Unsure whether to make insurance claim

Daisy_84

Unfortunately I managed to scrape my car and cause a huge dent across the two doors when turned into the carpark and was too close to the boulder. I went to a bodyworks place and they quoted around £1500 to fix my car. It's a 2014 Polo valued at 4000k. I am wondering whether to make an insurance claim instead which I guess will raise my premiums. 

Hoenir

An insurance company will always ask whether you've had any accidents. Not whether you've made any claims. Failure to disclose material facts isn't advisable. 

david29dpo

Up to you if you claim or not. Will your insurance increase by £1500?

hairtearer

Just a note to be wary of.  Any questions you ask an insurer  can be recorded as a claim even if you do not make a claim. e.g. in 2020 I thought there was leak seeping from my upstairs bathroom through the ceiling below. It was not much but we could not see where it was coming from. Not knowing how insurance worked, after exploring thoroughly, as a precaution, I called my insurer to ask what the process would be if I had a leak.  Did not take any action as it turned out there was a fault which was covered by our installer’s warranty, no significant damage so did not make any claim. It was resolved with no fuss. Nothing appeared on my policies until 2025 when I was looking for new insurance, I noticed a claim had appeared.

I investigated and found out which company had insured me at that time and asked why they had a record of a claim I had not made. It was difficult to get hold of any information about me, my data. 

Eventually I received a vague and confusing generic reply from some sort of amateur empath in training who wrote she was sorry I was unhappy, she understands I am upset and anxious.  Hmmm. Yes, this was a business letter.  She wrote; their call handler had logged the call correctly… I’m not sure which call they meant. The first enquiry or the second enquiry?  There were no references to anything.

The letter informed me an individual from a (named) company had visited and assessed.   The insurer paid them for this so my claim is recorded on CUE (Claims and Underwriting Exchange) a central database, forever I think.  

No one had visited to trace and assess but the computer says they did.  I am challenging this insurance nonsense.

The case handler wrote she appreciates I will be disappointed by this response.   It seems she, and whoever line manages her, have not worked out the difference between empathy and sympathy, or how to respond professionally in a business letter… a whole other world of hell here.

To anyone else who is being scammed by insurers, we need to set up an independent body funded by a premium charged to insurers annually, a little like ATOL and travel, to represent consumers independently to challenge sharp practice. This would work to the benefit of consumers and for those ethical and responsible insurers who are a necessary part of our lives.

I am heartily fed up the companies who think we, as individuals, will just throw up our hands and say we are powerless.  We are not. together we are not.

FOS and FCA have no teeth and are overstretched as it is, we need to do something together to stop this.

Daisy_84

hairtearer said:

Just a note to be wary of.  Any questions you ask an insurer  can be recorded as a claim even if you do not make a claim. e.g. in 2020 I thought there was leak seeping from my upstairs bathroom through the ceiling below. It was not much but we could not see where it was coming from. Not knowing how insurance worked, after exploring thoroughly, as a precaution, I called my insurer to ask what the process would be if I had a leak.  Did not take any action as it turned out there was a fault which was covered by our installer’s warranty, no significant damage so did not make any claim. It was resolved with no fuss. Nothing appeared on my policies until 2025 when I was looking for new insurance, I noticed a claim had appeared.

I investigated and found out which company had insured me at that time and asked why they had a record of a claim I had not made. It was difficult to get hold of any information about me, my data. 

Eventually I received a vague and confusing generic reply from some sort of amateur empath in training who wrote she was sorry I was unhappy, she understands I am upset and anxious.  Hmmm. Yes, this was a business letter.  She wrote; their call handler had logged the call correctly… I’m not sure which call they meant. The first enquiry or the second enquiry?  There were no references to anything.

The letter informed me an individual from a (named) company had visited and assessed.   The insurer paid them for this so my claim is recorded on CUE (Claims and Underwriting Exchange) a central database, forever I think.  

No one had visited to trace and assess but the computer says they did.  I am challenging this insurance nonsense.

The case handler wrote she appreciates I will be disappointed by this response.   It seems she, and whoever line manages her, have not worked out the difference between empathy and sympathy, or how to respond professionally in a business letter… a whole other world of hell here.

To anyone else who is being scammed by insurers, we need to set up an independent body funded by a premium charged to insurers annually, a little like ATOL and travel, to represent consumers independently to challenge sharp practice. This would work to the benefit of consumers and for those ethical and responsible insurers who are a necessary part of our lives.

I am heartily fed up the companies who think we, as individuals, will just throw up our hands and say we are powerless.  We are not. together we are not.

FOS and FCA have no teeth and are overstretched as it is, we need to do something together to stop this.

Thanks for the response and the caution. I won't contact the insurance company on that basis. 

Sorry about the experience you encountered. I'm all for setting up a body to challenge insurers. However, I have no technical expertise where legal matters are concerned. My strength would lie in website/social media platform design and research and marketing. I'm all game if you wanted to get a group together. 

DullGreyGuy

hairtearer said:
The insurer paid them for this so my claim is recorded on CUE (Claims and Underwriting Exchange) a central database, forever I think.  

6 years, not forever.

hairtearer said:
To anyone else who is being scammed by insurers, we need to set up an independent body funded by a premium charged to insurers annually, a little like ATOL and travel, to represent consumers independently to challenge sharp practice. 

The equivalent of ATOL is the FSCS, both step in in the event of the financial failure of an in scope  firm

Maybe you meant ABTA instead? In which case the ABI is the closest equivalent as a trade association like ABTA but because insurance is more heavily regulated they dont deal with complaints directly with the Financial Services and Markets Act having created the Financial Ombudsman Service to fulfil that role. 

Daisy_84 said:
Sorry about the experience you encountered. I'm all for setting up a body to challenge insurers. However, I have no technical expertise where legal matters are concerned. My strength would lie in website/social media platform design and research and marketing. I'm all game if you wanted to get a group together. 

Three already exist:

PRA - ensures insurers have financial stability and can afford to pay all the claims they are on the line to pay based on the policies they've sold, investments they are holding etc

FCA - ensures insurers are treating customers fairly and introduces regulation where it feels insurers arent acting in the right way. They also do thematic reviews of major issues hence DLG was instructed to review all total loss settlements over a period of years and the Pru to review 9 years of non-advised sales of annuities both of which were on top of notable fines. The actual cost of adjustments to settlements/policies typically pales in comparison to the cost of the review and fines so firms are heavily incentivised not to intentionally breach regulations.

FOS - is an escalation point for consumer complaints and are legally bound to find fair outcomes not just stick to the letter of the law. The decision of an ombudsman is legally binding on an insurer meaning if an insurer were to fail to follow the instruction then its a single form to convert the decision into a court order which then opens up the prospects of bailiffs/high court enforcement officers, winding up orders etc. 

Outside of maybe nuclear power there is no more heavily regulated or overseen industry.

Inevitably people dont like to admit they are the one in the wrong so when the FOS says an insurer's actions were appropriate we get people saying it's not fit for purpose or is biased etc.  In practical terms I cannot point to a single case where someone has gone to court after a FOS ruling against them and won.  There have however been several judicial reviews of FOS decisions instigated by financial services firms in which the courts determined the FOS was wrong in upholding the complaint but because of FSMA there is no mechanism to change FOS decisions so the customers still get to keep their FOS award despite the High Court saying it was wrong - the obv purpose for the FS firm is to prevent future wrong decisions on the same matter.