Advice on Tenement Building Insurance Through Factors

CakeOrDeath · 31 July 2018 at 10:50PM

Hi everyone,

I live in a tenement block in Glasgow and the factors sort our building insurance which everyone in the block pays for annually. I have had a couple of problems with water getting into my flat (first instance was cracks in outer brickwork and second was from a leaky pipe in the flat above) and the factors have told me I can't claim on the building insurance because only my flat is affected. It seems a bit crazy that I pay over £400 a year and can't claim for problems that have arisen and are outwith my control.

Am I totally powerless to get the factors to sort these problems out or if I want to be covered for instances like this do I need to take out a second insurance policy that covers my flat?

Adnerb · 18 August 2018 at 10:05AM

Hi - this is from lay person's knowledge gained through various Glasgow factor-related insurance tussles...

The insurance through the factors should be covering all the commonly owned parts of the building. Anything not commonly owned needs to be insured by individual owners, like the contents of individual properties.

The definition of what is commonly owned is summarised as any elements that provide shelter or support. I would have thought that a fault with an external wall letting water in would qualify under either part of that. But a leak from the flat upstairs wouldn't. (Also, and bizarrely to my mind, I've seen/heard it stated unequivocally that there is no requirement for the flat upstairs to cover the cost, even under their insurance - it has to be by a claim on the damaged flat's insurance.)

Your factors should provide you with a copy of the insurance policy when asked. Googling around for info about the Tenement (Scotland) 2004 Act should find more about the shelter/support thing for commonly owned ('Scheme') property.

Are you aware that it seems to be standard practice for factors to charge commission of 22-25% on insurance premiums (which of course they should be trying to negotiate down for the benefit of owners) and to hide this information in the small print of their Ts&Cs?

missile · 30 August 2018 at 5:03AM

By law the factor is required to provide details of the insurance policy. There will be an excess on the policy. In my case the insurance does cover consequential damage from a leak from the flat above and all owners are jointly liable for excess.
£400 / property is very high for block insurance. It would seem you are a poor risk. Have there have been many claims in the past? It may be your factor considers the consequential damage to your property is not worth claiming(?) e.g. less than the excess and / or another claim will push your premium even higher.

Perhaps this post would be better in the insurance section?

Fnixon · 12 January 2019 at 12:53PM

Hi, You think £400 is high? I live In a tenement factored by Hacking Paterson,where every household has to pay nearly £800 per annum. The only insurance work they are happy to carry out is with their band of over-priced contractors.

missile · 14 January 2019 at 11:44AM

CakeOrDeath wrote: »

Hi everyone,

I live in a tenement block in Glasgow and the factors sort our building insurance which everyone in the block pays for annually. I have had a couple of problems with water getting into my flat (first instance was cracks in outer brickwork and second was from a leaky pipe in the flat above) and the factors have told me I can't claim on the building insurance because only my flat is affected. It seems a bit crazy that I pay over £400 a year and can't claim for problems that have arisen and are outwith my control.

Am I totally powerless to get the factors to sort these problems out or if I want to be covered for instances like this do I need to take out a second insurance policy that covers my flat?

In Scotland you can raise your complaint(s) with https://www.housingandpropertychamber.scot/

missile · 14 January 2019 at 11:45AM

Fnixon wrote: »

Hi, You think £400 is high? I live In a tenement factored by Hacking Paterson,where every household has to pay nearly £800 per annum. The only insurance work they are happy to carry out is with their band of over-priced contractors.

We pay £1200 / annum. :eek:

I find it quite irritating when a newbie posts once and does not return to respond to advice. Hopefully our comments will be of interest to others?

CakeOrDeath · 3 February 2019 at 1:21AM

Apologies for not replying much sooner. I did check back regularly after the first few weeks but I hadn't had any messages and assumed I wouldn't get any. When some did come in I thought I might have got a notification about it, I was completely unaware. Bizarrely only found my way back here when googling about the same topic.

Thanks everyone for their input and sorry again that I left everyone hanging. An update on the situation is that after much pestering the leak from the flat above is being covered by the block building insurance and should be fixed soon. Getting an agreement to have the damage fixed on my side was easy but unfortunately it has taken forever for someone to take responsibility for fixing the leaking pipework. Still struggling to get anything done about the cracks in the outer brickwork. I feel this is responsibility of the factors but they're claiming that they would only fix it if it's a communal problem (even though they are responsible for the structure of the building).

missile · 4 February 2019 at 7:16AM

Hi,
Glad you have it repaired.
Please be advised, if you want notification select "go advanced" when posting and you will have the option to be notified when a reply is received :money:

missile · 4 February 2019 at 7:20AM

You might want to check your "Deed of Conditions" and quote those to your factor. If they continue to refuse to carry out repairs, make a formal complaint and take it to https://www.housingandpropertychamber.scot/

CakeOrDeath · 14 February 2019 at 12:14AM

I think things are starting to move in the right direction so I might not have to make a formal complaint. I will have a look at the "Deed of Condition" so that I know exactly what the factors are responsible for.

Thanks again!

bctech · 30 April 2019 at 4:31PM

James Gibb factors increased ours from £74/quarter (£296 p.a.) to a whopping £305/quarter(£1220 p.a.).Per flat.
Apparently it would cost nearly £6,000,000 to rebuild our Glasgow tenement.
Oh I forgot £1,360,000 of that figure is for alternative accommodation/loss of rent.
Which works out at £170,000 per flat just for alternative accommodation.
I don't believe they would pay out anything near these figures, so why do we have to pay the premiums on such ridicules amounts?

Advice on Tenement Building Insurance Through Factors

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