Home Insurance Claim for Kitchen, I’m so confused🙄

Kat222

Has anyone got advice for dealing with claims. We’ve been given a quote for replacement kitchen for 9k inc labour oh and flooring. My estimate is coming in about 10k. I feel like I’m doing nothing but going back and forth. It’s not clear. I asked for cost breakdown of their offer but it comes back in meters squared with no cost against each line.

It’s for my mum, she’s 89 today. I’d like her to get this kitchen done so she can see it 🫣 and not in another two years at this rate. Help anyone?

Isthisforreal99

Your post is confusing. You say you have been given a quote for £9k but 'your' estimate is £10k? Who gave the quote and who gave the estimate?

Are you saying Direct Line have offered £9k but any estimates you have are £10k?

Kat222

Apologies, yes direct line have quoted £9k but I’ve got estimates for £10k.
I keep asking for clearer information but don’t seem to be getting it. Do they delay on purpose?

Woodstok2000

Are they proposing they organise the kitchen installation, or are they going to give you £9k and leave you to it? Have they told you who their quote is from?

Kat222

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82102068#Comment_82102068

they offered to do the work but it would be months away and as mum is vulnerable I went to howdens and got a quote from them. A basic budget kitchen.
Their quote doesn’t give you labour hour estimates due to commercially sensitive rates.

Instead it supplies items covered with a meters squared calculation and no total pounds cost

Woodstok2000

What's the issue with Direct Line organising the work? Ignoring the £££, what are you unhappy with in their proposal? Or is it just their timeline to complete?

Isthisforreal99

Seeing as Howdens is trade only, curious as to how you got a price. Or did you go via a fitter who has a Howdens account?

beanielou

Howdens only work with people who have a Howdens account. So you would need to be a customer of a tradesman.

MyRealNameToo

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82102075#Comment_82102075

You need to read the policy terms on settlement, almost certainly it states that if you choose to take a cash settlement that the settlement will be based on what it would cost their preferred supplier to do the job. For over a decade now the FOS has accepted that this is a fair term when the insurer has the ability to offer a reasonable replacement themselves.

DLG is now part of Aviva so probably are doing major works on 7,000+ kitchens a year, needless to say if you are buying that many kitchens you can get decent discounts. To be honest its more surprising how close the two are to each other.

Like others it would be interesting to know how you got a quote from Howdens that are explicitly trade only? Do you have a trade account with them? Have you actually gotten a quote from a fitter whos proposing to use Howden? There are the occasional stories of howdens allowing direct sales but you get charged the full price whereas trades who put a lot of business through howdens pay less, but obviously up to them if they pass the discount on or not.

The other point to consider is if the whole kitchen was destroyed or not? Most home insurance doesnt include matching set insurance so if only half the units are damaged they insurer is only on the hook for those damaged unit and not the undamaged ones. If matching replacements cannot be found FOS at most makes them responsible for paying half the cost of the undamaged ones. This could be another point of diversion between the two quotes

Rodders53

Direct Line will likely be "giving" you their ex-VAT cost for the job if offering a "cash settlement"… VAT is paid out but reclaimed by them… so that's fair and correct.

So £9k plus £1.8k VAT = nearly £11k… You/Mum will have to find the difference if you want control of the job.

Howdens sell to Trade and (AFAIK) don't supply the traders to do the work and any prices quoted to Public are high (discounted considerably by them to the installers though)... and the better ones will be booked up for months in advance… So installers available today may not be the best choice, either.

Direct Line may / will have preferred traders to do this work in your area.

Plus any 'unforeseens' may push up the cost that Direct Line would have to suck up rather than you…

So try appealing to DL's better nature and get them to treat your old Mum as a higher priority?? Be nice!

MyRealNameToo

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82102762#Comment_82102762

Insurers can typically not recover VAT in general because they only sell VAT exempt products, some insurers do a mix of risk transfer and risk management, the later isnt VAT exempt so they can recover a proportion of their VAT

Secondly, the new kitchen is to the benefit of the policyholder not the insurer so even if they can recover 5% of the VAT on business expenses they cannot recover anything on claims where its not a service to them. Thats why if the customer is VAT registered then the insured pays the VAT element of the claim as they can then recover the VAT.

Some insurers do remove VAT from CIL settlement calculations because thats HMRC's money not the insured, the supplier or anyone else's but most will add the VAT back on if invoices are shown for the repair afterwards and that VAT was paid on them