Denied liability for storm damage to car UK

christyyates777

On April 12th 2015, my car was damaged by a 3 foot piece of plastic dislodged from an air conditioning unit on the roof of a 5 storey building.

My insurance paid ₤2000 to repair the damage to my sunroof, but they have never recouped their loss due to building's owners denying liability. I paid ₤400 excess and my insurance premium was doubled.

My defence is that they cannot produce a maintenance record for the a/c unit, despite at least 3 requests from my insurers. Their defence was strong wind. The wind was strong gale, but there are varying records of the wind speed at the time.

Could I win a claim against building's owners in a small claims court? I want to claim for the full ₤2000 + ₤400 + ₤600 (approx for 2 years of increased premium) ie. ₤3000? I could then reimburse the insurance company and restore my original premium.

Many thanks for any advice?

Christy Yates

boliston

Surely a maintenance record relates to servicing the working mechanical parts of the unit. If an ac unit is not serviced then it might not function to the best efficiency but I doubt external panels would become loose!

It sounds like me to storm damage rather than negligence.

Mobeer

You need to show that the owners of the air conditioning unit were negligent - essentially that they knew something was wrong with the air conditioning unit before the storm, but did nothing about it. Otherwise this will be seen as:
1) storm damage to the building, unrelated to your car
2) storm damage to the car by debris, unrelated to the building

The lack of a maintenance record probably does not prove that the owner of the air conditioning unit were negligent.

AdrianC

christyyates777 wrote: »

On April 12th 2015, my car was damaged by a 3 foot piece of plastic dislodged from an air conditioning unit on the roof of a 5 storey building.

My insurance paid ₤2000 to repair the damage to my sunroof, but they have never recouped their loss due to building's owners denying liability. I paid ₤400 excess and my insurance premium was doubled.

My defence is that they cannot produce a maintenance record for the a/c unit, despite at least 3 requests from my insurers. Their defence was strong wind. The wind was strong gale, but there are varying records of the wind speed at the time.

Could I win a claim against building's owners in a small claims court? I want to claim for the full ₤2000 + ₤400 + ₤600 (approx for 2 years of increased premium) ie. ₤3000? I could then reimburse the insurance company and restore my original premium.

You can't claim for the £2000, because it's not your loss.
You can claim for the £400.
You might be able to claim for the £600, but you would need to be able to quantify that figure.

What are your chances of winning? Slim. You would need to prove that the proprietors of the building were negligent. Whether there are records of mechanical servicing of the aircon or not is irrelevant - it's unlikely the component in question was part of any routine maintenance schedule.

Quentin

christyyates777 wrote: »

On April 12th 2015, my car was damaged by a 3 foot piece of plastic dislodged from an air conditioning unit on the roof of a 5 storey building.

My insurance paid ₤2000 to repair the damage to my sunroof, but they have never recouped their loss due to building's owners denying liability. I paid ₤400 excess and my insurance premium was doubled.

My defence is that they cannot produce a maintenance record for the a/c unit, despite at least 3 requests from my insurers. Their defence was strong wind. The wind was strong gale, but there are varying records of the wind speed at the time.

Could I win a claim against building's owners in a small claims court? I want to claim for the full ₤2000 + ₤400 + ₤600 (approx for 2 years of increased premium) ie. ₤3000? I could then reimburse the insurance company and restore my original premium.

Many thanks for any advice?

Christy Yates

If you were to attempt legal action then although you would be suing the company their insurers would defend the action.

You should give consideration to the apparent fact that your own insurer looks to have realised that they and you cannot prove any neglect, and realise that were you to take legal action you pay all the court fees yourself and won't get these back unless you win. If you lose you also face paying the other sides allowed expenses

Maybe get proper legal advice on your chances of winning before starting!

System

christyyates777 wrote: »

The wind was strong gale, but there are varying records of the wind speed at the time.

Many thanks for any advice?

Christy Yates

After spending far too much time at the top of a radio tower I can say with 100% certainty that what is a strong breeze at ground level usually ends up being way worse once you get above tree height.

forgotmyname

Tarambor wrote: »

After spending far too much time at the top of a radio tower I can say with 100% certainty that what is a strong breeze at ground level usually ends up being way worse once you get above tree height.

You don't need to be atop a radio mast to prove that, just look at a mature tree and you will see the top moves yet the bottom doesnt.

Proving 100% that the wind higher up = stronger.

Billy_Bullocks

forgotmyname wrote: »

You don't need to be atop a radio mast to prove that, just look at a mature tree and you will see the top moves yet the bottom doesnt.

Proving 100% that the wind higher up = stronger.

Or the tree lower down is thicker.

foxy-stoat

So your insurance premium increased by £300 a year because of this incident? Good luck with claiming £600, I tried this on a non fault motor accident and apparently its not a head of claim, even an uninsured loss.

You will only win if negligence is proved - your insurers know this thats why they have not pursured it. Its unfortunate but thats the way it works.

Its like when a tile from my next door neighbours roof blew off and landed next to my car in strong winds, if it fell on my car then my insurers would of paid if I claimed. As it happened it was a Housing Assoicataion property so phoned and emailed them striaght away. If another tile fell off and damaged my car or someone elses car then they would be negligent, not sure if I would of been negligent parking underneath if I knew it was damaged or not.

Good luck with your claim

arcon5

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