Water Damage and Car Insurance

Yeeshus

Hi MSE forums,

Last week, my area of the country was subject to torrential rain across a few days which resulted in the roads having a lot of standing water on them. I had to drive to work and did my best to avoid the standing water where possible and slowed for the water that wasn't avoidable due to oncoming traffic.

Three days later the electronic power steering in my car appears to have failed. The car is in the process of being recovered to my local independant specialist for investigation.

If the cause of the damage is determined to be water ingress, how likely is it that I would be allowed to claim (and win) this on my insurance? I would have expected these components on the car to be protected against water ingress at the very least seeing as they're on the underside of the car.

Thanks for any advice!

DullGreyGuy

If it can definitely be pointed to being caused by ingress of water from driving through too deep a water then the prospects are reasonable however if that the diagnosis you get and want to claim then you need to stop at that point, report the claim and your insurers will most likely will want to inspect the vehicle for themselves. 

As I mainly dealt with TP claims it's not something I saw often but in the cases that did pass my desk the car had always died immediately,  normally still in the puddle/ford. Three days later sounds very odd to me, not that I am a mechanic, and so I'd certainly be checking it more rigeriously had your case landed on my desk

Yeeshus

DullGreyGuy said:

If it can definitely be pointed to being caused by ingress of water from driving through too deep a water then the prospects are reasonable however if that the diagnosis you get and want to claim then you need to stop at that point, report the claim and your insurers will most likely will want to inspect the vehicle for themselves. 

This is what I was planning on doing if the specialist can 100% demonstrate the failure was caused by water ingress. While I avoided most of the standing water and slowed for what I couldn't, I can't say the same for other road users. At one point I got a wave of water washed over my car by traffic coming in the opposite direction.

DullGreyGuy said:

Three days later sounds very odd to me, not that I am a mechanic, and so I'd certainly be checking it more rigeriously had your case landed on my desk

Exactly my thinking also which is why I came here for advice first. It wouldn't be the first time i've seen failures happen x days past what caused it but it makes claiming much more difficult.