Mobile Phone Insurance - claim rejected

mouseymousey_2

Hello everyone

I suspect I already know the answer to this, but I'm so !!!!ed off that I thought I'd ask anyway.

I have mobile phone insurance which is provided by a third party, not my airtime provider. I recently put in a claim for a loss 3 days after I discovered it was lost. The reason for the delay was that I thought I'd give it a chance to turn up in lost property (I lost it on a train). I notified the air time provider straight away so they could put a block on my sim card, it was just the insurance company I told 3 days later.

Anyway, the claim has been rejected because of a clause that I hadn't noticed before that states that the insurance company have to be notified within 48 hours. The cold hard fact is that I didn't notify them within 48 hours so I guess I'm screwed and it's entirely my own fault.

My question is, is it worth appealing the decission?

I'm !!!!ed off for 2 reasons, 1 being stupid and not noticing that clause and 2, what difference does it make to the insurance company if it's 48 hours, 72 hours or even a month?

olly300

Do you have a reason why you couldn't notify them within 48 hours?

If you did then follow their complaints procedure and inform them that you will take them to the financial ombudsman.

If you didn't have a good reason then I'll put it down to experience and not bother getting mobile phone insurance again.

mouseymousey_2

The only reason I didn't contact them within 48 hours is that I thought I'd give it a few days for the phone to turn up in lost property. I thought I was doing the insurance company a favour by not cliaming straight away.

I get the phone insurance through my current account, I wouldn't bother paying for it

Anyway, I've learnt to make sure that I understand claims procedures better in future.

missile

They probably would not have paid out even if you had reported it. My wife's claim was rejected after she left it in a resturaunt because she "did not take reasonable care".

Pengranger

Hi. The insurance company should only be able to reject your claim if your actions have financially disadvantaged them - i.e. has your delay caused them to pay out more money? I would guess not in this case.

I would suggest you write to the Managing Director of the firm, request your claim is paid, and ask for compensation for lost line rental whilst they haven't paid out your legitimate claim.

If they don't then take some positive action, phone the Financial Ombudsman Service and register an official complaint. Don't go to FOS first though as it won't get things moving any quicker.

Basically the firm have put a false hurdle in the way of paying your claim.

Pengranger

MarkyMarkD

As missile said, would they cover loss in any case, rather than accidental damage or theft?

mouseymousey_2

Thanks guys for your input on this.

Pengranger - valuable advice, I will be sending a letter. Thanks.

Also, just to confirm, the policy does cover for loss as well as theft and accidental damage.

EDIT: I should add that the phone was in my pocket when I got on a train and I noticed I didn't have it the following morning. If it's in a pocket then I would see that as taking reasonable care, and after all I couldn't actually be 100% it was lost and not stolen.