So, we’ve been denied our insurance claim.

When we were kids, we used to take great pleasure in writing A.C.A.B on our knuckles as if we were dead hard bovver boys.

That sweeping generalisation of the local (and probably national) constabulary (A.C.A.B stands for all coppers are bastards) can now be applied to insurers, or more specifically one: Direct Line.

Related Direct Line are paying up This evening I received a phone call from UK Assistance, Direct Line’s claims advisors, the upshot of which is that we will be getting our…

So, having endured the fact some other little shysters have been in our flat and nicked several grands worth of gear, we’ve had our insurers turn down our claim. Why Loz, why?

Well, I’ll tell you, just as soon as I finish scribbling A.I.A.B on my knuckles…

The claim

Having reported our recent break in trauma to the coppers (who were definately not bastards) we went about alerting the Insurance company, which in our case is Direct Line. They said they would send a nice man round the following Friday.

Friday arrives and so does the claims advisor. We sit for an hour or so as I show him credit card reciepts, manuals, boxes and other things to prove that we actually owned the stuff that was nicked.

At the end of the conversation he tells me that it wont be a problem, and suppliers would be contacting me to replace the stolen items. Brilliant I think – what a relief.

Later in the day (around 6ish) I check my voice mail on my mobile to discover a message from the insurance claims advisor telling me that, in actual fact, we were not covered because of an endorsement on the policy.

A ‘wringing’ endorsement: ‘forced’ but not ‘violent’

This endorsement turns out to be one that states our policy is only valid if the break in is ‘forced and violent’. What does that mean then?

Thumbing through the handbook, I found no description, so I tried the Direct Line website. Still nothing. Even a Google search yielded nothing to give us any clarity.

Phoning the guy back, I got the description (he read it to me, so it exists somewhere), which basically boils down to this: if someone enters your flat, even with a key, it can be argued that it is forced as they are unauthorised, but for it to be violent there was to be visible damage to either the door or frame.

As our locks had been slipped with whatever bit of plastic they used, there was no damage to door nor frame, and as a result of the criminals being good at their jobs, a denial of our claim.

In the end then, it boils down to one word – ‘violent’. That’s what’s stopping us getting our money.

So what next?

Well clearly we are going to appeal. We are drafting a letter to send to Direct Line at the end of this week hopefully.

I also spoke to a very friendly woman on Monday about the taking ‘forced and violent entry’ endorsement off, to which she replied ‘Are you having any building work done? Otherwise I don’t understand why it’s there’. When I told her no, she said that she couldn’t understand why it was on the policy in the first place. She then put me on hold and went to talk to her boss.

When she came back she told me that they had removed it as they saw no reason for it to be there in the first place. I asked if it was a standard clause and she told me no, and reiterated that it’s usually only on properties that are having building work undertaken on them.

Also, the nice lady told me that there should have been a note detailing why the endorsement was placed on the policy, but there wasn’t one, so she couldn’t tell me why it had been put on.

Great. So the one thing that is stopping us getting our money isn’t actually supposed to be there.

Loyal or stupid?

I’ve been a loyal customer with Direct Line for about seven years now, both at my current flat, and when I used to live with Sissop.

It sounds cheesy, but being a designer I am easily swayed by such things as good solid branding, especially if you can pull of the masterstroke of sonic branding, without turning into an irritant – that’s you Intel.

As such, that’s about 1.5 grand of money paid out to them for cover, that when it came down to it, was worth nothing. Add the price of the replacement locks and we’re looking at more like 2 grand. And that’s without adding in the stuff that was half inched and the loss of a days contracting for me to stay at home to meet the claims advisor.

If anyone reads this, I would advise you to go and check your policy documents asap and make sure that you’re not going to get shafted in the same way we have been.