Insurance Voided After Accident

DullGreyGuy

You have the other issue which inevitably will need to be explored, given the material sums involved, of the fact it's not your car but a vehicle owned by a company.  As such you haven't lost anything but the company has - I assume the £26k has been put through the company accounts and VAT accounted properly? 

There will be the other question of what insurable interest you had in the car? With general insurance (as Motor insurance is) the requirement is for proof at point of claim not at policy inception (Life insurance is the other way around). 


That point aside, it is likely the estimate from the garage will be put through a system like Autatex which gives the accurate view of time estimates and parts required to do the repairs the garage states and will then be timesed by an appropriate hourly rate and parts at list price minus 10% or such. That will give what the estimate probably should have been which is going to be less than the shortfall on the total loss. Similarly VAT will be excluded from the repair costs a) as the repair isnt happening and b) the company is going to be VAT registered so could have reclaimed it given the value of vehicle it can choose to buy. 

I think you have a modest chance of getting the cancellation moved to non-fault/doesnt have to be declared but minimal chance of getting the claim honoured if I'm honest.

deckz

Wonka_2 said:

Whhooaaa there - although it shouldn't have a bearing on the process from a claims point of view we're 2 months/4 pages in and we're talking about a claim on a nigh on £100k vehicle - there's no wonder an insurer might want to play hardball on something like this.

I've re-read the thread and can't see any reference (probably for good reason to protect identity) on what the vehicle was, the nature of the 'business' and your relationship as 'a' rather than 'the' director. - all of which are likely to be relevant.

Before going to court are you absolutely clean on all other elements and they've not found something re the business ownership/operation/use of vehicles that leads them to think they've a good case

Hi Wonka,

I appreciate the concern.
However, there is nothing illegitimate or 'not clean', the only thing was the oversight from my side.

I do not intend for this to go to court - that is something I don't have time to deal with.
My main objective is to appeal through the FOS to clear my name from a policy voidance as this stemmed from a genuine mistake due to unfamiliarity with insurance terms when I registered the car. Anything else is a bonus.

DullGreyGuy said:

You have the other issue which inevitably will need to be explored, given the material sums involved, of the fact it's not your car but a vehicle owned by a company.  As such you haven't lost anything but the company has - I assume the £26k has been put through the company accounts and VAT accounted properly? 

There will be the other question of what insurable interest you had in the car? With general insurance (as Motor insurance is) the requirement is for proof at point of claim not at policy inception (Life insurance is the other way around). 

That point aside, it is likely the estimate from the garage will be put through a system like Autatex which gives the accurate view of time estimates and parts required to do the repairs the garage states and will then be timesed by an appropriate hourly rate and parts at list price minus 10% or such. That will give what the estimate probably should have been which is going to be less than the shortfall on the total loss. Similarly VAT will be excluded from the repair costs a) as the repair isnt happening and b) the company is going to be VAT registered so could have reclaimed it given the value of vehicle it can choose to buy. 

I think you have a modest chance of getting the cancellation moved to non-fault/doesnt have to be declared but minimal chance of getting the claim honoured if I'm honest.

Hi again DDG,

Yes, the sale has been put through the company accounts.

In regard to your second paragraph, I understand that the requirement is for proof at the point of claim, but would I be able to approach it at an angle where the voidance stemmed from a genuine mistake at the registration of the vehicle - I wasn't familiar with the nuances in insurance terminology.

I will approach it mentioning that I want to appeal the voidance and, despite the bleak chance, I think I may as well try with the claim too.
However, if I submit with the objective solely of getting my voidance overturned, would I have a better chance?

And because Wonka mentioned court, I want to re-clarify that I wouldn't have to attend or be forced into court by the insurance company? And that any involvement with the courts would solely be at my discretion if I choose to further pursue (not the insurer's)?

Many thanks.

deckz

Hi again all,

Due to a busy schedule, I only had time to begin the process of drafting a letter to the Financial Ombudsman very recently.

During this time, the insurers have finally sent me a proper reply to the complaint today which I attach below:

Dear XXXXXXXXXXXX

Policy/Claim Number: XXXXXXXX
Complaint Ref: XXXXXX

Thank you for waiting while I looked at your complaint. I'm sorry again that you needed to raise this with us and I hope my reply helps you to understand our position.

Please find below a summary detailing my review of your complaint, based on my findings I haven't upheld your complaint. I’d like to assure you that while I may not comment on everything raised, I’ve thoroughly read and considered all the evidence available to me. My review focuses on the key areas, and what I consider fair and reasonable.

Before I begin it’s important to mention that it’s not my role to overturn any decision made by the Underwriting Department, rather, it’s to ensure you’ve been treated fairly in line with the terms of your policy and make sure that you haven’t been treated any differently to another customer in a similar position. For the technical decisions, I rely upon the professional opinions of that Department as its their area of expertise.

We, like most insurers, can decide the type of risk we wish to accept and this can happen at the quote stage or even when the policy has been running for some time. We have strict underwriting criteria in order to provide our customers with the best possible service and to treat everyone the same. Therefore, we can decide to accept or decline a policy if it's outside of our underwriting criteria. This is a business decision we're entitled to make.

During our claim validation process, we became aware you werent the registered keep of the insured car. I’m sure it wasn’t intentional and it’s not a reflection of you as an individual, but our underwriters consider this misrepresentation. Had we known the correct information, we wouldn’t have offered cover as this falls outside of our underwriting criteria. I've discussed matters with the relevant department and i'm sorry to say the decision won't be overturned.

Under the terms of the policy, we must provide a written explanation of our decision and issue a 7 day cancellation letter. Having checked our system, I can see written communications were sent to you therefore, I'm satisfied the correct process has been followed and you haven’t been treated any different to someone in a similar position.

This represents our final decision in relation to your complaint and has been issued on behalf of our Chief Executive. I now need to make you aware of the following statement;


You have the right to refer your complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service, free of charge – but you must do so within six months of the date of this email.

If you do not refer your complaint in time, the Ombudsman will not have our permission to consider your complaint and so will only be able to do so in very limited circumstances. For example, if the Ombudsman believes that the delay was as a result of exceptional circumstances. I have attached a link to their leaflet for your information:

https://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/businesses/resolving-complaint/ordering-leaflet/leaflet

Is it safe to say that this does not change my situation much?

My main point was and still is that having a voided policy on my record for a lifetime over a genuine mistake seems incredibly severe.

Many thanks,