Need advice on insurance for damage caused by neighbours fire

littlerock

Shouted at Zurich this morning, Finally got them to look at my file and admit job had been classified as simple Escape of Water and not escalated to fire claims.......so loss adjuster only asked by Zurich to submit report and not given any delegated authority . After my rant, Zurich went away to change to fire claim and give loss adjuster delegated authority and access to budgets. Promised to phone back. That was at 09.00am. Still waiting to hear back it is in place. Suspect staff at Crawfords arguing over who is managing claim.

Loss assessor coming round shortly.

lisyloo

Be aware that complaints usually go to a completely separate department.
This sometimes gets a result and sometimes quite quickly.

littlerock

My original complaint - the one I shouted at in Zurich this morning - WAS to a different department. They promised to phone me back and never did. I suspect there is now a turf war over who should be handling my claim.
Plus the LV loss adjuster turns out not to work Fridays. Have signed up with loss assessor to represent me.

lisyloo

Its not clear if you’ve followed the formal complaints process or just make a complaint over the phone.
There will be a process to follow which will be on your documents and their website.

littlerock

My chief concern at present is it was passed by Zurich to Crawford's their loss adjustors as an Escape of water and treated as a minor claim..I was promised at 9.10 this morning it would be re classified as major fire damage and budgets opened with delegated authority to include urgent temporary work needed. Since then total silence.

Quentin

You say that you spoke (shouted!) to them at 9.oo am but have heard nothing since



Yet you have had time to post here 3 times since then!


Was your shout registered as a complaint?




You need to be making more noise (though not necessarily shouting!!) with your insurer!


The sooner the complaint is in (you can complain verbally!) the sooner the clock starts ticking


If you aren't happy with their reply to your complaint or they ignore you for 8 weeks you can then escalate to the FOS for their adjudication, all at no cost to you

littlerock

How does the number of times I have posted today , relate to the failure of my insurance company to get back to me as promised? My house is partly wrecked by next doors fire.

I phoned up and lodged an urgent formal complaint with my insurers yesterday, after finding out that my claim had been wrongly classified as an escape of water ( not impact of major fire on my house) , when passed to their loss adjustors. And that as a result, no one had any delegated authority to authorise emergency repairs. I got a message on my answerphone late yesterday afternoon, to call insurers first thing this morning, which I did.

After some heated comments on my part, the person in the Insurers Claims team opened my file on line and was apparently surprised to find it classified as escape of water. .Following further comments by me, he checked for delegated authority for loss adjuster to authorise investigation and remedial work and sounded quite shocked to find this was specifically excluded.

He apologised for this and said he would sort it out and get back to me later this morning to confirm it had been corrected to a fire claim with delegated budget set up for loss adjustor. He did not get back to me. Nor has he texted or emailed me. The loss adjustors answerphone has been on all day.

I am feeling quite traumatized actually. My lovely comfortable historic house is now wet and smelly with wrecked cellar and contents, books, paintings spoilt, smoke damage, charred roof beams, water logged plaster, party wall exposed to elements at roof level, a lot of my lovely original plasterwork in hall is ruined etc. At best I am facing months of remedial work and loss of valued possessions. None of this is my fault . My buildings cover is unlimited and yet I cannot get any sensible response from my insurers.. So I have hired a loss assessor to fight my corner.

Quentin

littlerock wrote: »

How does the number of times I have posted today , relate to the failure of my insurance company to get back to me as promised? .

The point is that you seem happy to post here about your woes yet are not directing your attention to the right party


It's apparent from what you say your insurer is poor


But no-one here can get this solved for you



From what you say your insurer needs more kicking - try and escalate the issue. Using your time phoning them might be more fruitful than posting on a forum!


(And you could have made an attempt to get emergency cover on your open roof issue! Then fight this issue with your insurer. Leaving it open to the elements like this is just going to end up causing you more problems)

littlerock

You seem to think I have been idle. I have not. I posted as I assumed other readers would be interested to hear my experience and it also helps me to retain a record of what is happening.. Clearly you think I am doing nothing but sitting around. Nothing could be further from truth.

Claims team are fed up hearing from me. I have had to organise a lot of emergency stuff myself and save recejpts because loss adjuster has not been given any designated authority to organise or pay for this despite my complaints to both insured and loss adjuster daily . eg i had to sort out tradesman electrician to do safety check on electricty so it could go back on. Similarly I had to get hole in party wall at roof level repaired myself.

In fact I always have to go via switchboard to talk to building insurers and rarely get same person twice. I am told by them this is the system. My buildings loss adjuster was not available yesterday. The contents loss adjustor who I tried to reach about getting a skip, turns out not to work Fridays.

I made formal complaint verbally on Thursday to buildings insurer and they phoned me back late afternoon. Friday morning they accepted my claim had been misclassified and promised to sort it out urgently including setting up budgets and payment authority for loss adjustor and get back to me. I assumed it would a few hours.

Yesterday afternoon I was organising emergency repairs to hole in party wall at roof level with a builder I managed to find available. By the time I stopped for breath it was mid afterrnoon and no one from insurers home claim team had got back to me and the buildings loss adjuster still had his answerphone on.

You seem to think the insurers are helpful and responsive to formal complaints. If that has been your experience you have been very lucky. If you have not experienced this sort of traumatic event, I wish you luck when you do. I have now given up trying to deal with insurers myself and appointed a loss assessor. Thank you for your sympathy.

littlerock

For anyone interested in what it is like to deal with Zurich on a home damage claim have a look at their reviews on Trustpilot.