Home insurance / Subsidence help

confused304032

Hello - I have made a series of dumb errors regarding subsidence claim and home insurance and I am sick with worry and unsure how to proceed. I'd be grateful for any advice.

In the very dry summer of 2022, a worrying crack appeared in a downstairs wall in our home. I called our insurer, More Than, who passed me on to a specialist subsidence investigation company who (eventually) sent around a guy to inspect it. 

The results were inconclusive. The crack actually closed up in the winter and has remained like that ever since. However, the claim is as yet unresolved - nothing further has been concluded - but I still seem to be stuck in some sort of subsidence limbo. That's one problem.

My main problem, however, is that the original insurance policy expired in September last year - I thought it was on auto-renew but it wasn't so I've just realised I have been without insurance for the last few months. Only: I can't take out another policy because there's an ongoing subsidence claim. And I don't seem to be able to restore the original More Than policy - at least online.

Do I take this up very honestly with More Than? And can I get them to cancel that original subsidence claim? We want to move house quite soon and I obviously don't want anything like this hanging over us. 

I'd be grateful for any advice.

Worried of Bristol.

Smithcom

confused304032 said:

Hello - I have made a series of dumb errors regarding subsidence claim and home insurance and I am sick with worry and unsure how to proceed. I'd be grateful for any advice.

In the very dry summer of 2022, a worrying crack appeared in a downstairs wall in our home. I called our insurer, More Than, who passed me on to a specialist subsidence investigation company who (eventually) sent around a guy to inspect it. 

The results were inconclusive. The crack actually closed up in the winter and has remained like that ever since. However, the claim is as yet unresolved - nothing further has been concluded - but I still seem to be stuck in some sort of subsidence limbo. That's one problem.

My main problem, however, is that the original insurance policy expired in September last year - I thought it was on auto-renew but it wasn't so I've just realised I have been without insurance for the last few months. Only: I can't take out another policy because there's an ongoing subsidence claim. And I don't seem to be able to restore the original More Than policy - at least online.

Do I take this up very honestly with More Than? And can I get them to cancel that original subsidence claim? We want to move house quite soon and I obviously don't want anything like this hanging over us. 

I'd be grateful for any advice.

Worried of Bristol.

I would recommend that speak with More Than asap to see if they can re-incept cover, particularly given that the recent subsidence claim was with them.

Surely you need to establish if there is any subsidence before:

1. Cancelling the subsidence claim
2. You even think about not declaring the issue to a prospective purchaser

Perhaps, appoint your own structural engineer?

Hope you get it sorted

SC

Annemos

Hello confused304032

Here is what I believe. I am not a professional, but I had a Subsidence claim and I had to do a lot of research on many issues. 


Two things going on here, it seems. 

1.  The Subsidence claim is still open. There are many Ombudsman cases that say, that your Insurer must now continue to offer you Insurance cover, both while the claim is ongoing and also after it has finished, if it was a case of Subsidence. 

There are cases to show, that even non-ABI insurers are expected to follow this "Industry-wide good practice."

The times when they are potentially not expected to do that, is if they have withdrawn completely from the UK home Insurance market. And even then, there have been recent cases that they have to help the homeowner set up a policy with another Insurer. 

The other time they can escape doing this, is if the homeowners has done something that they should not have done, which allows the Insurance company to get out of cover. I have always imagined that this means if something like fraud has taken place, or if the homeowner gained a criminal record etc. 

I think the best thing you can do on this, is to call the Insurance Company straight away and say exactly what has happened and discuss the issue of the auto-renewal that you thought was in place.

(I am wondering if that auto-renewal failed within their systems, because there is an ongoing Subsidence claim? So the Computer System kicked it out. Did you get any e-mails within a month before the policy expired? I was finally dropped from my Subsidence cover one week before my policy expired, but I had been monitoring that there was apparently no renewal for about 3 weeks before that and I had kept asking them about it.) 

You do really need to try and get it reinstated back to the original date. As I believe it is not good to have had a lapse in Insurance cover. In my case, they could only set up a new policy from "today's" date. But they did give me a letter saying I was actually covered for Subsidence during the 6 months, for when I had been dropped. 


The other thing going on is, what exactly is causing your movement. Typically when cracks close up like this in winter, if you are on clay soil, then it might be due to vegetation and trees in the close proximity. Are you on clay soil? Does your soil crack up in summer? Do you have trees in the vicinity? (Not sure if 2023 was very wet, which may have helped the crack to stay closed up in the summer?) 

Here is a link for you to input your postcode and check what soil is under you. (Will have to send you that shortly. They have changed their website!) 

Good luck with getting the policy back and also finding out the status of the claim. 

Oh yes and I agree with Smithcom. If you cannot get to the bottom of this, you potentially need advice from a Structural Engineer. 

(One other note: I do not believe it is now as straightforward as simply cancelling a Subsidence claim. I believe the record that there has been one registered, will be retained in the Insurance Industry's Claim and Underwriting Exchange database. This will need to be declared to any future buyer, I believe, on those forms we have to fill in as a seller. So somehow, you are going to have to get a conclusion on what the movement was, if not from your Insurer, then from a Structural Engineer.) 

Annemos

Gosh it has gone super sophisticated now and is blowing up my Computer's memory!  Try clicking on the little magnifying glass on the top right and then you can enter your postcode. 

This showed me that there was indeed a clay belt under my home. 



https://geologyviewer.bgs.ac.uk/?_ga=2.55722786.880535112.1709558191-1295252817.1709558191

dunstonh

In the very dry summer of 2022, a worrying crack appeared in a downstairs wall in our home. I called our insurer, More Than, who passed me on to a specialist subsidence investigation company who (eventually) sent around a guy to inspect it. 

Most cracks are movement (especially in drought years).   its important to ensure you use the right term as subsidence can be a dirty word but movement can be more or less expected.   nearly every house in our area suffered movement in 2022 due to the drought. One wing of our house saw a wall looked like raspberry ripple.     

We don't go to the insurance as its routine maintenance.  We also had a structural engineer visit before we bought the place who graded it level 2 and said to deal with it as routine maintenance and not use insurance.   (a bit of repointing, adding in helifix ties and reducing the water draw in the area)

The results were inconclusive. The crack actually closed up in the winter and has remained like that ever since. However, the claim is as yet unresolved - nothing further has been concluded - but I still seem to be stuck in some sort of subsidence limbo. That's one problem.

That sounds more like movement.  Dry ground stretch opens the cracks and wet ground expansion closes them back up.

Do I take this up very honestly with More Than? And can I get them to cancel that original subsidence claim? We want to move house quite soon and I obviously don't want anything like this hanging over us. 

too late. its logged.  Try and get More Than to reinstate the policy and employ your own structural engineer to report.  It probably wont be as bad as you think.

Annemos

dunstonh. Do you have to declare this each year, when you take out Insurance? (When they ask about cracking etc.)

dunstonh

Annemos said:

dunstonh. Do you have to declare this each year, when you take out Insurance? (When they ask about cracking etc.)

My insurer have the original surveyors report and I stay with them each year.   Nothing new is declared each year because it's the same old cracks that reopen every dry year.     Decades or generations of repairs mean there are weaknesses in certain spots and its the filler that fails.   Some bright spark decided to replace the plaster at that end  in the past and rigid plaster isn't what it needs.  At some point, we will strip that plaster off, repoint the bricks and include more ties and then use traditional plastering to bring back the stretchiness it needs.

Nothing new or unexpected has taken place and routine maintenance sorts the issues without the need to disclose to the insurer.

 

DullGreyGuy

You can withdraw the claim but that may do more harm than good as it'll show as a closed claim for Subsidence which will be declarable when you sell and mean getting home insurance for the next owner is next to impossible. You really need to push forward for a determination of if it is subsidence or, as others here suspect, movement. 

dunstonh said:
One wing of our house    

Always amuses me... imagining some courtyarded country inn... maybe one day see a photo if its anything more palatial 

Annemos

It is a dilemma for homeowners? In these borderline cases. To submit a Subsidence claim or not to. 

If one does not declare the cracking to the Insurance company and it then gets worse, so one has to put in a claim......  one can later be accused of hiding the facts in the "answers to questions" which were declared when the policy was taken out. And the policy potentially then gets cancelled for misrepresentation. 

Or one might be told that it was pre-existing damage which "the Insurance Company agents have spotted was already present on Google Earth StreetView, 3 years ago". And then they might try to refuse the claim that way. 

It is also not so straightforward to find a Structural Engineer who can come out quickly. And can homeowners always afford to do that? 

If you read Insurance Company websites, then the original poster did what they advise: report anything other than minor cracking to the Insurer as soon as it is spotted. 

Wobblyhouselondon

I posted my comment on a different trail but it is more relevant to this one. I am interested in @Annemos ’s answer as it wasn’t our experience, but maybe we should have fought it: Annemos said:  "There are many Ombudsman cases that say, that your Insurer must now continue to offer you Insurance cover, both while the claim is ongoing and also after it has finished, if it was a case of Subsidence.". Now after our claim, our insurer (AXA at the time) dropped the subsidence cover and there was nothing we could do. We hadn’t done anything wrong, we paid the exess, removed the ivy that broke the drains at our expenses. But we didn’t check with Ombudsman, maybe we should have. But I wonder if it has changed now as things seem to have hardened in the world of home insurance, see my post below.

Anyway this is the post I put on a separate thread, in case someone here @dunstonh or @DullGreyGu, has any welcome advice:

This is about concerns about selling our house which has a history of subsidence (repairs were done and we have certificates of Adequacy). Recently we tried to find a different insurer because our specialist insurer has increased the price quite dramatically. ALL the other supposedly “specialist” insurers have refused us. Insurers now seem to be more freaked by subsidence than 10 years ago. They are not interested in Certificates of Adequacy. I am concerned that, were we to have another subsidence event (we’ve had 2 in 30 years due to broken drains), our insurer would remove the subsidence cover, and we would not be able to find another insurer to insure us for subsidence. They can also remove subsidence from your cover if they decide to apparently, without a claim being made. Then we wouldn’t be able to sell, which we’d like to do in the next couple of years. I’m even wondering if it might be worth forking out 15 grand on underpinning and then try to sell it like that . Any advice welcome. Thank you.

Annemos

Re the Continuation of Cover issue. 

When I had my case starting in 2018, there were not so many cases from the FOS. The ones that were there, were mostly concerning the members of the ABI. Those members had definitely signed up to retaining homeowners. And, if at all possible, even after the Subsidence Claim was finished. 

So I had a struggle on my hands in 2019/2020, as mine was not a member of the ABI. But eventually they did accept Continuation of Cover for me while I was mid claim. (They are now a member of the ABI and still continuing cover after the claim.) 

Since then, there are several more FOS cases. These also say this is Industrywide Good Practice, whether the Insurer is an ABI member or not. And there have also been discussions on what happens when an Insurer pulls out of the market. And they also imply that cover should continue if at all possible after the Claim has finished. 


This case is the best one, I feel. It says this (and also says it for non-ABI members).   

When considering this we generally look to see if the insurer has taken reasonable steps to ensure the intention of the ABI guidance is achieved despite their withdrawal from the market. The guidance is intended to ensure consumers with previous or current subsidence claims can continue accessing subsidence cover on reasonable terms – and to support a smooth functioning of the property market. It says that when there is a claim the insurer handling it should normally continue to provide subsidence cover for the property.


https://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/decision/DRN-4190935.pdf

And here is one where a Claim had already finished, also non-ABI member. 

https://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/decision/DRN-4123124.pdf


Your own comment is very worrying. The cases I have seen have been tested for people who are actually still in ongoing Subsidence Claims.     And seemingly the same would be expected to apply for homeowners whose claims have finished and that Insurer who handled the claim is still in the market. (Not much one can do about the premium charged, though. People have tried complaining about high premiums, but did not get anywhere.) 

But in a case like yours where, for whatever reason, the link has been severed with the Insurer that did the Claim, then I don't know what will happen. As you say, I hope the other two experts have more suggestions for you. 

I am not sure whether underpinning would actually improve the situation. It was still a Subsidence Claim? 

Just a further note.... you are not at increased risk of flooding or surface flooding are you? Could that be a factor adding to this issue.