House insurance - empty property, outstanding claim

RachelN76

I have a really tricky situation.

My mum died in August.  I am the executor and sole beneficiary of her will.  She has a house.  Insured with AA.
In December a pipe burst, lots of damage, claim currently with the AA.  Being sorted - but won't be quick because of what needs doing.
Insurance has now run out.  AA won't renew because it's unoccupied.  I've found people who will insure if it's unoccupied or still under probate etc; but they won't cover if there is an outstanding claim.

Any ideas?  I'm just really worried that an asteroid will hit the house or something else will happen and I don't have insurance!

DullGreyGuy

Contact a broker, you are in very niche insurance space where there aren't enough customers for direct insurers or mass market intermediaries

RachelN76

I'm back.  I've contacted every agent, broker and insurance company i can find.
Nothing.

Does anyone have any ideas at all, or do I just have to accept the risk?
(I'm a VERY risk averse person, and this is giving me major palpitations!)

huckster

Have you tried Home Protect?

Also see which Insurance company actually insured the house under the AA policy.  See if you can approach the company directly.

AA as brokers might not be authorised to arrange  renewal of an unoccupied property, but the actual Insurance company may offer cover subject to changed terms.

Weem83

RachelN76, did you ever get round the outstanding claim and insurance issue? I am in a similar position and we are arguing with the underwriters about not being able to get insurance elsewhere. Our claim should have been done and dusted in July/August, but here we are, 11 months after the initial leak, with no end in sight. They have admitted they messed up and caused unnecessary delays when we made a formal complaint, but are still not willing to insure our home. We can’t go elsewhere either.

Annemos

I wonder.... can you do a search on ombudsman cases.  Search in Insurance Section: "loss of ongoing cover open claim". 

A search using words something along those lines.  (Try a few variations.) 

You may well find some other cases where an Insurance Company took an unreasonable amount of time to do the repairs and refused to carry on insuring the home. And then, if the FOS did order "continuation of cover", under what circumstances? 

Here is the link for searches. 

Also please note, if you find a case that might be relevant, save it and then move on to the next in the list. (If you stay too long on one case, the website may time out.)

https://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/decisions-case-studies/ombudsman-decisions

(Also keep any details of what you did to prove that you could not get insurance elsewhere. That might help if you do have to go to the Ombudsman.) 


Good luck. It is horrible to be without insurance. I had to fight very hard when they stopped my Subsidence Cover. I found the help I needed within the FOS cases. It takes a bit of time to search the cases, but it really worked for me.

(The arguments worked so well, the Insurance Company did not make me go to the Ombudsman.)