Notify your insurers

givememoney

We are caravaners and reading our mag, read about someone who's claim was rejected because he hadn't notified his insurance company that he had a towbar fitted.

We looked at our policy and noted we had in fact told them about our towbar but DH has recently changed our alloy wheels for steel ones and rang them to inform them of the change. They told him any change over the original spec should be disclosed.

This didn't cost any extra

Spicy_McHaggis

I gave up after the first three words.

forgotmyname

When i first asked a long time ago they always said no need to mention that.

But over time more and more insurers say we will make a note that you have one fitted. Never any extra for this though.

Swapping steel and alloys is a bigger issue.

Gloomendoom

I always mention towbars. I'm always told that they don't need to know.

foomanchu

Some insurers record it, some don't, if a claim was rejected because it wasn't recorded I'm sure the insurance ombudsman would take a dim view. I'm sure there are many second hand car owners who don't know what was factory fitted and what wasn't.

Geodark

Some insurance companies have a list of modifications that don't require notification, I am with more-than and in the back of one of their pamphlets there was a list of things like towbars, roof bars, roof boxes etc. I found this out after ringing up and notifying them that i had fitted a roof box.

InsideInsurance

The difficult can also come from the fact that most insurers only want to know about changes made after the vehicle was built in the factory but a minority (eg Admiral) also want to know about any optional extras that were included when the car was built.

This difference can trip people up but as others have pointed out it makes it particularly difficult for 2nd hand vehicles where you may not know if metallic paint was an optional extra or standard or if the alloys it has were the standard ones, an optional extra or an aftermarket fit.

An insurer would struggle to avoid a claim for it however unless they can prove the insured intentionally attempted to defraud the insurer or if the insurer accepts it was accidental and they would not have offered cover had the modification been declared. They would however be entited to charge an additional premium and back date to inception should they find out there was a modification, accept it was accidentally not declared and they would have offered terms

Penelopa.Pitstop

InsideInsurance wrote: »

The difficult can also come from the fact that most insurers only want to know about changes made after the vehicle was built in the factory but a minority (eg Admiral) also want to know about any optional extras that were included when the car was built.

And in which part of the quote form Admiral asks about options fitted by factory? I think there was a discussion about it before and it was confirmed they don't ask about options fitted by factory only modification done after car was produced.

InsideInsurance

Penelopa.Pitstop wrote: »

And in which part of the quote form Admiral asks about options fitted by factory? I think there was a discussion about it before and it was confirmed they don't ask about options fitted by factory only modification done after car was produced.

Help text of the modifications question on the single car quote form states:

A modification is any change to the car away from the manufacturer's standard specification (including optional extra's)

forgotmyname

Ive had an insurer ask me about any factory fitted options. But when i listed some of the features my car had and asked if they were standard or not they didn't know.

When asked if they didnt know how was i supposed to know.. No reply.

I just thought they will find any excuse to refuse a payout.

facade

InsideInsurance wrote: »

Help text of the modifications question on the single car quote form states:

A modification is any change to the car away from the manufacturer's standard specification (including optional extra's)


What a brilliant sentence, do you read it as

A modification is any change to the car (including optional extra's)

So an optional extra is a change
or

A modification is any change to the car away from the manufacturer's standard specification including optional extra's

So a factory fitted modification isn't a change?



Presumably, going back to my O Levels, "Modification" is the subject of the sentence, so everything else in the sentence describes a modification and the first one is correct.

But a couple of extra words likely wouldn't have hurt and made it clearer.