Water damage insurance claim advice please

BarleyGB

Im looking for some advice about a water damage claim on Buildings and Contents insurance (I don't have accidental damage)

During heavy rain, initially through gutter overflowing, and laterly a roof leak I have considerable damage to my house (ceiling collapse, 2sq metres, roof repairs, new carpets and redecoration required etc), approx £4000.  Had I not been home and used wheelie bins & buckets, it could have been 5x that.

My insurer states this would be through Storm Peril, and to quality at least 25mm rain must have fallen in an hour.  Nearest rainfall measures are 5-6 miles away and show maximums of 6-8mm per hour (I don't think this is a fair reflection of the heavy rain in my immediate vicinity)

There was a huge amount of rain locally (many floods) but it seems they set to use arbitrary data to dispute vs the policy criteria.

Could anyone advise me how to proceed, what is the best approach to positioning my claim so its looked at most favourably, how best to offset arguments the insurer may make, wear and tear, maintenance, level of rainfall at measuring sites etc (I have an assessor visiting on Tuesday)

The roof and gutters are well maintained and in good order, the gutters are cleared annually.  Ive not claimed on house insurance before and kind of expected id be covered for unforeseen events like this.  Its like them saying even though your roof blows off its not been windy enough.

Thank you.

MyRealNameToo

BarleyGB said:

Im looking for some advice about a water damage claim on Buildings and Contents insurance (I don't have accidental damage)

During heavy rain, initially through gutter overflowing, and laterly a roof leak I have considerable damage to my house (ceiling collapse, 2sq metres, roof repairs, new carpets and redecoration required etc), approx £4000.  Had I not been home and used wheelie bins & buckets, it could have been 5x that.

My insurer states this would be through Storm Peril, and to quality at least 25mm rain must have fallen in an hour.  Nearest rainfall measures are 5-6 miles away and show maximums of 6-8mm per hour (I don't think this is a fair reflection of the heavy rain in my immediate vicinity)

There was a huge amount of rain locally (many floods) but it seems they set to use arbitrary data to dispute vs the policy criteria.

Could anyone advise me how to proceed, what is the best approach to positioning my claim so its looked at most favourably, how best to offset arguments the insurer may make, wear and tear, maintenance, level of rainfall at measuring sites etc (I have an assessor visiting on Tuesday)

The roof and gutters are well maintained and in good order, the gutters are cleared annually.  Ive not claimed on house insurance before and kind of expected id be covered for unforeseen events like this.  It's like them saying even though your roof blows off it's not been windy enough.

Mass market consumer insurance is written on an "insured perils" basis, ie for a successful claim your must link the damage back directly to one of things they cover you for like fire, flood, storm, earthquake, accidental damage etc. 

So based on what you say and given the absence of AD cover, your only likely chance is that this is a claim for storm damage. Your policy book will define what a storm is, it's common for it to be based on wind speed and/or precipitation rate; the cheaper the policy typically the higher definitions they have. 

Do you know where the weather station is that they have used as the reference? Have you asked them to check the next nearest to see what their records were? If you find that all local station record 8mm per hour then you're not likely to get anywhere. If another one is over the required rate then it's trying to explain why that more distal weather station is actually more likely to be accurate to the weather you experienced. Eg if the low one is on the far side of some mountains and the wind/rain was coming from your direction and the high one has no major obstacles then you speculate that the clouds dumped their rain on your side of the mountains and so the measuring centre was in the rain shadow of the mountain hence the lower level.  Others have argued they were much higher elevation than the measuring station so would have had higher windspeed etc. 

Whilst it is up to you to prove it is the effect of an insured peril they will also look to see if there are other factors that are explicitly excluded like maintenance issues with blocked guttering or poorly maintained roof etc. Having the paperwork to show you had them cleared a few weeks earlier certainly won't harm your argument. 

The reality is that roofs that are well maintained simply dont blow off with 2mph winds 

Ayr_Rage

Neither you or your insurer can use anything apart from the data that is available, whatever you might think about the possibility of them fudging the figures to suit.

You can argue the geographical toss as above.

Prepare for a fight.

Ms_Chocaholic

Can you use this webpage to look at data for your area.  It's currently set to Leeds/Bradford as i don't know what area you live in.  Once you have set it for your area you will see on the right hand side of the page that there are other "nearby stations" you can click on to get their data too.

https://meteostat.net/en/station/EGNM0?t=2025-11-02/2025-11-09

HTH