Inappropriate VOIDANCE

WalknTalk34

Following my recently trying to claim on my house insurance the insurance company have refused to accept the claim and issued me with a voidance on the grounds that as my stepdaughter was living with me at the time the policy was taken out and had a live IVA (Individual Voluntary Arrangement) that I did not declare. 
I was not aware she had this IVA (she was asked and said not) and she has no financial commitment to me or my property (neither does my partner - its all in my name).  
I have appealed to the Financial Ombudsman who have upheld the voidance as they have said I could have checked if she had an IVA and had I done this I would have known - I wasn't aware you could even do this let alone think to!
I just feel this is so unfair as I genuinely did not know and I have never ever been in a situation like this before - I have never even claimed on insurance.  My premiums have now doubled for Home and Car insurance and I will forever have to declare this as most insurance companies ask have you EVER had insurance declined, cancelled or voided.
Any advice anyone can give me?

cw8825

WalknTalk34 said:

Following my recently trying to claim on my house insurance the insurance company have refused to accept the claim and issued me with a voidance on the grounds that as my stepdaughter was living with me at the time the policy was taken out and had a live IVA (Individual Voluntary Arrangement) that I did not declare. 
I was not aware she had this IVA (she was asked and said not) and she has no financial commitment to me or my property (neither does my partner - its all in my name).  

I was not aware she had this IVA (she was asked and said not)

This makes the misrepresentation deliberate, there's not much room to manoeuvre.
 She has flat out lied, if she had not been asked you may have had grounds for appeal

tacpot12

It probably isn't relevant to what you can do about it, but was the claim in anyway relevant to her having an IVA? If it wasn't relevant, was this part of your complaint to the Insurer and to the Ombudsman? 

You might have a legal claim against your step-daughter for what this has cost you, but I suspect that you will struggle to get compensation to cover the future impact as it is unending! It seems a very harsh punishment for something that was beyond your control. If your new home insurance has legal expenses cover, you might try calling the legal helpline for advice, but if your step-daughter is still living with you, they might decline to do so due to the potential conflict of interest if she were also to ask them for advice. 

Your lesson is salutory. If you had found out about the IVA before making the claim and cancelled the insurance yourself, you would have been fine, but the truth seems to have come out only when you needed to make a claim. I hope your partner is compensating you if her daughter isn't. 

You have my sympathy.

DullGreyGuy

tacpot12 said:

It probably isn't relevant to what you can do about it, but was the claim in anyway relevant to her having an IVA? If it wasn't relevant, was this part of your complaint to the Insurer and to the Ombudsman? 

The law around non-disclosure is CIDRA, its very prescriptive:

1) Careless - depends if the insurer would have covered had it been declared... if they wouldn't have taken on the business then they can cancel the policy and avoid the claim. If they would have they have to settle the claim but reduce settlement by the difference % in premium the declaration would have made (ie if premiums are £500 but would have been £750 had the dec been made then a £9,000 claim gets settled as £6,000)

2) Reckless or Deliberate - allows the insurer to void the policy, keep the premiums and avoid any claims

There doesn't have to be any connection between the non-disclosure and the claim, doesn't even have to happen at claim stage. 

WalknTalk34 said:
I have appealed to the Financial Ombudsman who have upheld the voidance as they have said I could have checked if she had an IVA and had I done this I would have known - I wasn't aware you could even do this let alone think to!

I just feel this is so unfair as I genuinely did not know and I have never ever been in a situation like this before - I have never even claimed on insurance.  My premiums have now doubled for Home and Car insurance and I will forever have to declare this as most insurance companies ask have you EVER had insurance declined, cancelled or voided.
Any advice anyone can give me?

Presumably this is a decision by an Adjudicator? In which case you can reject their decision and ask for it to be reviewed by an Ombudsman. 

How did you buy the policy? You ideally need to go back and double check exactly what the website says including any helper notes. Does it state you check the insolvency register even if everyone tells you they dont have an insolvency problems?

If its already been appealed and an Ombudsman has confirmed the case won't be upheld then its pretty much the end of the line unless you fancy court but few end favourably. It would be useful to know the case reference from the Ombudsman if this is the case as an anomonised version of the Ombudsman's final letter will be on the FOS website so others can see all the details. 

Aretnap

cw8825 said:

WalknTalk34 said:

Following my recently trying to claim on my house insurance the insurance company have refused to accept the claim and issued me with a voidance on the grounds that as my stepdaughter was living with me at the time the policy was taken out and had a live IVA (Individual Voluntary Arrangement) that I did not declare. 
I was not aware she had this IVA (she was asked and said not) and she has no financial commitment to me or my property (neither does my partner - its all in my name).  

I was not aware she had this IVA (she was asked and said not)

This makes the misrepresentation deliberate, there's not much room to manoeuvre.
 She has flat out lied, if she had not been asked you may have had grounds for appeal

I don't think this is correct. Assuming he didn't set the policy up as a joint policy with his step-daughter, the contract is between the OP and the insurance company. It's the OP who is responsible for disclosure, and if he was lied to by a third party to the contract (like his step-daughter), that doesn't make it deliberate non-disclosure.

It doesn't necessarily even make it careless-non disclosure. The OP would have to make the arguament that he did all that could reasonably be expected of him to ensure that the information that he provided was accurate. It surprises me that the FOS would expect him to check his step-duughter's credit history - I certainly wouldn't think to investigate my family members' credit history when buying insurance. OTOH it probably wouldn't even occur to me to ask my other half if she had an IVA, so it might come down to whether he had good reason to suspect that his step-daughter wasn't being 100% honest about her finances.

Unfortunately as DullGreyGuy says if you have a final decision from the FOS then your options at this point are fairly limited. I would lso be interested to see the anonymised version of the final decision, which should be available here.