Likely cause? Breakdown company refusing to come out (Emergency Assist Ltd)

Taiko

Yeah, they seem to be a company that fight every claim from what I'm now reading. My original one for the flat battery they initially refused because they deemed I use the car for business, because I use it to drive to work like most sane people..
From a contractual viewpoint, it's the use of the "and" within that policy wording. That implies to me that they would not attend if I hadn't met those terms, yet I believe that by taking the advice of the recovery operator for the flat battery and getting it replaced I had done as expected. 

Garage are looking into it, so will update with findings. Thanks all for your help so far, and does seem a case of you get what you pay for! 

Sandtree

Taiko said:

From a contractual viewpoint, it's the use of the "and" within that policy wording. That implies to me that they would not attend if I hadn't met those terms, yet I believe that by taking the advice of the recovery operator for the flat battery and getting it replaced I had done as expected. 

Would need to see it in context, and on a bigger screen, but the first part of clause 6 is:

 any Breakdown as a result of inadequate repair, unsuccessful DIY or any previous Breakdown... 

Much of the rest of the clause is fairly redundant as whilst your "and" statement can be argued that you dont trigger the clause under limb 3 that still leaves the argument that the repairs were inadequate and therefore fails limb 1 and this section is an OR statement.

Taiko

Attached the policy document itself 

https://gofile.io/d/jZDbWd

Car_54

Herzlos said:

Car_54 said:

HansOndabush said:

As to your vehicle problem, not enough information to hazard a guess I'm afraid.

I would hazard a guess that the original problem certainly wasn't the battery.

The mechanic diagnosed it as a battery, a new battery was fitted and the car was fine for a while, so it's fair to assume that issue was the battery. The only common denominator here is "car won't move" and that probably covers most breakdowns.

Though with a £33/year break down plan I expect them to exclude just about everything and fight hard to reject any claim since a single claim is going to lose them money.

I'm struggling to understand how a failed battery could ever cause the car to "splutter and stall". Also the OP said it started again, which suggests the battery was OK.

AdrianC

Car_54 said:

Herzlos said:

Car_54 said:

HansOndabush said:

As to your vehicle problem, not enough information to hazard a guess I'm afraid.

I would hazard a guess that the original problem certainly wasn't the battery.

The mechanic diagnosed it as a battery, a new battery was fitted and the car was fine for a while, so it's fair to assume that issue was the battery. The only common denominator here is "car won't move" and that probably covers most breakdowns.

Though with a £33/year break down plan I expect them to exclude just about everything and fight hard to reject any claim since a single claim is going to lose them money.

I'm struggling to understand how a failed battery could ever cause the car to "splutter and stall". Also the OP said it started again, which suggests the battery was OK.

A knackered alternator, though, could easily cause both a flat battery AND spluttering and stalling.

sheramber

What ever caused the existing battery to fail may have also  drained the new battery over time.

tim9966

I did have that problem a few years ago with my car. It turned out to be a fault with the wiring loom. I assume it was causing a short circuit somewhere and that sometimes caused the car to die for no reason. It would then restart first time. 

bartelbe

The problem here is they didn't get to the root cause of the problem, why was the battery flat? Voltage drain, bad earth, worn alternator or hadn't been running for a whiled?

As for their refusal to come out the second time, utterly laughable. There is noway they can know it had anything to do with electrical system, let alone the same fault as before. We had a similar problem and it turn out the crud had got into a fuel line and blocked it.

My advice is dump these clowns as soon as possible and get a better breakdown service.

Taiko

Cars back up and running. Needed a new rocker cover gasket, spark plug, HT leads and coil pack. Seemed what had happened was an oil leak that was unknown to me during the days between using the vehicle, and it was this that caused the stuttering. Having been dark when I went to head out on the evening of the breakdown, I hadn't seen anything around the car at all.