Car Insurance Question RE "locked boot"

elsien

So the quibble about the locked boot isn't relevant as the items weren't in the boot anyway?
I've always read it that if the items are in the locked boot and the parcel shelf is in place so they can't be seen then it's covered, even if not in a fully separate compartment. Having things in the footwell is different because even if there's a coat plonked on top, there still a fair bet that there's something underneath.

forgotmyname

Its possible they broke in just for the coat and the items beneath were a bonus.

Yes your totally clutching at straws. The boot issue is a non issue. The items were not in the boot area. So complaining about that will not get you very far.

Your items were in the footwell, covered by an item but it could have been that item they broke in for.

You made a mistake, learn from it and move on.

Also the police asking the carpark to have an attendant is also a non issue, its upto them how they run their carpark. The carpark owners could say why do the police not patrol the area.

takman

rdflynn wrote: »

Thanks for all the replies. I wanted to clarify some points as I fear that the reason I'm asking this might be misconstrued somewhat.

To be clear - I am not trying to find a loophole in order to claim against my policy because of me doing something clearly and obviously out of the policy requirements. For instance, I can clearly see why I would not be able to claim if I had left a bag on full display on the front seat or something similar.

My contention is that I had a bag that had been put into the rear footwell (i.e. behind the driver's seat) that was covered by clothing (I can see why this is problematic). The bag was not visible from the outside of the car as it was covered. Also (and again I can see why some of the following points are problematic): a. I have privacy glass round the entire back windows of the car, b. we were parked in a car park under a 5 star hotel in a very posh part of London, c. the car park is run by a reputable company that should have had attendants on the premises and d. was parked near the attendants office with motion detecting lights in the car park so any movement should have been picked up.

It turns out that the attendant (only one is on per night) are shared amongst 7 other car parks in the area so they are never actually present in any given car park unless there is a specific reason to do so (i.e. someone's car is broken into, or a homeless person is sleeping in the lift). The CCTV is only pointed at the car park payment machine - there are no other cameras. The local police have repeatedly asked the car park owners to guard their car park as many people have had their cars broken into (we only found this out when we had the police officer contact us after the event) and, more worryingly, the police know enough about what has been happening to have a complete idea of the MO of the people doing the break-ins (i.e. the criminals know the shift patterns of the attendants, they know the vans that drop the attendants off at the start of their shifts etc) AND the police know the MO of attack - they only go for cars where the engine is warm as they know that the occupants have recently left the car and will not be back for a while. They do not target based on contents - they are speculative (i.e. they break into anything with a warm bonnet in the hopes of finding something).

This is why I am trying to find something - anything - to contest this, as I feel that even if I had a partition boot with no ingress potential from the main body of the car I would still have been a target. The police officer said as much in his communication with me, as did the attending officers on the night - basically, wrong place wrong time. They still would have smashed the back window and rooted through the car (and obviously then be able to gain access to the boot from the main car with a boot release switch or similar) no matter what as they knew they could get away with it as there were no attendants and no risk of us coming back within a short time period. As I can't (to my knowledge) easily claim liability from the car park company (as they have the disclaimers that they bear no responsibility etc etc), I am looking to see if there is any way I can get the insurance company to look at my case again.

I appreciate that I may be grasping at straws, and apologies if I have confused anyone. I am not naive enough to think that I have found some never before seen loophole in my policy, and I am not trying to get a situation where I can sue someone for millions. I am just immensely frustrated that it appears that my insurance policy is rather worthless when I needed it most (I have seen that other insurers, such as Hiscox, do not seem to have the same exceptions in their policy - and yes, I will be moving my policy over to them if that is the case).

Once again, thank you all for the information and the pointers towards further information. I may not be able to do anything about this and have to accept that I have basically been a bit of an idiot, but at the same time I feel very aggrieved that this situation could have been easily mitigated by the car park company simply spending a little bit of money to ensure their security was up to scratch.

Just like i said above thieves will usually only break into a car if they can see something to steal. So the coat in the rear foot well of the car is a big giveaway that it is being used to hide something and even if its not they have gained a coat. Just think about it why would someone put their coat on the floor in the rear of the car when it is easier to just put it on the seat... unless of course it is hiding something.

Most cars these days do not have a mechanical boot release (i can't think of any that do). Even my car that is from 1998 has an electronic boot switch that only operates when the car is uncloaked by the central locking and my newer car that has boot switches inside do no work unless the car is unlocked. So getting into the car does not mean a thief can open the boot.

You also need to get into the mindset that almost no car parks are actually secure so in future just get into the habit of putting everything in the boot before you leave the car.

But you mention about breaking the rear window, just out of interest is this what they did to get into the car?. If not which window did they break and how many?.

rdflynn

takman wrote: »

But you mention about breaking the rear window, just out of interest is this what they did to get into the car?. If not which window did they break and how many?.

Yes, they did break the rear driver side window - did not touch the front windows at all. There was no sign of blood or anything, and no sign of the item used for the break in, so the police think it was a brick or something similar that they then took back with them.

rdflynn

lisyloo wrote: »

I think you are.
The policy requirements are boot or locked compartment.
A footwell is not covered, simple as that.

I would highly recommend hiscox.

Thanks for the recommendation of Hiscox.

rdflynn

elsien wrote: »

So the quibble about the locked boot isn't relevant as the items weren't in the boot anyway?
I've always read it that if the items are in the locked boot and the parcel shelf is in place so they can't be seen then it's covered, even if not in a fully separate compartment. Having things in the footwell is different because even if there's a coat plonked on top, there still a fair bet that there's something underneath.

Yep, that's what I would have thought if there were a normal MO for the criminals, This is basically as the police have said that it wouldn't matter what was/was not on show, it still would have happened.

But as has been pointed out elsewhere I am just going to have to accept that I made a stupid mistake and let it go.

Thanks for the input.

rdflynn

forgotmyname wrote: »

Its possible they broke in just for the coat and the items beneath were a bonus.

Yes your totally clutching at straws. The boot issue is a non issue. The items were not in the boot area. So complaining about that will not get you very far.

Your items were in the footwell, covered by an item but it could have been that item they broke in for.

You made a mistake, learn from it and move on.

Also the police asking the carpark to have an attendant is also a non issue, its upto them how they run their carpark. The carpark owners could say why do the police not patrol the area.

Fair enough.

lisyloo

Most cars these days do not have a mechanical boot release (i can't think of any that do).

My 1988 Corsa does. Appreciate that's old.

takman

rdflynn wrote: »

Yes, they did break the rear driver side window - did not touch the front windows at all. There was no sign of blood or anything, and no sign of the item used for the break in, so the police think it was a brick or something similar that they then took back with them.

If they only broke the window next to where the coat was kept this does also point to them only breaking in to get the item. So if they didn't see anything it's likely they wouldn't have broken into the car at all.

rs65

rdflynn wrote: »

I am looking to see if there is any way I can get the insurance company to look at my case again.

........

I am just immensely frustrated that it appears that my insurance policy is rather worthless when I needed it most

You left the bag in the footwell. It's not covered.