A question about : Flood Damage insurance PROBLEM
Hi, can anyone help answer my question.
We took out Building & House Insurance this Monday @ around 14:00pm with Churchill Insurance, this was done online and was setup has a Direct Debit,So no monies have even been paid to Churchill as this is only a few days since taking out insurance with them.......
So at 16:30pm {Monday] we went to stay at some friends house {because it was a Birthday Party} but when we arrived back home at around Tuesday dinner time our house had be completly FLOODED on the ground level.....so my question is can we still claim of our new insurers {Churchill} for this damage, even though we have only taken out the insurance on Monday???
I have just rung Churchill again to find out what is happening and to ask if we can have alternative accomadation has we have small children and it is dangerous foir them. and they said yes but you will have to pay for this yourself but keep your reciepts, so we can issue a payment for the amount you pay for your alternative accomadation.
They also said we are locked in there system due to the nature of the claim which will be reviewed {this is because of the time we taken out our insurance, then we claimed the next day} But we where not know we were to be flooded.
This was something we never expected and has you would have seen on the news over the last few days, we are in the South Yorkshire Region {RAVENFIELD, ROTHERHAM}
Just want to know that once the cover was taken out, it is taken from the time & date the cover was taken out from ??
Any help & advise will do.
With thanks
Jase
Best answers:
- I think Churchill be looking closely at your claim due to it being taken out on the Monday & you claiming on the Tuesday. They will probably look at if and when flood alerts were issued for your area & compare the timing to the time you applied for insurance.
- sounds very suspect to me! Be honest, were you caught without any home insurance and thought to yourself you would get in before the flood hits your neck of the woods? And going away for the night also sounds pretty handy.
Best of Luck with the claim but I can see Churchill giving you a really really hard time! - Thanks for that, I understand this but we never heard of any flood alert within our area, just the heavy rain that we saw...and we only took insurance out because of areas that where at risk of flooding {these areas are not near to us} but we took the precuation just incase.
The drains in our area i believe where the cause of our flood as they could not cope with the amount of rain.
Surely though once we took out the insurance this was from immediate effect?
Like the claims line i talked to at churchill, they said it was unfair that i am locked in this sytem of theirs due to the nature of the new insurance...and he said he could understand if i was claiming for a plasma etc but with a flood then this can be unexpected.
Surely they would have to pay out ? what do you think ? if they say no maybe i have a case against them, as this is genuine claim and me & my family could not believe the damage.
Any help m8 - Difficult one. I can see Churchill doing some research to see whether a flood alert was in place in your area at the time you took out the insurance, and maybe refusing to pay if an alert was in place. However, if there was no alert then I can't see what they can say.
The other thing I would question is whether you declared any risk factors when asked..for instance confirmed or denied any previous floods in your area as they may look at that.
After all it is only like taking out car insurance on a brand new car and crashing it the first day..I've seen stories like that in the papers before. - There were a number of flood warnings in place on Monday, but my geography is not good enough to know whether any actually apply to your area.
https://www.environment-agency.gov.uk.../Midlands.html - Just looked on the link you gave and my area's not even on there.
If there was a flood alert i would we know?
Thanks - Sounds VERY suspicious to me too. I can't understand why you didn't have insurance anyway, given that you have young children. What would you have done if the house burnt down??
You knew there was flooding within 20 miles. Flood warnings were widespread on Monday. You were concerned enough to arrange insurance.
The worst happened. I think the chances of the insurance company paying out are very slim.
PS - That link was for the Midlands, not the Northeast, so Huddersfield wouldn't have been on there. - People buy insurance at all sorts of time and I don't think Churchill have a leg to stand on. It's like buying AA cover and the next day your car goes bang.
The big factor in your favour is the internet cover which is timed and in effect evidence. No messing about with "But my proposal form was in the post". All I would say is that you should make 100% sure that there's money in your account to cover the first instalment otherwise I think they could have stronger grounds for rejection. - My insurance had run out but week after i had lost my job, so I forgot all about the insurance and as you could possibly understand, also I heard of floods in Barnsley through the post man and NOT a flood alert warning, and this is ome distance from us and we are under the Rotherham Council NOT Barnsley, so any flood alert if there was one for Barnsley would not effect us.
There was also NO flood alert/warning for the area where i am either.
Many thanks - Caboodle
I think you may be on dodgy ground if you admit you took out insurance because you heard of floods in the general area. If there had been no floods reported or none forecast and your claim hadn't been the very next day I don't think there would have been the same issue. It will look suspicious to the insurance company & it's only to be expected that they will look at the claim with a magnifying glass. - Your claim will look bloody dodgy, regardless of what you do or say.
If I was trying to get rid of the claim, I would personnally use the pre inception clause, argueing that the proximate cause of the flood began before the policy was incepted.
It will look even worse if you didnt have any other cover immediatly before it and wasnt simply a matter of changing due to price. - These are the obvious refs. to Rotherham:
https://www.environment-agency.gov.uk...Northeast.html
River Don at Rotherham 1
Status:
Received at: Flood Warning
12:15 on 25-Jun-2007 Properties on Masbrough Street, Sheffield Road, Central Road, Bridge Street, Main Street and Marsh Street, It includes the South Yorkshire Police Sub-Divisional Headquarters and the Central Railway Station
River Don at Rotherham S
Status:
Received at: Severe Flood Warning
14:02 on 25-Jun-2007 Properties on Masbrough St, Sheffield Rd, Central Rd, Bridge St, Main St, Marsh St, Erskine Rd, Effingham St, St Anns Rd, School Lane, Cross St, Don St and Stadium Way, including Retail World Shopping Centre
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