Who is right? Me or the Insurance Company???

tommy21

I will try to be as specific as possible without making it too specific! Apologies for length. I am insured with a well-known (and often groaned about) motor insurance company that does decent rates on paper but can cause be difficult if you run into trouble. I was involved in an accident very recently that was not my fault. The other driver accepted full liability and their insurance company is going to assess my car and has offered a car rental for a number of days. So far so good. However when I rang my insurance company to inform them of the incident, they did the usual identity checks (name,address etc.) and discovered that I am on their books as living in a county area rather than a city area (the latter is where I live). They now say I owe them a further roughly €200 on top of the premium I already paid (which ironically is the amount I saved by switching from my always decent to deal with original insurance company) as a city area is more dangerous for storing the car at night and thus requires a greater premium according to them.

Obviously I would never have switched if the premium was so high (I've been with them about a month or so now). I spoke to my solicitor yesterday who said to worry about the accident first and deal with my insurance company later (the address problem came up before I even knew about rental car)

The only problem now is that I am supposed to go get my rental car tomorrow and I am required to have comprehensive insurance (only have third-party fire and theft) so normally you would pay your insurance company a fee of €51 or thereabouts for the privilege which I would then claim back later. However they now are refusing to do this upgrade unless I pay them the €200 first! I am really pissed off because I printed off the page that lists the quote etc. before I accepted it and it has just my area down at end of address (neither city or county, just the place name. e.g. Dublin not Dublin City or Co. Dublin). There was a discount for doing this online but I decided to do it by phone as I thought would be safer (pah!).

Now they did send me out one of those confirmation forms that you sign and send back and on that it does list my address as the county one, but I think it should not matter and am reluctant to fork out more. To be honest I failed to see the distinction at the time and was more worried about checking car details etc.

What do people think? Should I bite the bullet and pay or not bother with a rental car (which is only for 3-4 days apparently anyway though it would be handy for getting around) and fight my corner via solicitor (who I will try to get on to in morning but he's a busy man!). Is it worth the hassle or should I just pay out? I guess at least it would be the same as if I stayed with my original company but €200 is still €200. Many thanks for reading!:P

edit: I offerred to fax the quote page but they would not budge.

Del2005

Was the insurance cert posted you your Dublin address or country address?

If it went to your Dublin address then I'd fight my corner and not pay the €200. If it went to your country address then I'd say you have to pay, unless you can request a copy of your phone call by FOI. Otherwise it's your word against theirs. I've heard lots of bad things about this company if it's who I think and I think your fighting a loosing battle without a copy of the phone call.

Davy

tommy21 wrote: »

Now they did send me out one of those confirmation forms that you sign and send back and on that it does list my address as the county one, but I think it should not matter and am reluctant to fork out more.

They can argue this, you should have corrected it then and initialled it before you sent it back.

Thoie

Just to clarify, are you saying you live in Wallettown, Dublin 38, but that the address went down as Wallettown, Co. Dublin? Are there two different Wallettowns - one in D38 and one in Co. Dublin?

When giving your address out over the phone, do you normally say Wallettown, Dublin 38? If so, and you're confident that's what you said on the phone, ask them for a copy of their own recordings to show that it's their agents mistake, not your problem.

thesandeman

Honestly, to avoid the hassle and if it doesnt affect you in any other way I wouldnt bother. If its only for a few days I doubt you will be doing much driving anyway with the weather the way it is.

thebiglad

You solicitor is correct there are 2 points here and do not be railroaded into paying €200 just to able to hire a car in a collision which is not your fault.

So lets take the car hire first.

Following an accident you are entitled to a replacement car providing that you have a reasonable need for it. It will be reimbursed by the insurer of the responsible party.

If you had to pay your insurer €51 to upgrade cover for the hire car then that would have been recoverable as part of your personal claim anyhow.

So the hire company expects you to insure the car, is this the only option or can they supply a short term policy specifically for the hire car? If not then consider using another hire company - they will generally hire out vehicles with insurance - sure they are probably more expensive than the 'uninsured' car but what can you do? Just make sure you try to get a reasonable rate and stick with group B vehicles. Also as I said at the start of this section, ensure you can justify a reasonable need for the car too.

If you cannot afford hire, explain the situation to other insurer and ask them to either pre-fund the hire car or arrange one for you - they usually will do this in an undisputed liability claim.

As for the 2nd point, address question - an insurance policy is issued on utmost good faith which basically means that they have the right to investigate and confirm policy details at a later point but will initially not question anything you tell them.

If you were able to get a quote for a place with 2 versions 1 say D27 and the other Co.Dublin without being required to specify which it was (bearing in mind that An Post were able to get the documents to you presumably without issue) is a fault of their system and you acted in good faith.

For this reason I do not believe you have to pay them €200 - when you got a quote it would not be fair and reasonable for you to believe a saving of €200 with a company advertising themselves as competetive was caused by erroneous address.

If they pursue you further contact the Insurance Ombudsman to explain the situation and also a quick letter from your Solicitor (which he should do gratis) should make the issue go away. Then at renewal, find another company.

Hope this helps.

tommy21

Thoie wrote: »

Just to clarify, are you saying you live in Wallettown, Dublin 38, but that the address went down as Wallettown, Co. Dublin? Are there two different Wallettowns - one in D38 and one in Co. Dublin?

When giving your address out over the phone, do you normally say Wallettown, Dublin 38? If so, and you're confident that's what you said on the phone, ask them for a copy of their own recordings to show that it's their agents mistake, not your problem.

For example, I live in Wallettown, Dublin City (no postcodes where I actually am), but it went down as Wallettown, Co. Dublin.

I normally say X city on phone, I never say Co. so that why I don't get it.

tommy21

thesandeman wrote: »

Honestly, to avoid the hassle and if it doesnt affect you in any other way I wouldnt bother. If its only for a few days I doubt you will be doing much driving anyway with the weather the way it is.

Hmm true, not sure what to do to be honest. I hve to think about when I get the next car insured (i.e. transferred too) in terms of the benefits of just paying and being wiser/more attentive next time. If I were to cancel my policy now, I would lose 30% of original cost which would in fact be about the same they are asking me to pay! But then they probably wouldn't let me have the money while there is an ongoing dispute.

tommy21

Davy wrote: »

They can argue this, you should have corrected it then and initialled it before you sent it back.

That's what I'm thinking, despite it all might it all come down to my signing that piece of paper even if they made a mistake on the phone or I could get some form of transcript of call?

tommy21

Del2005 wrote: »

Was the insurance cert posted you your Dublin address or country address?

If it went to your Dublin address then I'd fight my corner and not pay the €200. If it went to your country address then I'd say you have to pay, unless you can request a copy of your phone call by FOI. Otherwise it's your word against theirs. I've heard lots of bad things about this company if it's who I think and I think your fighting a loosing battle without a copy of the phone call.

Well not sure what you mean by that, as in I don't have the letter with postmark so I can't check. I do have the insurance cert whcih has my county address on it. My argument is that the quote I orignally got said just the place I live e.g. Dublin not Co.Dublin or Dublin City.

Thoie

tommy21 wrote: »

That's what I'm thinking, despite it all might it all come down to my signing that piece of paper?

thebiglad has good advice - the car rental place should be able to provide you with insurance cover, and separating the two issues in your head will be good for your overall sanity.

Personally, given that you said Wallettown, X City, and not Wallettown, Co. X, I'd be inclined to tell them to (politely) feck off for themselves and listen to the recordings. The two locations are obviously "the same" if the postman was able to deliver your insurance disc in the first place, and if the two are interchangeable then why should you pay extra for their IT issues?

tommy21

thebiglad wrote: »

You solicitor is correct there are 2 points here and do not be railroaded into paying €200 just to able to hire a car in a collision which is not your fault.

So lets take the car hire first.

Following an accident you are entitled to a replacement car providing that you have a reasonable need for it. It will be reimbursed by the insurer of the responsible party.

If you had to pay your insurer €51 to upgrade cover for the hire car then that would have been recoverable as part of your personal claim anyhow.

So the hire company expects you to insure the car, is this the only option or can they supply a short term policy specifically for the hire car? If not then consider using another hire company - they will generally hire out vehicles with insurance - sure they are probably more expensive than the 'uninsured' car but what can you do? Just make sure you try to get a reasonable rate and stick with group B vehicles. Also as I said at the start of this section, ensure you can justify a reasonable need for the car too.

If you cannot afford hire, explain the situation to other insurer and ask them to either pre-fund the hire car or arrange one for you - they usually will do this in an undisputed liability claim.

As for the 2nd point, address question - an insurance policy is issued on utmost good faith which basically means that they have the right to investigate and confirm policy details at a later point but will initially not question anything you tell them.

If you were able to get a quote for a place with 2 versions 1 say D27 and the other Co.Dublin without being required to specify which it was (bearing in mind that An Post were able to get the documents to you presumably without issue) is a fault of their system and you acted in good faith.

For this reason I do not believe you have to pay them €200 - when you got a quote it would not be fair and reasonable for you to believe a saving of €200 with a company advertising themselves as competetive was caused by erroneous address.

If they pursue you further contact the Insurance Ombudsman to explain the situation and also a quick letter from your Solicitor (which he should do gratis) should make the issue go away. Then at renewal, find another company.

Hope this helps.

On the first matter, I'm a bit confused. The company is footing the bill for the car hire but I have to have comprehensive insurance first which will then be temporarily switched over to their insurance I think is what the rep said. The problem is that my insurance company won't let me upgrade to that unless I pay them in full first.

On the second point, I did in fact months back receive a solicitation letter from said company (before my insurance expired) asking " Are you paying more than X amount?" This was in fact more than I was paying at the time but was for my city address. Is this what you mean? They delivered two different quotes (one asked for, one not asked for) to my address using city the first time and county more recently, but both were received by me despite this?

tommy21

I was also just thinking surely if the letter got to me in the first place, I could be considered to live in Co.X? If I am considered to live in city like they say, then I should not have gotten any letter living in the county.?

edit: phew just edited the last bit lol hope nobody saw my location

thebiglad

tommy21 wrote: »

On the first matter, I'm a bit confused. The company is footing the bill for the car hire but I have to have comprehensive insurance first which will then be temporarily switched over to their insurance I think is what the rep said. The problem is that my insurance company won't let me upgrade to that unless I pay them in full first.

They are just taking the cheapest option - under law they must return you to the situation you were in had the accident not occured. You were driving a car with TPF&T - you are not obliged to upgrade your cover, they are obliged to supply you with a car which is insured in its own right, if their agent cannot then Hertz/Avis can and the insurer will have to cover the cost of that hire. Do not be pushed here, anyway you told us you have a solicitor, what the hell are they doing surely they have told the insurer they want a fully insured replacement car supplied to you.

tommy21 wrote: »

On the second point, I did in fact months back receive a solicitation letter from said company (before my insurance expired) asking " Are you paying more than X amount?" This was in fact more than I was paying at the time but was for my city address. Is this what you mean? They delivered two different quotes (one asked for, one not asked for) to my address using city the first time and county more recently, but both were received by me despite this?

The insurer is just chancing their luck here - if you as say it was a genuine quote sought by yourself and their quote system was not well set up I cannot see how you will have an issue - stand firm and get your solicitor to fire in a letter just to let them know you are not taking any crap (make sure he does not charge you!) and as I said if they keep pushing you - contact the Insurance Ombudsman Office to have the matter arbitrated - insurer will then back down.

ch750536

If the other driver has admitted liability to their own insurance company then tell your insurance company not to get involved.

Tell the other persons insurance company you want a hire car (I think you can get one for 14 days) and that they should pay for it directly, they will be fine with this.

Insurance companies will always **** you over. In my opinion you are lucky if you have an injury as this is the only way you will come out of this without losing money. In my example they disregarded that my 10 year old car had just had an NCT, disregarded that I had to pay €1500 for a direct replacement and disregarded that I had to take 2 days off work due to the accident. 2 years later the solicitor got almost what I wanted and they paid for his fees too.

With regards to your own insurance company, personally I would let the policy run till it expired, they obviously posted the policy to you....

parsi

tommy21 wrote: »

I was also just thinking surely if the letter got to me in the first place, I could be considered to live in Co.X? If I am considered to live in city like they say, then I should not have gotten any letter living in the county.?

edit: phew just edited the last bit lol hope nobody saw my location

Getting the letter doesn't really mean anything (unfortunately) - An Post can be quite dilligent in getting letters to you even if the address is incorrect. My suburb in Cork is also a townland somewhere else so very occasionally letters have gone up country and then back down to me (people have left out the "Cork" bit).

tommy21

I managed to get onto solicitor this morning. He said to pay it but to ask that it be noted that it is paid "under protest" "while I consider my position". So I was going to wait until I got to rental agency to pay over phone, but bizarrely the hire company said my insurance company need not get involved as all insurance was being covered by the other insurance company (who I am claiming against). Only in the event of an accident caused by me would my insurance company then come into play. No excess for me to pay or anything if i am not the cause of the accident. They tried to give me car for 2 days (!) but I told them the norm is until I have transport/cheque so they said they would see what they can do (pah!).

So all appears well for now. I think I will do what solicitor said anyone by registered post with a cheque (as it suits me better!) so that at least my cover continues on and let the solicitor sort the rest. Best option do people think?

pinkypinky

tommy21 wrote: »

For example, I live in Wallettown, Dublin City (no postcodes where I actually am), but it went down as Wallettown, Co. Dublin.

I normally say X city on phone, I never say Co. so that why I don't get it.

Are there parts of Dublin city not covered by either the postcode system or Co. Dublin? I had always presumed that if your area didn't have a postcode, it was Co. Dublin?

I'm not questioning the veracity of your statement - just interested from a geographical POV.

tommy21

pinkypinky wrote: »

Are there parts of Dublin city not covered by either the postcode system or Co. Dublin? I had always presumed that if your area didn't have a postcode, it was Co. Dublin?

I'm not questioning the veracity of your statement - just interested from a geographical POV.

Well I don't live in Dublin at all sorry for confusion, jut wanted to be non-specific. DIfferent part of the country completly with no postcodes!

thebiglad

tommy21 wrote: »

I managed to get onto solicitor this morning. He said to pay it but to ask that it be noted that it is paid "under protest" "while I consider my position". So I was going to wait until I got to rental agency to pay over phone, but bizarrely the hire company said my insurance company need not get involved as all insurance was being covered by the other insurance company (who I am claiming against). Only in the event of an accident caused by me would my insurance company then come into play. No excess for me to pay or anything if i am not the cause of the accident. They tried to give me car for 2 days (!) but I told them the norm is until I have transport/cheque so they said they would see what they can do (pah!).

So all appears well for now. I think I will do what solicitor said anyone by registered post with a cheque (as it suits me better!) so that at least my cover continues on and let the solicitor sort the rest. Best option do people think?

Do you really believe your €200 is coming back??

Very defeatist/lazy approach by the solicitor or maybe he knows more of the circumstances than we do;)

tommy21

thebiglad wrote: »

Do you really believe your €200 is coming back??

Very defeatist/lazy approach by the solicitor or maybe he knows more of the circumstances than we do;)

Yeah I guess I do, what else can I do? I won't have any insurance for my car when its back otherwise. I'm not sure what circumstances you are implying, you all have gotten the story as it is happening to be honest.

What I meant earlier was that the solicitor told me to send the money on the basis that I needed my company to play ball to upgrade insurance. Now that I don't need that I am still thinking it is a good idea (off my own inititative) to do so as my grace period to send money runs out in a few days and I would rather be able to keep on driving then have to spend weeks fighting it. At least this way its paid and there is a possibility of getting it back at some stage (again noting it is paid under protest). If I don't its not like I'm down thousands but just a bit of a balls to be paying for their screw-up.

Certainly a lesson for the future, I'm sure some of you can guess the company in question, I will never go with them again and will advise everyone of same.

craichoe

tommy21 wrote: »

Yeah I guess I do, what else can I do? I won't have any insurance for my car when its back otherwise. I'm not sure what circumstances you are implying, you all have gotten the story as it is happening to be honest.

What I meant earlier was that the solicitor told me to send the money on the basis that I needed my company to play ball to upgrade insurance. Now that I don't need that I am still thinking it is a good idea (off my own inititative) to do so as my grace period to send money runs out in a few days and I would rather be able to keep on driving then have to spend weeks fighting it. At least this way its paid and there is a possibility of getting it back at some stage (again noting it is paid under protest). If I don't its not like I'm down thousands but just a bit of a balls to be paying for their screw-up.

Certainly a lesson for the future, I'm sure some of you can guess the company in question, I will never go with them again and will advise everyone of same.

Why not just cancel the insurance and go with someone else then ?
You don't have a car to insure at the moment anyway.

Tell Quinn that you don't agree to the changes in the terms of the contract and would like to withdraw, then take your money back and go with someone else.

LookBehindYou

There a different issues here.
1 : accident happened, other person admitted responsibliity, ok so their insurance takes care of the bills when finalised.

2 : you got your own insurance based on the information you supplied to your insurance company, they gave you the quote based on that information.
If the information you supplied was not 100% true, the insurance could be considered null and void. The onus is on you to suppy the correct information. The insurance company will insure you based on that information supplied to them.
On the matter of the hired car, it seems that fully comp insurance is needed to protect you from any liability in the event of any accident happening while you have that hired car.
It seems reasonable for the insurance company to get paid for upgrading your policy from tpf+t to fully comp.
Or you could pay extra to the rental company to get them to insure you for that period.(on a seperate policy)

tommy21

craichoe wrote: »

Why not just cancel the insurance and go with someone else then ?
You don't have a car to insure at the moment anyway.

Tell Quinn that you don't agree to the changes in the terms of the contract and would like to withdraw, then take your money back and go with someone else.

I might look into that alright and ask them what charge I would incur by doing so.

tommy21

LookBehindYou wrote: »

There a different issues here.
1 : accident happened, other person admitted responsibliity, ok so their insurance takes care of the bills when finalised.

2 : you got your own insurance based on the information you supplied to your insurance company, they gave you the quote based on that information.
If the information you supplied was not 100% true, the insurance could be considered null and void. The onus is on you to suppy the correct information. The insurance company will insure you based on that information supplied to them.
On the matter of the hired car, it seems that fully comp insurance is needed to protect you from any liability in the event of any accident happening while you have that hired car.
It seems reasonable for the insurance company to get paid for upgrading your policy from tpf+t to fully comp.
Or you could pay extra to the rental company to get them to insure you for that period.(on a seperate policy)

Yeah, I'm beginning to think I'm screwed to be honest and will have to kust chalk it down to paying more attention! I didn't need to upgrade my insurance in the end, the guy in the rental said that I was covered under their policy. I best check again in the morning however, as from what your saying, it seems unclear if I am covered in terms of damage to the rental car if I were to cause an accident (touch wood).

Thanks for everyone's helps so far while my brain processes all this!

thesandeman

thesandeman wrote: »

Honestly, to avoid the hassle and if it doesnt affect you in any other way I wouldnt bother. If its only for a few days I doubt you will be doing much driving anyway with the weather the way it is.

Sorry, haven't read the rest of the thread yet, but this is really bad advice.

What happens if you have another accident and they say you have no insurance? you are well and truly screwed!

Also, I assume I know the company you are talking about, you may aswell be talking to a brick wall, however, I would take this to the ombudsman. Fight this, don't let those sc*mbags get away with it.

Rev. Kitchen

Next thing you do is change insurance company if its the same company im thinking of the hassle they have/will put you through isnt worth saving 200 euro.

I was with them, got a renewal for more than the previous year i rang them and asked could they do better (every insurance company will get you a better deal if you ring) the woman just barked that no thats the price she isnt checking anymore that all i could do was take some of the value off the car and it might save 50euro.

I rang the AA and got my insurance for 40% less. !!

dudara

OK, you did get the quote and purchase the policy in good faith. Definitely contact the ombudsman and see what they say.

On another point, do you live with the city boundaries of your city. If you do, then your address is XXX, otherwise it's Co. XXX.

The Irish postal service is very good at delivering letters with odd addresses. Just because you received the letters doesn't mean that the address is technically correct.

tommy21

Rev. Kitchen wrote: »

Next thing you do is change insurance company if its the same company im thinking of the hassle they have/will put you through isnt worth saving 200 euro.

I was with them, got a renewal for more than the previous year i rang them and asked could they do better (every insurance company will get you a better deal if you ring) the woman just barked that no thats the price she isnt checking anymore that all i could do was take some of the value off the car and it might save 50euro.

I rang the AA and got my insurance for 40% less. !!

But won't I lose a fortune on any refund of the rest of the premium considering policy is two months old?

tommy21

dudara wrote: »

OK, you did get the quote and purchase the policy in good faith. Definitely contact the ombudsman and see what they say.

On another point, do you live with the city boundaries of your city. If you do, then your address is XXX, otherwise it's Co. XXX.

The Irish postal service is very good at delivering letters with odd addresses. Just because you received the letters doesn't mean that the address is technically correct.

On first point, I think I wll do that. Can't do anything awhile though as I need insurance while I have the rental to cover any damage that I might end up doing (rental agency covers all other damages)

I live within the city, 5 mins from the city centre.

tommy21

Deleted User wrote: »

Sorry, haven't read the rest of the thread yet, but this is really bad advice.

What happens if you have another accident and they say you have no insurance? you are well and truly screwed!

Also, I assume I know the company you are talking about, you may aswell be talking to a brick wall, however, I would take this to the ombudsman. Fight this, don't let those sc*mbags get away with it.

Well that's true, I'll have to keep it for a few days in case god forbid had an accident in the rental. Anyone have any idea on how long it takes to resolve via ombudsman? Do I need to get my solicitor involved here also or can I make the complaint myself? I'm caught in a bind because if I don't pay the insurance within the next week I estimate they will likely suspend it meaning I can't drive (im assumming rental car wil be long gone back by then as assessor is viewing car tomorrow or possibly already today).