Car Insurance - Not updated address

compingqueenjrm

Hi there,

I had a query about car insurance that I’m wondering if anybody here has knowledge on.

Our car was involved in a hit & run incident whilst it was parked up last week. We’ve been dealing with our insurance company since and they’ve called up with a settlement figure today (the car was written off).

The valuation on the car was fair - however they’ve taken 17.4% off the settlement figure as my husband forgot to update the address on the policy when we moved. Hands up this was our fault and we genuinely thought we’d updated everything - not sure how this was missed. We only moved a month ago so not like it’s 9 months ago.

We thought we would just pay the difference in premium which is £40 but instead apparently (according to Admiral) the Financial Ombudsman Service has brought in a new rule that if you don’t update details then the percentage difference will be deducted from the settlement figure. As we’d paid 82.6% of what the updated cost was this means the remainder would be 17.4%. So instead of a £40 difference it’s now going to be £250. This would obviously also mean a huge cost if our car was worth more.

I’ve tried searching to look into this as this doesn’t quite seem right to me? We’ve not purposefully evaded updating our details it was a genuine mistake. Does anybody know of this policy from the FOS? I’d looked through our car insurance documents and it makes no mention of this but apparently it’s a new thing.

I totally get the FOS putting things in place to prevent fraud etc but feel this is a wee bit steep in our circumstance.

Can anybody point me in the direction of this policy so that I can look at it in more detail?

Thank you!

foxy-stoat

Try speaking to someone at the FOS directly and see if this is just made up BS or another Admiral way of reducing the payout for not disclosing a change.

AdrianC

So your car was parked up at your new address, which is in a much higher risk area than the old one...?

Nodding_Donkey

Sounds reasonable to me. Insurance companies have always been able to deduct a percentage if an item was under insured.

Aylesbury_Duck

That's where the accident took place but a move of five miles is likely to have changed the overall risk profile and therefore the overall premium. I moved a few hundred yards away years ago and my premium changed.

I think you need to contact the FOS and ask for clarification on the way this has been calculated.

dacouch

It comes under the "Insurance Consumer Act"

https://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/publications/technical_notes/misrepresentation-and-non-disclosure.htm#a11

compingqueenjrm

Thanks dacouch that's really helpful.

It doesn't look like there's much we can do. The difference in policy was around £40 but because of this 'proportiante' clause we will in fact be paying a difference of £250 (as they've deducted 17.4% off the settlement value). The policy itself was only about £260, so with updated details would have been £300 in total.

This does seem harsh to me for something that was a simple mistake. All details at the inception of the policy were true - and it was certainly not a deliberate misrepresentation. You know what it's like when you move house and you sit updating everything - how this was missed I don't know, but it wasn't on purpose.

It does feel especially harsh in this case where it's a non fault claim where someone has written off our parked car. We just seem to keep losing out. It would be even more devastating if the car was worth more in value as say the vehicle was settled at £10,000 that would mean the 'proportionate' charge would be over £1700 for a difference of £40 in premium.

It's certainly not a mistake we will be making again. I'd blame baby brain (I'm 7 months pregnant) but the car insurance was actually on my husband's list of things to sort :cool:

Thanks all for your responses!

DoaM

Why are you claiming off your own insurance rather than claiming directly of the third party insurer? The TP insurer would pay you the full, fair, value and wouldn't have any escape clause regarding change of address - it wasn't their policy which attracted a premium for change of address.

BoGoF

DoaM wrote: »

Why are you claiming off your own insurance rather than claiming directly of the third party insurer? The TP insurer would pay you the full, fair, value and wouldn't have any escape clause regarding change of address - it wasn't their policy which attracted a premium for change of address.

Did you miss the 'hit and run' bit?

DoaM

Did you miss the bit in OP's other thread where the TP insurer is now known?

atrixblue.-MFR-.

DoaM wrote: »

Did you miss the bit in OP's other thread where the TP insurer is now known?

Did you miss the update where the insurer is now known and the cement site had admitted fault.