Flood damage to contents - who pays?

KLB

Hi,

My boss lives in an apartment block and the flat above him had a big leak that damaged the building and his contents. The claim for buildings damage to the ceiling etc is being handled by the building managers. But nobody is recognising the damage to the contents which runs into several thousand pounds.

My boss is reluctant to make a claim on his contents insurance, because that means his premiums will go up and why should he be out of pocket in this way for someone else's mistake? The flat above does not have contents insurance.

Do you know what's the correct way of approaching this? Whose insurance pays? Does my boss just go through his insurance or do we go the legal route to claim the money from the flat above?

Thanks,

Kelly

DullGreyGuy

This is escape of water rather than flood... flood from insurance terms comes from outside the building.

Generally, you claim off your own contents insurance.

To be able to claim off the third party, the property owner/tenant above, you would have to prove they were negligent. For EoW claims this generally means the leak is a result of them drilling through a pipe etc or there had been repeated problems which they had already been made aware of and had had sufficient time to try and fix it but hadnt. 

Your boss needs to discover the cause of the escape of water in the first instance.

lisyloo

When you say mistake, can you clarify?
They flat upstairs will be liable if the were negligent and you can either get them to admit liability or have proof.

Otherwise your boss has to pay for it and this is what insurance is for.

He may have access to a free legal helpline on his insurance which won't cost him anything to call.

Keep_pedalling

Unless some one’s negligence caused the leak he has no other option than to claim from his own insurance. Why would you be worried about what will likely, at most, to be a small increase in premiums against a loss of thousands? 

PRAISETHESUN

As above, they should claim off their own insurance policy - it's what they have the policy for after all. If it can be definitively proved that the water damage was a direct result of the leak in the upstairs flat, then the boss's insurance company should reclaim that amount from the upstairs apartment, and any increase in premium should be minimal.

DullGreyGuy

PRAISETHESUN said:

As above, they should claim off their own insurance policy - it's what they have the policy for after all. If it can be definitively proved that the water damage was a direct result of the leak in the upstairs flat, then the boss's insurance company should reclaim that amount from the upstairs apartment, and any increase in premium should be minimal.

No, it requires negligence not just for the leak to have originated from upstairs.

lisyloo

PRAISETHESUN said:

As above, they should claim off their own insurance policy - it's what they have the policy for after all. If it can be definitively proved that the water damage was a direct result of the leak in the upstairs flat, then the boss's insurance company should reclaim that amount from the upstairs apartment, and any increase in premium should be minimal.

Yep, DullGreyGuy is right is required negligence to be liable which is pretty hard to prove. Same applies to falling roof tiles, flying bins, flying fences etc.

it very hard to prove negligence on someone else private indoor property.
only time it would work if you have records of previous complaints/notifications of the issue that they then ignored.

PRAISETHESUN

Hence the "If it can be definitively proved" in my comments above... I agree that is unlikely to happen.

In any case, OP needs to claim off their own insurance rather than wasting time by trying to prove any alleged negligence. Personally I'd much rather the damage get repaired first, then waste time fighting over who has a responsibility to actually pay for it.

DullGreyGuy

PRAISETHESUN said:

Hence the "If it can be definitively proved" in my comments above... I agree that is unlikely to happen.

In any case, OP needs to claim off their own insurance rather than wasting time by trying to prove any alleged negligence. Personally I'd much rather the damage get repaired first, then waste time fighting over who has a responsibility to actually pay for it.

But you said... definitively prove that the water came from the flat above... thats not what needs to be proven, its that their negligence caused the water escape. It doesnt matter where the water came from. 

In principle they could have been drilling into the floor and caught the OP's own pipe... they would still be liable for negligence even though the EoW originates from within the OP's own flat. 

phillw

It isn't so simple.

My fathers next door neighbor sued my dad claiming damp in all parts of his house was caused by the garage being built too close to the house. The council weighed in saying that the garage shouldn't have been built there.

Fortunately my dad had kept all the planning documents, in fact my dad had wanted to build the garage so that it was attached to his house but they forced him to build it where it was. The council sheepishly went away.

My dad just put it through his insurance, who eventually settled (much to his annoyance).

When the work started, my dad spoke to the plumber who told him there had been a leak in the bathroom that flooded it & that is all he was called in to sort out.

You don't need to prove negligence, or even that the event happened. You just need to have a lawyer that is prepared to fight.

My dads next door neighbor sued everyone, for made up reasons all the time.