Buildings Insurance Claim - inconvenience...

*MF*

@ NJB77

Disputes/complaints about insurance and insurance claims that cannot be resolved with the Insurer should be referred to the Financial Services Ombudsman, link here:

http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/

Perhaps advise Norwich union that is what you propose to do, might affect their decision, and if it doesn't then the FOS is your next move.

Frustrated_NU_client

Hi, just joined this forum.

We had a fire in our house nearly 4 weeks ago and finally an assessor was sent round last week. We have received a letter from the assessor - presumably copied to Norwich Union, saying that the boiler needs to be replaced and some redecoration done. We have been asked to pay an excess of £65 to Asprea.

My question is this. In view of the comments re Asprea contractors, how do we go about using our own. I would like to sort this out at an early stage to save us grief later on. To date we do not have a financial estimate of the work to be done. Is this estimated by Asprea's contractors and therefore do we have to use them after the estimate has taken place? To be fair to Asprea, they sent out an assessor as soon as they got the paperwork from Norwich Union and the assessor seemed competent.

It has taken us 4 weeks - with no hot water - to get to this stage so any help greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[Deleted User]

Hi FrustratedNUClient

I'm not in the office right now, so don't have full details, but you are entitled to use your own contractors. If you contact your claims handler and explain that is what you want to do they should be able to explain the process to you. In the meantime I'm back in the office on monday and will be able to give more details then.

In response to some of the asprea comments, I've been absent from this thread largely, but I have been reading them and taking note of them and all of the information is being shared amongst colleagues. This isn't being ignored.

Becca

Oscar_The_Grouch

Nice to see you are back Becca.

To Frustrated NU Client, I notice you don't mention anything about the clean-up of smoke and the removal of the stench from carpets and cupboards. This is something your adjuster should have arranged. There are several fire and flood restoration firms:

Rainbow International (probably the largest and worst firm)
Chemdry (owned by Homeserve)
ServiceMaster (independent I think)
Revival Company (independent)

These are the largest. My personal favourite is Revival Co. They also have a tie in with Johnsons Dry Cleaners and the Certified Restoration and Drycleaning Network (CRDN) who can deal with clothes that reak of smoke as well as soft furnishings and curtains.

Ask your loss adjuster about a restoration firm, as if they can clean the areas that have been smoke damaged before everything is re-painted, you won't get the smoke stains coming through in a couple of years time - no doubt just when you want to sell the property or something!!

nanu_3

Hi All

Have seen the work of Chemdry and Rainbow.

Both exellent

All smoke damaged walls will need to be stain blocked using a quality stain blocker/killer such as zinsser prior to re decorating.

PH_First

Where do you start with this lot??. The BIG thing with Asprea is they are a "Middle man" as such, where the BOB network used to have the claims direct from NU and others on a cost+ point of view it worked quite well (not a 100%). when the BOB contractor took the claim they would survey it and see it through to the end of the claim until the policy holder was happy, satisfied with what has been done. Now its completely different, you have a claim, it goes to NU (or other) this then gets passed to Asprea who then set a date for a surveyor to come and survey the works to be done or repudiate which ever it may be, then they go back and write a report of the works, then its converted into a scope of works which is done on a schedule of rates (My god, worst thing ever for the policy holder), then it is passed onto a contractor who are under the BOB network, who then arrange a foreman/supervisor to give you a call and arrange a start date if a small job like emul ceiling or replace some skirting, or a site visit if the claim is rather large just to run through a schedule to suit the policy holder, then the contractor comes in and starts the works.............low and behold there's a discrepancy in the scope where the surveyor hasn't picked up something in the property which is down to be done, a foreman/supervisor comes out, takes photos of the missed works, or damage done whilst removing something else i.e: ceiling, wallpaper etc etc, writes a report (Variation Order), takes it back to his office who then emails this to Asprea along with photos, and WAIT!!!, meanwhile the policy holder is now getting upset cause no works is progressing on their property cause the contractor is awaiting authorisation from Asprea to go ahead with what was missing or damaged. All this mounts up to a lot of time wasted for the contractor, money wasted for the Ins, and a whole lot of grief for the policy holder who by now is struggling to get any more time off work to allow the trades in!!!!!!. Now going back to when it was cost+, the BOB network contractors surveyor went in once the claim was passed on from the Ins, he would take all the photos required, explain to the policy holder what happens next and whats going to be done, he would then pass it to his foreman/supervisor to arrange a start date, date arranged, work commences, something missed off the surveyors report, foreman/supervisor rings his surveyor/manager and explains, problem solved in one phone call DONE by the contractor himself NOT the PH, money saved, complaints at a minimum, what else can you say. I could go on for hours about the whole charade, but its not just NU, nor is it just Asprea or the BOB network, its the combined lot as a whole arguing about whose in the right, how can we make another £10 off this claim and make me more and more lolly!!!. I feel sorry for 90% of the policy holders (10% is bogus crap) who are left twiddling their thumbs whilst all those who are meant to help them through their troubled time, whilst they struggle to get through the pain of the whole upsetting flood or leak, are trying to make a quick buck from the policy holders themselves, lets face it, its you who pay for Ins, and its them that rape it. From the inside looking out, PH First

[Deleted User]

Hi all

I wanted to write and let you know that the feedback you as customers give us does not get ignored! Hopefully this will go some way towards showing you why.

In particular, I want to tell you about some of the really hard work that has been going on behind the scenes with our colleagues over at Asprea to really help improve the experience you have when it comes to a claim that they will deal with on your behalf.

The team have worked together to look at every aspect of your journey through the claim from the first phone call you get to the language used in the letters that you recieve. It is a really exciting time. Naturally we all hope noone has to make a claim on their insurance, but if you do, we as a team with Asprea are trying to do everything we can to make it as pain free as possible.

Now, noone is saying that all the issues will disappear in the blink of an eye, and I can't go into huge detail about what has changed, but we are trying to do everything we can to make things work for you, our customer.

If you have more questions, please contact me, the usual email address.
Becca

[Deleted User]

Becca - firstly I think its great that you are willing to get on here and help peoiple out and i hope the company i work for will do so too

EVERYONE ELSE - I specialise in complaint handling at a major UK insurer - I will be happy to put together complaint letters for you if you wish (totally free) I believe that as long as you approach ANY insurer with the right attitude ANYTHING is possible - ex gratia payments although rare DO HAPPEN

SO if you would like a hand - PLEASE PM me

BEAR IN MIND - Insurers are under a lot of strain with the floods of this year and last year not to mention the ongoing nightmare from 2005 so things might take a while to resolve - the main issue is that you get your complaint in ASAP - remember YOU ARE PAYING FOR A SERVICE!

deputy1234567

I currently work at Asprea and sadly from all the comments read your right the service received is a joke, but don't be to hasty to slam the Personal Claims Adviser(PCA) they were sold the NU Asprea dream as well and have sadly been let down, from day one we were told this was never going to be a 'call center' this was a 'contact center' where under no circumstances would this company be run by call stats but on quality and only receive maximum of 10 calls a day, this was even the basis on which our training was delivered although that turned out to be of no use what so ever. Within the first few months we would come into a change in the way of working on a weekly basis, some working better than others, to this day there is not a solid working practice in place that suits the needs of the Customer or the PCA.
Over the past six months there has been a drastic change, where call stats are all that Management seem to care about which seem to show to NU that calls and customer needs are being deal with sufficiently, maybe this is due to the fact that Asprea's contract with NU is up for revision in March. This has had the effect on staff of them not being able to deal with each individual claim in the correct manner which leads on to demoralizing the PCA's as they try to go about sorting out their Customer's problems.
There have been steps to sort this situation out by recruiting Call Handlers, who at best are given 3 days training before being thrown in at the deep, which portray a poor image of the company when a Customer calls to inquire about their situation and the call handler has not had adequate training for the situation, again this is down to a lack of guidance by Management.
It seems strange that there is not a high turn over of staff in Asprea, this i guess is down to them having the correct people in place to achieve the goal that was set out initially, but are not being given the tools to do the job to the best of their ability, on the other hand there have been a few immediate team managers that have left, that says to me that there is a problem with the management structure within this company.
There is also the problems with the Contractors that we were given as part of the original deal from NU that we had to keep them with us, as part i suspect, of a sweetener to them when Asprea came along and took their work away. We constantly have problems in getting them to carry out the simplest of tasks and they normally find someway of making the job/work last that little bit longer in order to have the Customer complain and have their Asprea experience tarnished.
Surveyors are finding it difficult too, they now work under a 'sidewinder' diary management system which leaves them not knowing from one day to the next where they will be going or working, there has been instances of Scottish Surveyors having to travel south to carryout an inspection during their eight hour day before returning north to finish their area, thus leaving the PCA to have to call Customers to make excuses about their Surveyor visit being canceled, this is not only restricted to Scotland one Liverpool Surveyor had to come up North to Glasgow to carry out an hour inspection before returning back south, again this is a management structure problem.
Then we have the strange ritual of the 'family jobs' where members of staff/management fast track their relations in to the company and in to positions they are far from qualified from doing, they don't have to go through the proper procedure of interviews, that would take to long. Middle/Senior Management know this practice exists and which offices are more prevalent but do nothing to stop it.
My advice sadly to any Customer would be that if they do have to make a claim on their buildings insurance, to get in two local tradesmen quotes and send them directly to their Insurance Company for a cash settlement, thus leaving them in control of their claim.
This company is taking on water and slowly heading for that big March iceberg on the horizon sadly a lot of good people are being let down by a management team that are ill equipped to steer the ship in the correct direction.

mattymoo

Thanks for the honesty deputy.
Care to comment on behalf of NU Becca?