Would damage to house caused by a collapsed drain be covered under home insurance?

ohdarn

Hello everyone. We've recently had a structural engineer visit our property about some cracks that have appeared in some supporting walls.
His opinion is that it's possibly down to a collapsed drain at the front of the house.
As far as I understand, the drain itself is unlikely to be covered unless we could prove it had collapsed due to some accident.
However, would the damage to the house be covered?
At a guess I'd say it's probably not, but thought the collapse may be treated as the accident that subsequently caused the damage.
Thanks for any advice.

Spies

Ring your insurer and ask? 

ohdarn

They're not open at 11:30pm on a Friday night.

Cheers anyway though.

HampshireH

ohdarn said:

They're not open at 11:30pm on a Friday night.

Cheers anyway though.

Will probably be today though even if just till midday 🙂

Your policy documents should be a good starting point in the meantime

TSx

This is likely to be considered subsidence by your Insurer so you may want to consider the implications of having a subsidence claim on your record if you go ahead with this. It will probably be covered though (subject to a likely £1,000 excess)

dunstonh

TSx said:

This is likely to be considered subsidence by your Insurer so you may want to consider the implications of having a subsidence claim on your record if you go ahead with this. It will probably be covered though (subject to a likely £1,000 excess)

It could also be movement.

But I agree with your sentiment.  In our area, the rural houses are old with shallow foundations and are built on clay.  Every year they stretch and contract and have done for hundreds of years.  Eventually, the lime mortar gives, but then it was meant to be sacrificial and repaired under normal maintenance.     Nobody dreams about going to the insurer when a crack opens up internally or externally.   They just get someone in to repair it.     In drought years, pretty much every house in the area has a crack or two open up.     You just deal with it and don't involve the insurer.

In this case, the OP may want to consider speaking to a trade and ask them for a quote for the work to put right before they involve the insurer.