HELLO From New Zealand

Buffythedebtslayer

Sending Hugs Chev,

will do some reading around and see if I can find anything.

They can't expect you to pay the whole amount right? That is mental.

xx

moo2moo

Call me naive but surely in undertaking to do the work on your behalf the insurance company acknowledged a valid claim. You would expect at the very least a letter that says "its nowt to do with us love, you'd better sort it yourself" if it wasn't covered.

What a nightmare.

((hugs))

ps. I assume you've never admitted to not inspecting it but merely noted a leak between your annual inspections.

pps. Incidentally bunding isn't always a legal requirment

boredofbeingathome

Hi Chev, sorry to hear about the Carp going on with your insurance company.

I would look at a few things re their promise that you were covered and also get the ombudsman involved in it.

I am sure most phone calls are now recorded, so request a transcript of phone calls and give them the times and dates on which you have contacted them. You can get this off phone bills if you haven't kept a copy of the times.
You will also need to request copies of paperwork as well as any notes made on the system about your claim. That would be my first port of call.

Re the court date- i would request for the courts to delay this whilst you get evidence together. I am sure there is a form about that you can do this, and it will be a reasonable request given that you now live in New Zealand and the company should have contacted you directly about this.

I would get all the costs together and again transcripts of everything re the fact that you went ahead on the understanding that the work was given the go ahead by the company. This, could be the basis of your argument really.

Good luck with it and i am sure Wol will answer you directly if you pm her. She has more knowledge than any of us put together about insurance companies.

BOB X

Verbatim

Hi Chev,

I haven't been a follower of your thread but saw your post on Hypno's diary.

We've had a leak from an oil tank this year and at first were told the insurers wouldn't pay for cleaning up the contamination. I posted over on the insurance forum and had a few helpful replies to the effect that this was probably correct but that in effect they often do pay, I think because the risk of a claim from insured parties could result in a large legal claim against the insurer. I had to contact the Environmental Health and the Environment Agency because of the risk to the water supply. (In our case this was an unlikely scenario.)

Anyway I was pleased and surprised to then hear that our insurer will pay for the clear up. Hasn't happened yet so fingers crossed. Not much help to you but if there's any query I can help with pm me.

Verbatim

Actually I've remembered that they agreed to pay for the neighbour's decontamination even when they said they wouldn't pay for ours. Got the initial situation report from the clean up co' and the £45k seems a common estimate for this. :eek: I fervently hope they don't turn round and say they made a mistake about paying.

So surely your insurer should pay for your neighbours land under the public liability clauses?

chevalier

moo2moo wrote: »

Call me naive but surely in undertaking to do the work on your behalf the insurance company acknowledged a valid claim. You would expect at the very least a letter that says "its nowt to do with us love, you'd better sort it yourself" if it wasn't covered. This was what we thought, ie do the work, with THEIR contractors, with them project managment (badly), then yes you would expect them to pay up. Also what really annoyed me was that they didn't say they wouldn't pay until 4 months after the initial claim....

This was why we thought we should take them to the ombudsman...

What a nightmare.

((hugs))

ps. I assume you've never admitted to not inspecting it but merely noted a leak between your annual inspections. It was discovered by my next door neighbour (ie him finding fuel in his cellar) 3 days before we were due to do the yearly inspection.

pps. Incidentally bunding isn't always a legal requirment

Yep it is now! When you replace a tank it has to be bunded. They changed the rules in about 2005 or so. And anyway we would have had to have one because the replacement site was within 5 metres of a water course...so the environment agency could have objected to it...

chevalier

boredofbeingathome wrote: »

I would look at a few things re their promise that you were covered and also get the ombudsman involved in it. I must check with the solicitor why they thought on balance we would be found against. I can't remember now but there was a reason.

I am sure most phone calls are now recorded, so request a transcript of phone calls and give them the times and dates on which you have contacted them. You can get this off phone bills if you haven't kept a copy of the times. Good point. But what do you bet that they will be lost....
You will also need to request copies of paperwork as well as any notes made on the system about your claim. That would be my first port of call. Another good point.

Re the court date- i would request for the courts to delay this whilst you get evidence together. I am sure there is a form about that you can do this, and it will be a reasonable request given that you now live in New Zealand and the company should have contacted you directly about this. Thankfully our solicitor is able to handle this forward. She agrees that the paperwork is not in order, so the judgement will have to be set aside. That is the first thing to do. Then we will look at it from there. One thing I am not clear on is whether if she gets it set aside, whether that puts a stop to it once and for all, or whether it just means that they have restart the process again.....

I would get all the costs together and again transcripts of everything re the fact that you went ahead on the understanding that the work was given the go ahead by the company. This, could be the basis of your argument really. We have done this already. We went through their complaints procedure, and they gave their final opiniony type thingy, and as far as stupidoaxa is concerned, that is the end of their involvement. We are left to deal with the other parties insurers. PRAXA kindly informed them that they were no longer involved. sigh

Good luck with it and i am sure Wol will answer you directly if you pm her. She has more knowledge than any of us put together about insurance companies.

BOB X

I will let her get to it when she does, she has enough on her plate as it is.

moo2moo

chevalier wrote: »

Yep it is now! When you replace a tank it has to be bunded. They changed the rules in about 2005 or so. And anyway we would have had to have one because the replacement site was within 5 metres of a water course...so the environment agency could have objected to it...

But it wasn't a requirement when your tank was installed unless you had a tank installed post 2005 in which case it wasn't fit for purpose if it leaked that fast.

Its still all pants though!

chevalier

Verbatim wrote: »

So surely your insurer should pay for your neighbours land under the public liability clauses?

Well you would think so, but there is no logic in this. I mean the initial assess sent out by twaxa sent an email to the company to the effect saying that he saw no reason not to pay. But this didn't seem to be enough to either a) make that company pay, or b) make a strong enough case to take them to the ombudsman.

Thing was when this happened I was in the grips of pretty bad post natal depression. I either hadn't been diagnosed yet, or has only just been put on the medication. I can't really remember all of the ins and outs of it now. I hope my solicitors notes can be revisited about this.

I do know that it was either you went to court, or you went to the ombudsman. We has decided to wait and see and then it all went quiet for 18 months til now. So something to revisit with the solicitor perhaps?

Thanks for all of your replies guys. I appreciate your support.
chev

Wol2

Hi chev

Goodness me it's a bit of a pickle isn;t it. I'll do this in chunks over the next couple of days

COURT ORDER
OK as to the court order........this needs to be set aside on the basis that you have never received the paperwork, have been living abroad, that the claimant knew who to send the paperwork to in your absence and still got the details wrong. You will probably need to provide evidence of the previous letters notifying the claimant of how to correspond with you (ie via your solicitors). Once it;s set aside it means the whole process starts again (unfortunately)



FINANCIAL SERVICES OMBUDSMAN
Firstly my claim with the Ombudsman is still going some two years later :eek: The original adjudication was not in my favour and it has now been referred for final review to the chief ombudsman and that will take another 12 months:eek:. There was no explanation or reasoning behind the adjudication.....and it seems clear that some of the adjudicators are unaware of the full scope of the Ombudsman's jurisdiction. I was demonstrating breach of contract/negligence by the insurance company and (more particularly) their agents the loss adjusters....The Ombudsman IS able to adjudicate on that......so the adjudicators verabl conversation with me prior to making their decision that "this should be a breach of contract case handled in court" was erroneous.

You can go to court any time you want....but if you go to court the Ombudsman will cease processing your complaint. So the idea is to try the Ombudsman first and then go to court. I have now lined up a solicitor to consider whether there is merit in a no win no fee court action against the insurance company for negligence.The time limit for serving notice of court action is max 6 years after the "event ".

You should therefore contest the insurance company's final response - start with the Ombudsman (you can always withdraw and go straight to court) as you have to do this within a certain itme period of receiving it...I can;t remember the cut-off time and I think you may be fast approaching it so you need to look into this fast. The FS Ombudsman decision is NOT binding......you can still disagree and go to court.....but obviously if it takes two years to get a decision you need to keep an eye out that you don;t jeporadise your cut-off time to mount court action.


INSURERS LIABILITY
The loss adjusters work for the insurers..in view of the nature of your claim you will probably have been appointed loss adjusters to handle this on the insurers behalf.....possibly Cunningham and Lindsey or Crawfords? (those are the two biggest)..They authorise work/payments etc on behalf of the insurance company and decide if a claim is valid or not. The insurance board here on MSE is littered with threads where the loss adjusters or the insurance company have tried to wriggle out of the insurers liabilities to you the policy holder....they have a duty of care to process your claim with diligence, in a timely fashion, keep you informed and treat you fairly. They should be abiding by the Principles of the FSA under which they are regulated (see link below taken from the FSA handbook- mine were in breach of at least 5 of them!)
http://fsahandbook.info/FSA/html/tailored-GENINSR/PRIN/2/1


ACCEPTANCE OF CLAIM?
If the insurance company (via their agents the loss adjusters) have appointed their own builders to handle the work and the work has been authorised/done....they have implicitly accepted liability. They can;t then turn round and "unaccept it".....that is breach of contract.....and is treating you unfairly. You should have correspondence form them either implying/accepting the claim is valid..(I believe you mention an email saying the claim should be paid - presumably from the loss adjusters?) ...or quoting the section in the T's and C's that shows you are not covered and therefore the claim is denied. Yes, it may be that they only have a responsibility to your neighbours and you have to pay for own but that should have been detailed to you in correspondence before the work started. At what point did they back off? was it before or after work started. You mention 4 months after work started? Completely unacceptable if that is the case.....and I would argue you have been misled.

WHO PAYS FOR WHAT?
Paying for the neighbours: Under your buildings cover you should be covered for legal responsibilites - I quote from my policy booklet "your legal responsibility as owner of the buildings and land belonging to your home to pay damages and costs to others which are the result of accidental damage to physical property"

Paying for your own damage: Also under my building cover I am covered for "accidental damage for which I am legally responsible for to underground drains/pipes, cables and tanks which are used to provide services to and from my home"

Check your policy t's and c's (mine is a well known supermarket undewritten by St Andrews Insurance so yours may differ) - However it seems pretty clear cut to me that the insurance company are liable to pay to rectify the damage to your neighbours properties....and should also rectify your own damage unless they can prove you were negligent.

I'll stop now......and post again tomorrow regarding possible ways forward........and where your solicitor may/may not fit in.

Chin up HUn.....the fat lady has not yet sung
xxx