laptop to claim or not to claim?

rabman

Hi guys,

I recently claimed on a laptop which my wife damaged in the house (she dropped it when it was on the bed). I was insured with barclays home insurance and the claims proceedure was surprisingly simple as the laptop was covered under home contents and they swiftly replaced it with an equivalent model through a compnay named 'iVal'.

I then had the option of buying the laptop back or going for £100 data recovery (it still had loads of files on it) and so i thought it would be more economical to actually buy it back for only £50 more. My son then decided he would take it upon himself as a some project to repair it himself and he has since taken it to his unviersity halls.

Thing is about a few days ago he called home to say his friend spilled water on his laptop keyboard! I've told him to claim on his halls insurance which covers accidental damge upto £1000 but im not sure whether I should get him to call the company (cover4students) who use a replacement company called 'Powerplay direct' and inform them that the laptop in question was claimed for not so long ago (although we bought it back and since repaired it) as an act of disclosure of information (as it could relate to the claim and also show we have disclosed all information so as not to be considered of commiting fraud!). Im not sure as to the process/whether they actually cross-reference the information for previous claims but I want to ensure that my son does not get any hassle further down the line and simply gets a quick, no hassle replacement!

Any advice much appreciated. Cheers!

Robbi

soolin

Personally I think you are going to trigger an investigation. No doubt the insurers in the first claim will have logged the details of the PC so when a second claim goes in for a new laptop for the same 'faulty' laptop I think this is going to get messy.

peddy

iVal and Powerplay Direct are different sections of the same company so I wouldn't risk it if I were you.

See here http://www.powerplaydirect.com/jobs/

courtjester

In terms of your 'loss', the value of the laptop is really no more than you paid the insurer for the salvage - £50. On the basis that the laptop was purchased back as a non-working item, then spilling water on it effectively has not made the usability of a non-working laptop worse, so in truth there is no additional loss to claim anyway.

Accepting that your son may have got it working through the 'accrued value' of his labour, what does that add in terms of the value of his time and /or parts applied to the machine? Probably very little or nothing.

Overall, I would take the view that you have been compensated for the loss of this machine and it is unrealistic to expect to be compensated twice over - if you pursue it, you are exposing yourself and your (as yet unblemished) insurance record to potentially damaging investigation... or worse flagged as potential fraud or serial claimer, for no appreciable return.

PS - water in itself will not damage the components, unless the machine was turned on and 'shorted-out'. It could well be fine once fully dried out...

Bathdaft

I recently put in a claim to my home insurance re damage to a Sony laptop. I bought it in July 2009 and it has a years warranty til july 2010.
I accidentally dropped my laptop damaging power input socket, wifi switch, bluetooth and audio output socket.
I was referred to IVAl insurance valuers. They said they would assess the damage and repair it. I said that I had been told by Sony in order to keep the 6 months warranty it had to go back to them. IVAl say they will only repair it themselves and give 3 months warrannty on the repairs. If I allow IVAL to repair the computer I lose 6 months warranty.
My insurance policy biooklet states that an appointed contractor will assess the cost of repair it doesn't state the contractor themselves will repair the item only to arrange the repair.
Am I being held to ransom and have any of my consumer rights been breached?

Bathdaft

CHIR0

Bathdaft wrote: »

I recently put in a claim to my home insurance re damage to a Sony laptop. I bought it in July 2009 and it has a years warranty til july 2010.
I accidentally dropped my laptop damaging power input socket, wifi switch, bluetooth and audio output socket.
I was referred to IVAl insurance valuers. They said they would assess the damage and repair it. I said that I had been told by Sony in order to keep the 6 months warranty it had to go back to them. IVAl say they will only repair it themselves and give 3 months warrannty on the repairs. If I allow IVAL to repair the computer I lose 6 months warranty.
My insurance policy biooklet states that an appointed contractor will assess the cost of repair it doesn't state the contractor themselves will repair the item only to arrange the repair.
Am I being held to ransom and have any of my consumer rights been breached?

Bathdaft

Hi,

I would stay well clear of iVal. They are an agent used by many insurance companies to keep costs to a minimum. Unfortunately this is at customer expense with replacing equipment with low grade parts or cheap complete replacements. It is your laptop so if the warranty is only valid through being repaired by Sony I would go down this route.

I would put this in writing to your insurance company too, also stating that as Sony warranty is for the remaining period they either have to agree to this also in writing, or offer the exact same warranty as Sony before any repair is started. They take your money & the risk by being the insurer so must honor any claim.

I currently have a claim against iVal in the county court. iVal are part of Powerplay Direct, BeValued and pc-laptop spares on Ebay. All operating from the same address in Eastbourne. Their telephone number is a premium rate number so you pay to speak to them. All except for the Ebay company can be found on LinkedIn .com showing the links and same address.

Just deal with your insurance company in writing only and insist on NOT using iVal. What is said on the phone is then often ignored. Keep a log of all phone calls including the cost & inform your insurance company that you expect reimbursement of those too as part of the claim.

I had a Sony laptop which was top of the range when bought. It was dropped but had very little damage. A ridiculous offer was made, at which point I asked for it to be returned. Before the claim was settled iVal 'disposed of' the laptop with all my data on it. I never received a detailed report as should be the case from their own paperwork. This still has not been provided. Court case is scheduled for next week unless they get granted more time. It's been over a year now from when I started my insurance claim.

After my court case I will post the results here for all to read. I also note there are many complaints on the web now about iVal. Wish I had known about them before.

Good luck.

Curly

sorry to hear about your trouble CHIR0 im glad you registered and welcome to the site lol you must of felt you had to worn every 1 and quite rite.:)

any way good luck next week you shouldn't need any

CHIR0

Sorry I didn't post sooner. I did win and got awarded compensation for the lost data although not as much as I would have liked. At least it was a good result in one way but would have preferred not to go through this ordeal in the first place. At least everyone else gets warned and maybe they will improve their standard of service in the future.