Non Fault Insurance Claim Ripoff

Curvybiker

Quentin wrote: »

Anyone can see there is no injustice at all. Compare your claim against someone else who never needs to claim over their bike getting damaged in that bay.


Who parked the bike in this vulnerable position?


(cf someone sitting at home eating breakfast who has a bike parked safely in a private place to which no-one else has access and thus cannot have it knocked over and damaged)

Sir, I am not sure if you are joking with me or on something, as this has to be the most ridiculous post so far!
Your barb about my not reading posts has come back to bite you in the proverbial, as if you will note my post #7 addresses this very fact (albeit it a bit tongue in cheek!).

Who parked the bike in this vulnerable position? :rotfl: This has to be the classic of all comments, well done!

TSx

It's not based on that single incident though, it's based on a generalisation across lots of incidents. Perhaps (and I'm not saying this is the case) you park your bike in a particularly awkwardly designed car park where prangs are more likely to occur.

When the actuaries are working out how and if they should load a premium for none-fault incidents, they are not looking at your individual claim, they are looking at tens of thousands of claims to build up an overall picture. This might say that for customers with no claims, there is a 10% chance of them having a claim in the next year, but for customers with a none-fault incident, there is an 11% chance of them having a claim in the next year. It may only be a small difference but it could be enough to justify raising rates slightly for those customers.

Curvybiker

TSx wrote: »

It's not based on that single incident though, it's based on a generalisation across lots of incidents. Perhaps (and I'm not saying this is the case) you park your bike in a particularly awkwardly designed car park where prangs are more likely to occur.

When the actuaries are working out how and if they should load a premium for none-fault incidents, they are not looking at your individual claim, they are looking at tens of thousands of claims to build up an overall picture. This might say that for customers with no claims, there is a 10% chance of them having a claim in the next year, but for customers with a none-fault incident, there is an 11% chance of them having a claim in the next year. It may only be a small difference but it could be enough to justify raising rates slightly for those customers.

Thanks for the reply.
The car park was large, clearly laid out and easily accessible in and out. It was a hotel car park and the parking bays were a lot larger than the average for this day and age, e.g. a multi-storey or somesuch (they seem to get smaller everyday), so I cannot see this being a factor in this case. The person involved dropped their bike, which in turn knocked mine over causing the damage.

The way I see it is I am not making a claim as such, I am (and had to) informing the insurance company that someone else has caused damage to my bike and it needs sorting out by their insurance. I am not claiming off my insurance, I have paid them in advance and are now getting them to resolve the problem for me. Is this a claim or not just part of their service? Maybe I am naive in this thinking?

Either way, even if I did not 'claim' and just settled privately, I still have to disclose the incident and am then possibly penalised in the future for this disclosure. Am I then classed as a 'claimant' even though I only disclosed? I have no choice as I must disclose this information according to the insurers, so I cannot avoid this and this is my point and why I feel it to be unjust at least, or a just a plain rip off.

Quentin

However you go about this you are making a claim and are a claimant

Unless you make this claim off your own policy your insurer is unlikely to assist ( unless they refer you to a claim handling company)

Your options are to claim off your own policy, claim directly off the third party or their insurer or instruct your own claim handler.

TSx

Curvybiker wrote: »

Thanks for the reply.
The car park was large, clearly laid out and easily accessible in and out. It was a hotel car park and the parking bays were a lot larger than the average for this day and age, e.g. a multi-storey or somesuch (they seem to get smaller everyday), so I cannot see this being a factor in this case. The person involved dropped their bike, which in turn knocked mine over causing the damage.

That's the point though. When they analyse thousands of claims, they don't see it's a spacious car park or care. All they will be interested in is are there more or less claims from people with a previous non-fault claim. What I was getting at is there may be reasons why over hundreds of claims there are slightly more cases where they then go on to make a fault claim. Mass market insurance is based on statistics across hundreds or thousands or even millions of claims and drivers,

The alternative would be to approach a broker who can take the specific circumstances into account - you'll likely find that they can get you a policy with no premium loading for the non-fault incident, but it will cost more than the bargain-basement policy you'll get at the top of a comparison site.

The way I see it is I am not making a claim as such, I am (and had to) informing the insurance company that someone else has caused damage to my bike and it needs sorting out by their insurance. I am not claiming off my insurance, I have paid them in advance and are now getting them to resolve the problem for me. Is this a claim or not just part of their service? Maybe I am naive in this thinking?

Insurance relies on 'utmost good faith' which essentially means that you need to disclose anything which may affect the risk and both parties should be honest with each other. There was some ambiguity around what needed to be disclosed but since the introduction of the Consumer Insurance Act 2013, the insurer must ask clear questions. You in turn need to answer these questions honestly. If they ask about previous claims, the answer is you made one, but it was none-fault and nothing was paid out. It is up to the insurer what it then does with this information.

Either way, even if I did not 'claim' and just settled privately, I still have to disclose the incident and am then possibly penalised in the future for this disclosure. Am I then classed as a 'claimant' even though I only disclosed? I have no choice as I must disclose this information according to the insurers, so I cannot avoid this and this is my point and why I feel it to be unjust at least, or a just a plain rip off.

As above, you need to answer the questions given clearly. If they ask for information about "claims, losses or incidents" then you will need to disclose any incidents. If they only ask for claims then you do not need to disclose an incident dealt with privately, although the insurer should still be informed for information only (being clear that it is not a claim)

James_B.

Curvybiker wrote: »

Sir, not wishing to get into a slanging match but you are for sure a deluded individual to believe for one minute what is written in the papers, Financial or otherwise.

If you honestly believe that Bloomberg is producing erroneous figures, and that the insurance companies are lying in their financial results, then there's not much point in my trying to have a rational discussion, I'm afraid. Best I can do is offer you the standard aluminium foil hat that I have available at a very low price to you and other conspiracy theorists.

Given that it's my day job to work with these data, I'll prefer to stick with what I know to be the right numbers, not what some loon on the internet believes to be lies put there to cheat him out of ten pounds.

Curvybiker

James_B. wrote: »

If you honestly believe that Bloomberg is producing erroneous figures, and that the insurance companies are lying in their financial results, then there's not much point in my trying to have a rational discussion, I'm afraid. Best I can do is offer you the standard aluminium foil hat that I have available at a very low price to you and other conspiracy theorists.

Given that it's my day job to work with these data, I'll prefer to stick with what I know to be the right numbers, not what some loon on the internet believes to be lies put there to cheat him out of ten pounds.

:eek: I appear to have pushed your buttons sir, so you just believe what you want to believe and I shall not try to upset you any more. And I would not like to deprive you of your own aluminium foil hat by any means. Kind offer though it is, you keep it and wear it with pride! :T

Curvybiker

Quentin wrote: »

However you go about this you are making a claim and are a claimant

Unless you make this claim off your own policy your insurer is unlikely to assist ( unless they refer you to a claim handling company)

Your options are to claim off your own policy, claim directly off the third party or their insurer or instruct your own claim handler.

I think I am getting there regarding the 'claim' part and feel that I have been naive in not understanding the terminology. To me, in my simplistic view, it is as I have said before; I tell the insurance company that someone else has 'done me wrong' and ask them to sort it out. Not a claim in my eyes more of a request, as I have paid the insurance company an upfront fee I believed this was a reasonable scenario. Not having been in this situation before I felt this to be the case; wrongly it would appear according to your post.

I am now in receipt of a letter from my insurance company telling me that I am to pay the excess to the garage that is fixing my bike and the rest will then be sorted out by my insurance company. After speaking to one of the Team Leaders, my insurance company has also assured me I can claim this excess back after it is all completed as I am not at fault. I live for this day!!

I still feel aggrieved that this may increase my future premiums (albeit by a small amount) regardless of my innocence, but it would appear by all the posts on here I should just accept it as I was foolish enough to leave my house on a vehicle in the first place.