Buildings Insurance Claim Advice

losalnos

Hi all, just a bit of advice before I get in to an argument with my insurers! I'll try to keep it brief!

Long story short, I have a leaking pipe behind the wall of my bathroom. Unfortunately, it's a tiled wall: plain white metro-style tiles and a dark grey grout.

I have trace and access insurance and the insurers have agreed I'm covered. However, when their (the insurers) contractors came to look at the job to decide what the cash payout would be, their offer was only based on taking off and then replacing the tiles from the part of the wall that covers the pipe. 

My argument is that even if the contractor could find the exact same tiles and grout that was used previously, due to one being over 5years old and the other being brand new, they won't match and the two halves of the same wall will look slightly different colours. I'm not even asking for the whole bathroom to be re-tiled so it all matches (which is actually what I want), but surely the bare minimum for the insurers to comply to is one wall should all match?

Has anyone else had experience? Are the insurers/contractors just being cheap and should i argue my case, or have others tried this before and I'm going to spend an hour on the phone getting frustrated and nowhere?

Many thanks in advance. Apologies for typos.

DullGreyGuy

Need to read your policy about "matching sets", most basic and average policies exclude matching sets and therefore are only liable for the parts that are damaged and not the undamaged elements. 

If a direct match isnt available the standard practice in most cases is the insurer contributes 50% to replacing the undamaged items but it does depend. For example if you had continuous carpet in 3 rooms unbroken by door steps etc then they'd pay for the damaged room and 50% of the other two rooms. If you have doorsteps and so its matching carpet not continuous carpet then they normally can get away with offering nothing on the other rooms.

Matching Set cover, to me at least, is a really important coverage that most people dont think they need until you talk to them about kitchen doors, dining chairs etc. 

Annemos

Policy I have only does matching sets for the kitchen cupboards, bathroom suite and the 3 piece suite. Tiles would be excluded. (I am unable to change Insurers). 

I am thinking I would just go for the shabby chic style of mismatch, if anything happens to me! 

losalnos

Many thanks for the advice. I'll take a look.