Why isnt this covered please? re: house insurance

Kinhh

Hi All
I have an Edwardian semi detached. To seperate the houses, is a pane of stained glass - small squares that make up a divider between the houses... if that makes sense!

My daughter had a few friends over, a kid turns up that was trouble - he started a fight with my son and then left. He then threw a beer bottle at our car, which skimmed off a hit the stained glass window. The cost of repaire is £800.

Our insurance say it's not covered. Am I right in saying that if someone smashed our window this would be covered? 

Sorry for the waffling! Thanks, Katie

user1977

No, the semis separated by stained glass doesn’t make sense. But anyway…on what basis are the insurers saying it isn’t covered? It sounds like malicious damage to me, which is a lot pretty standard risk. 

Aretnap

The industry should have explained why they did not think it was covered when you attempted to make the claim. What did they say? 

It would also be helpful if you said who the insurance was so that we can refer to their policy documents. 

At a guess...many policies exclude malicious damage if it was caused by a guest or anybody else who was lawfully in your house. So if a random passrryby the something at your window and smashed it, it would be covered, but not of someone your daughter invited into the house did it.

MyRealNameToo

Kinhh said:

Hi All
I have an Edwardian semi detached. To seperate the houses, is a pane of stained glass - small squares that make up a divider between the houses... if that makes sense!

My daughter had a few friends over, a kid turns up that was trouble - he started a fight with my son and then left. He then threw a beer bottle at our car, which skimmed off a hit the stained glass window. The cost of repaire is £800.

Our insurance say it's not covered. Am I right in saying that if someone smashed our window this would be covered? 

Sorry for the waffling! Thanks, Katie

If I read it literally you are saying the party wall is glass, so your lounges dont have a wall between you but a floor to ceiling window. I am assuming it's a divider between the open porch rather than that or the other option of it being a glass fence dividing the gardens.

Was the incident reported to the police? Guessing not.

Your insurers should tell you why it's not covered but my guess would be that they are treating it as accidental damage which may be an optional extra on your policy that you haven't selected? Or they are considering it a deliberate action of someone you've invited in. They probably will require the police to be involved to consider it under malicious damage and even then as they are a friend there may be limitations

gwynlas

Many Edwardian houses have stained glass panels as a decorative divider between porches.

I would not expect insurance company payout for malicious damage but expect the miscreant to pay.

It would be a shame to lose this feature

Mark_d

Kinhh said:

Hi All
I have an Edwardian semi detached. To seperate the houses, is a pane of stained glass - small squares that make up a divider between the houses... if that makes sense!

My daughter had a few friends over, a kid turns up that was trouble - he started a fight with my son and then left. He then threw a beer bottle at our car, which skimmed off a hit the stained glass window. The cost of repaire is £800.

Our insurance say it's not covered. Am I right in saying that if someone smashed our window this would be covered? 

Sorry for the waffling! Thanks, Katie

Your daughter's friend caused malicious damage to your property.  Do you think the insurance should pay for this, or should it be your daughter's friend who has to pay?
If you want a new TV, maybe a friend of your daughter could smash your TV?
In my view the money has to come from you or your daughters friend.  If you want the beer bottle's damage to be treated as criminal damage, the incident should be reported to the police and them the insurance would likely cover it.

Voyager2002

Was the kid who threw the beer bottle one the friends who had been invited, or perhaps someone who was angry that he had NOT been invited? Either way, what do his parents say?

If he was a guest, then this could only be insured if you have cover for accidental damage. If not, then this ought to be covered as malicious damage, but a police report would be required.

Aretnap

gwynlas said:

I would not expect insurance company payout for malicious damage but expect the miscreant to pay.

It's perfectly reasonable to expect an insurance company to pay for malicious damage - it's a standard peril which is covered by pretty much all home insurance policies. With the caveat that some (but by no means all) insurers limit cover for damage caused by guests, or if the miscreant isn't reported to the police.

If the miscreant is a rowdy teenager then I would not expect him to pay, given that rowdy teenagers tend not to have £800 lying around. I might want him to pay, but I've learned in life that what I want and what I get are often not the same thing.

If the insurance company do cover the damage, they can pursue the miscreant for the £800 themselves, if they think the effort is worthwhile.

Until the OP comes back and tells us who the insurer is, and why they say they don't think the damage is covered, there isn't really much more to say - it's all guesswork at this point.