HELLO From New Zealand

chevalier

Can't get over how sad this all is, and how weepy it is making me. Has been so hard here, hearing all the stories. About 1 school where there were kids who's dads were the down the mine and who were worried, and kids whos dads were the rescuers, and who were worried about them going down too.

Such a sad outcome for a small community (Greymouth especially but new zealand only has 4m population, so seems to hit home more).

chev

beanielou

Yes Chev it is very sad news.
In fact believe it or not one of them comes from Scotland & a town near where I live.
Take care x

chevalier

beanielou wrote: »

Yes Chev it is very sad news.
In fact believe it or not one of them comes from Scotland & a town near where I live.
Take care x

Sorry to hear this. The thing is that it will rumble on here for months. first off they think it could be weeks before they can get in the mines for the recovery, and then there will be the funerals, and then the inevitable enquiry. I am pretty sure something really really bad is waiting to be found out about it all, and the fallout is going to be hell for everyone involved.
chev

chevalier

So for long term followers of this thread, you may remember in 2007 we found out that our oil tank had been leaking. It has managed to leak into the neighbouring property, including their septic tank system.

It has contaminated the ground so that all needed to be dug out and remeditated. Naive persons that we were, we put our claim in having been assured several times over the phone that we were covered, and what a terrible thing to have happened yarda yarda yarda.

Anyway we go through the winter with no heating or hot water, as progress is veeeerryy slow. In the meantime we find out that the insurance company says oh actually you aren't covered at all. You should have been inspecting it regularly and oh by the way didn't you know that oil tanks should be bunded to prevent this sort of thing?

So when we left the UK, we instructed solicitors to deal with the other sides insurers. We were going to take A*X*A to the ombudsman, but our solicitors suggested that it was very finely balanced as to whether we would win it and to therefore not do so.

The othersides insurers sent us a speculative letter saying pls could we have 'in the region of' £46000 pls. And we told our solicitors to say provide us a detailed breakdown of the claim first.

And that is how it was left. They never got back to us with the breakdown, and frankly we didn't chase. We were setting up over here, and there was so much carp going on to get my permits sorted, that I was just thankful it has all gone quite to be honest.

So today, sorry yesterday we found out from my FIL that some paperwork had been sent to Tahoe (even though the insurers knew to send all paperwork to the solicitors), about a county court judgement. Where is said


" Amongst this mail is a Milton keynes County Court "Judgement for Claiment." This states that "You have not replied to the claim form" " It is therefor ordered that you must pay the claiment £47,134.70 for debt and £2,165.00 for costs" "You must pay the claiment the total of £49,299.70 forthwith"


:eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:

Thing is our tenants are pretty good about passing on mail (you can only get a 2 year redirection with royal mail sigh), so the first question is where is the original notification of intention to proceed?

Then the paperwork is made out to my OH's first to christian names, not his christian names and surname:rotfl:.

Don't get me wrong I fully expect that we will have to pay some of this claim, mainly because twAXA refused to pay after doing the work in such a way that I am sure took longer than necessary, and after THEIR assessor said there was no reason for them not to pay out.

SIGH.So thankfully our solicitor seems to think that we can at least get this judgement can be set aside, as the forms haven't been done correctly. Of course this probably just puts off the inevitable, and WOL2 if you are reading I would appreciate your input.

I still think we should have taken PRATxa to the ombudsman and wonder now if we should anyway. I can't really remember why it was the solicitors said don't do it. Maybe because we could argue in court that we weren't liable....

So there you have it. Get my residency and think I can relax and this happens.

I guess the worst they can do is put a charge on the house. But I have a nasty feeling that that attracts and 8% interest rate - ouch. And we aren't really ready to sell yet because we were waiting to get the house prices rising again....We aren't in negative equity but still.

On the other hand, it would make it difficult to get money out of us, if we sold the house and took the money out of the country... Only problem is that the exchange rate is 2.07NZD to the UK£ at the moment, with is terrible. We would lose so much money on the exchange rate. When we came here ONLY TWO years ago the exchange rate was 2.75NZD to the £!

SIGH.

Any help views other stories would be REALLY REALLY helpful and appreciated. Even some hugs is good:(
chev

hypno06

((hugs)) are probably about all I can come up with that is productive Chev - it was axa who rejected my claim when all my luggage was nicked when I went skiing a few years ago, so I am sorry to say that I have little faith in them as a company (although we are forced to stay insured for them as they cover the kids racing).

You can certainly get things set aside so that you have chance to defend....if they have gone to the wrong name and the wrong address there is no way they can say "you should have known", but apart from that, my knowledge of such things is non-existant.

A swift kick up the backside of the solicitors involved is called for methinks.

Good luck xxx

se999

Chev have you started a thread on the housing or insurance forums or my home, they could be the best places to get some advice.

Souk08

:grouphug:for you Chev. Can't be of any practical help but XXX

urg123

(((hugs))) Chev - it must be so hard to be so far away - I'd want to be storming about getting things done. Is it worth thinking about complaining about the solicitors advice?

taxi73

just hugs from me as nothing practical to add.

beanielou

Not got a scooby doo to be honest Im afraid.