Highway Insurance have finally settled my claim

[ro284]

Sorry about your further hassles Mark, i think it would be nice to take them on and win via the Insurance Ombudsman, after all it is Breach of Contract as i see it! What it better than Third Party, FIRE! and theft? Fully comp!
but i can understand you just wanting to just go and get your car back,(perhaps this is what they hope you will do!)
Good luck Bob

[kbareham]

This made me so angry - it seems to me that so many of these companies will try it on and hope that you back down. I called my dad who spend 41 years working in the city on motor policy for a major insurer. His suggestion was:

1) Take legal advice. Confirm whether there are any specific exclusions in the policy. Most policies exclude mechanical failure, but you need to check whether there are any specific exclusions for consequential damage. The expectation is that they could reasonably refuse to pay for the replacement of a faulty hose, but would be liable for the fire damage that resulted.

2) Write to the general manager stating why you feel the claim is valid.

3) If the claim is still refused, take it to the insurance onbudsman.

4) Check whether you have cover for legal costs. You may be able to use this to cover your case against them!

Hope this helps

Keith

[Bobbit]

just read this thread. WTF?? I know insurance companies are robbing barstewards but this is taking the p1ss. I would agree with the others advising legal action, but i know what it\'s like when you need your car back. I had hastle with my first car, some little turd set it on fire. the insurance company refused to pay out at first then offered me £450 for it. Argued the toss and they eventually agreed to up it to £650!! I told them that when it was towed away it had personal items in i wanted back but they \'lost\' the car. I asked about money for personal items and they said they had already paid out and that included personal items. I argued that i only agreed to the £650 if i could get my personal items back but they had no records of the conversation. How did the know how much they offered me them?? Got sod all from them and after a year i lost my cool, swore over the phone ( i work in a similar environment and try not to loose it as i know what it\'s like) and called it a day. I\'ve regretted it for the last 7 yrs as i knew i was in the right, so my advise is to fight this, cause if you dont you may regret it. Right rant over, i\'m off for a big jack and coke! Good luck if you do fight it fella

[BlitzBoy]

Well here is the letter word for word, I have not left any words or sentances out

So take a seat and try and not to lose your temper as you read as I did!!

“We write with reference to the above motor insurance claim and regret to advise you that as you have failed to comply with the policy terms and conditions we will not be paying for the damage to the vehicle.

Under the claims handling section of your policy it states:

Fraudulent, False and exaggerated Claims

Fraudulent, false and exaggerated claims increase premiums for our policyholders. We will not pay a claim which is in any part fraudulent, false or exaggerated, or if you, or anyone acting for you, or where we have been given any documents which are false or stolen. We will also seek to recover any costs that we have incurred. In such circumstances, we will cancel your policy and we will not return any premium.

During your interview (telephone) with us 3rd July 2006 you told us that you were on the way to car show in Stratford on-Avon where you were to ’show’ your car and that you met other people at a lay by off the M25 when your vehicle caught fire.

We are now in full receipt of the full fire report which states that a fuel pipe came lose while you were driving and that it was spilling fuel as you were travelled and that the fuel ignited as you indicated to pull in to the lay by.

At this point we can confirm that problems caused by mechanical failure such as this are not covered by the terms of the policy and we would therefore be unable to cover you for this event.

That Aside, during your interview with us you were asked if the vehicle was fitted with a Nitrous kit or any other fuel boosting equivalent. You replied that it was not. We have today spoken with a trained vehicle engineer who has now completed a full and thorough inspection of your vehicle. He states that there are fuel pipes in the vehicle in areas where fuel pipes would not be located unless a fuel boosting mechanism were fitted to the vehicle. He has located a fuel pipe T connector that’s is usually used to take and mix another substance with the main fuel supply and is sending this to us as evidence. Another breach of the Policy terms, as we will not provide any cover for a vehicle that is fitted with such a device.

(Now this were I told a white lie that I was not going drive down the strip, but at the end of the day its nothing to do with a claim or fire accident, so him making this statement is pointless other then trying to make me feel like a dirty low down criminal that deserves to hung)

In addition to the above you were asked if you had ever raced this vehicle and if you were planning to race on the day in question. You replied, “no, I\'m not good enough” (I mistook his question as meaning do I race the car round a racing circuit which I never have done)
This is clearly a falsehood as we have written evidence, which confirms you have attended and raced in previous events and that you were on the list to race on the day of the event. Evidence from various websites shows that you have the alias of Blitzboy and we have printed some interesting threads as further evidence of your deceit!
The letter then goes on that I need to collect my car

[Donato]

As far as i can see they are not paying because of the t piece, i would like to think that they have to PROVE that you have used nitrous for them to not pay, as you havent and they cant they have to pay. I would persue this mate, if nothing else just to wipe the smile of there faces at yaking your premium and getting away with not paying out...

[nikp]

No, i disagree Donato: they are not paying, essentially, because it is a mechanical failure, which are not covered by insurances. However, they are stating other \'facts\' (Ok, one is true - the strip - but the other is obviously crazy interpretation of something an \'engineer\' found) as more grounds to not pay out.

[M@r]{]

****ing w**kers.  What a load of bull.  And what a cowboy outfit.  This machanical failure crap is unbelievble!!  So the only claims they pay out for is where human error is the sole cause?  What if your brakes fail, or you get a blow out?  And then hurt people?  Are they not covering this?  Are they allowed to do this by law?   Isnt that just like not begin insured at all?  

I can see why you may not want to drag this out as you will probably get just as much from the parts you can salvage as what they will offer you for the car anyway.  But that is not the point.

These ***kers need puting out of business, need to spread the word

[BlitzBoy]

Well im going to collect my car, salvage my parts and continue to claim the value of the car less salvage parts cost

[dre]

I can\'t believe what i\'m reading. Surely a T piece is not conclusive evidence that u were running nitrous??? :xconfused

No Nitrous bottle, nozzle\'s, management etc... What do they think you just plug it into the T piece on the fuel line and away you go?!?

Can\'t you get an enginer\'s report from RE:WORX saying they done all the work on the car (fuel system) backed with invoices. Or maybe a dyno chart where they tuned it on pump gas!!

I wouldn\'t let it lie mate, you got nothing to loose.

Goodluck with it all.

[BlitzBoy]

Yes Mark, tell the Lotus forum about this story Im sure some of them are insured with them, people who own Lotus\' always drive to circuit meets and do a few laps, seems the insurance company is car club unfriendly!

[Adriansturgess]

As far as the nitrous question goes, I guess it is possible that a previous owner had it set up for nitrous and some of the parts have been left in place...But that shouldn\'t affect your insurance claim, obviously. I think they are throwing a number of different reasons into the melting pot to make it harder for you to fight the case. You have now got to :

a) Acertain whether they are within their rights to fail to pay out for mechanical failure

b) Somehow prove that you didn\'t run nitrous

c) Get them to accept that you \'misunderstood\' the question about racing and that in any case that has no bearing on the claim.

It might even be worth having a little chat with a solicitor, you can sometimes get a free initial consultation where they could probably tell you whether they thought it worth pursuing or not.

[OLSKOOLROTAR]

Just read the so called report from these jokers:mad:

Blitz you gotta fight these pricks, you can get an independant engineer to check your car over as a counter to there so called specialist. Any proper engineer would know to use a boosting agent ie NOS requires more than a T piece. As to the racing bit, its irrelevant you were on a public highway and anyone could\'ve used your log in and typed all sorts of things :yes couldnt they!

Dont back off from them mate, thats what they want

See you on sunday :Thumbs-up

Jase

[BlitzBoy]

cheers for the advice Guys im going to "Fight the power!"

[Ada7]

Sorry to here all of this mate. Makes me so mad :mad:
It doesnt look good at all if an insurance company wont cover us for mechanical failure. Like you\'ve already said, is it really worth paying the extra for a fully comp plan???

I hope you keep fighting this mate. I\'m sure they reliy on the fact most people will give up and except what they say, thinking its to much like hard to work to fight on. If this was America you\'d be sueing them by now for the money and stress!!

Adam

[Ada7]

maybe I need to go and have a drink with him as Blitzboys solicitor,I will take A with me as he can resucitate him during the interrogation of why he is such a dick face.......:mad:

Might have a sudden laspe in memeroy about then though :rollin :p

Adam