know any better the family felt sorry for the occupants below and paid for repairs - no good deed....)

In this situation the onus is on the OP to protect their goods. They chose not to. As such they should not be able to claim off anyone else's because its 'not fair' or 'not their fault'

regardless, this is what paying for insurance covers you for. Events that are unexpected and in most cases accidental which the policyholder was not expecting.

Water from an upstairs flat would be very hard to prove negligence and not only that even if the housing assoc viewed the pipework once a week a leak could spring at any time. So review is not a indicator of negligence.

Writing to your MP stating its unfair will gain little. I also expect the HA to dismiss any claim you make for your damages. Why should they be responsible for your losses - regardless if they had someone there in 2 mins or 24 hours. Unless they fell down on any of their posted emergency response times.

But most state 24 hours and the responsibility for gaining a resolution within this time to the tenants (usually written in to stop occupants sitting on a problem just because they want the HA to deal causing untold damage in the meantime). so i doubt you will gain headway there.

I think you will be given a short sharp shrift (I will admit to basing this assumption on only working two weeks on a housing team as a temp several years ago) where this scenario cropped up very often and as such they were very aware of where their responsibilities lay.

Though I appreciate you are upset at the loss/damage to your items i personally doubt you will gain much in the way of compensation.

However you may just have a lovely MP and a generous housing assoc who might just prove me wrong.

[Deleted User]

Seems like the pipe must have broken for a reason, and the fact that the stop !!!! was useless made things that much worse. In other words either the tenant did something to cause the leak or the HA didn't maintain the system properly which caused it. The latter seems somewhat likely since the stop !!!! was not in good condition.

Whoever's fault it is owes you for your losses.

Building_Surveyor

DELETED USER wrote:

Seems like the pipe must have broken for a reason, and the fact that the stop !!!! was useless made things that much worse. In other words either the tenant did something to cause the leak or the HA didn't maintain the system properly which caused it. The latter seems somewhat likely since the stop !!!! was not in good condition.

Whoever's fault it is owes you for your losses.

...based on guesswork and assumptions... Did you read the other posts giving correct advice?

*hand over face*

bigadaj

DELETED USER wrote:

Seems like the pipe must have broken for a reason, and the fact that the stop !!!! was useless made things that much worse. In other words either the tenant did something to cause the leak or the HA didn't maintain the system properly which caused it. The latter seems somewhat likely since the stop !!!! was not in good condition.

Whoever's fault it is owes you for your losses.

So, legally speaking, that's either god or Mother Nature, dependent on your beliefs.

TeamTango

Right everyone, listen to me! Have you had an incident whereby the flat above you has caused damage to your flat below, via water ingress? Has your ceiling paint been damaged? Or has an outright flood occurred and the ceiling collapsed? As in this case?
I’ll tell you why you should listen to me (and I’m going to post this on as many relevant forums that I can find) is that I’ve just gone through a small claims court procedure because I felt most of the information on these forums was plain wrong! Even the information given out from lawyers was wrong. So ignore everything you’ve read and read the following, because it’s bang up to date (June 2015) and total accurate.
First off let me pr!cis the law:
If water (or any other item) from a property has caused damage to your flat, they are totally liable and must pay for ALL damage and loss.
That’s it. That’s all you need to know.
But I’ll elaborate further.
If an above flat has had a water leak and it’s damaged your ceiling and property in any way, the above flat OWNER is 100% liable. In this case that means the HA. It doesn’t matter if the flat is tenanted nor does it matter how the damage was caused. If the tenant caused it, no matter. If a pipe burst that has laid below the upstairs flat for 50 years, no matter. In this case as long as the pipe serves the upstairs flat in some way, even if the flat owner doesn’t know about it, they are liable. If it was any type of unforeseen accident (or even deliberate!) no matter. In ALL cases the flat owner from which the leak emanated is liable for all damage caused. Occasionally if a top floor flat has a leak that damages several flats below, only the top floor flat owner is liable.
Liability is NOT an issue. You don’t have to prove it, nor is it relevant. The upstairs owner could be Mother Teresa with no idea of what’s happening, but she would still have to pay IN FULL for the damage caused to your flat. So if they have had an unfortunate and unforeseen accident, they are liable!
So you get the gist. I’ve read so much BS on various forums that overly complicate matters, or simply have no idea, that I got very frustrated with them so decided to sue the upstairs owners for the damage caused to my flat by their tenant. The owners settled before court, in full, plus costs. They settled because their solicitor said they had an unwinnable case.
To add further detail one of the more irritating bits of advice was for the receiver of damage to claim on their building/home insurance. WRONG! Why the hell should you have to claim when the excess on all insurance policies is at least £50 - £100? Also, as soon as you make this claim your insurance premiums can rise, your excess can rise and you will find it very hard to change insurers if you want a cheaper deal because as soon as you apply the first question asked is “have you had any claims in the last 5 years?”
So going through your insurance will cause you further loss. Not only immediate loss but long term loss as well. Don’t do it!
However, I have to put in a negative here. It is highly likely that any upstairs owner will simply not play ball and no matter what you say, won’t offer to pay for any damage. So you will have to sue them via the county court. In most cases they’ll settle before court but if they don’t you WILL win. So gird your loins and use the excellent small claims court via the county court. Make sure you take plenty of photos of the damage. If the above flat owner won’t repair do NOT repair yourself. Get 2 quotes and use a professional (the cheapest) to repair the damage. Even though it will mean you paying out quite a bit this is an important element as it clarifies costs and the quote from the painter/decorator is independent verification of your damage.
Hopefully this has helped and clarified the situation.

G_M

The person to sue is the local vicar.

This is an act of god, and the vicar is his representative.

DaftyDuck

But, which denomination?

Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1879

or

Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912?