help - accident, but car insurance maybe invalid

[isla]

Hi,

 

I wonder if anyone can give me some advice as iam currently very worried..

 

I was involved in a car incident.. which i dont believe was my fault, but that would be hard to proove.

 

I have since looked into my insurance and realised a couple of details maybe wrong..

 

Iam insured with More than.

 

I think i put down the wrong amount of years no claims bonus when i applied for the insurance.

 

Iam concerned now that a claim has gone in from a third party they may turn around and say that my insurance is invalidated.

 

Does anyone have any experience of this and in the case they do invalidate it what do i do? do i have any recourse with the insurance company and how do i protect myself from what i think will be a inflated claim from the third party.

[Mossycat]

Providing you made a genuine mistake and it was not an attempt to defraud or mis-lead your insurers it is very unlikely they will invalidate your insurance.

 

Were you not asked to provide proof of the no-claims bonus you claimed you had when you took the policy out? Usually they give you 'x' amount of days to send this proof in, or some companies contact your previous insurer to check the claimed bonus was correct.

 

If it was a genuine mistake and they have spotted it you will in all probability be asked to pay the difference in premiums between the no claims bonus you claimed and the no claims bonus you actually had.

 

Just out of interest, what did you claim and what do you actually have. When did you take this policy out?

 

Mossy

[gyzmo]

What Nossy cat said is he general rule with things like this. Insurers should not invalidate policies or refuse claims on genuine mistakes like this - they will simply ask for the additional premiums.

 

the only problem that may occur is if you have had other accidents that have not been declared or if they would not have insured you on the correct information (some insurers for example will not insure people with less than 4 years NCD). however this is very unlikely to happen and an insurer would have difficulty in refusing to deal with the claim in these circumstances.

[pinkeclaire]

I have held car insurance for 17 years, have no claims and no endorsements on my licence. 2 months ago I added my boyfriend as a named driver. I had a crash 2 weeks ago and my insurance company have asked for both my and the named driver's licence. My boyfriend has now told me that he has no licence. I am gutted. I had no reason not to believe he didn't hold a licence. If I'd have known this I obviously would not have added him as a named driver but will my insurance company blame me for this and will my insurance be withdrawn? My car was written off and I was offered £5000 so I'm at risk of a big loss here through no fault of my own other than trusting my so called boyfriend.

[gyzmo]

The general rule was that the policyholder is responsible for all information provided, including that of other people. They could invalidate the policy due to the omission.

 

However, used to be able to do this only if it can be shown that it was unreasonable for you not to know (or rather that you did not negligently misrepresent).

 

So the question is, is it reasonable for you not to know that BF did not have a license? You could have asked to see it, but do people do that? Is it reasonable? I would say not.

 

In terms of it being you that crashed the car, I would presume that all the insurer will do is remove BF from policy and maybe keep any additional premium paid.

 

In any case, and quite away from insurance, I, imho, would question, after lying about something like that, whether BF should become ex-bf pdq.

[pinkeclaire]

The general rule was that the policyholder is responsible for all information provided, including that of other people. They could invalidate the policy due to the omission.

 

However, used to be able to do this only if it can be shown that it was unreasonable for you not to know (or rather that you did not negligently misrepresent).

 

So the question is, is it reasonable for you not to know that BF did not have a license? You could have asked to see it, but do people do that? Is it reasonable? I would say not.

 

In terms of it being you that crashed the car, I would presume that all the insurer will do is remove BF from policy and maybe keep any additional premium paid.

 

In any case, and quite away from insurance, I, imho, would question, after lying about something like that, whether BF should become ex-bf pdq.

 

Thank you for replying. I have been thinking exactly this, I felt no reason to have to ask to see his license. He's 30 years old and a Sergeant in the Army, I've been with him 2 years and he's very, well so I thought, sensible and never done anything to make me feel I needed to distrust him in any way. Apparently he took his test in 1997 and passed, which the DVLA have on their system, but the pass certificate went astray in the post and because he had no intention of having a car and was travelling around being in the Army he never chased it up so after 2 years the pass certificate became invalid, which he wasn't aware of until now. He just thought he had to apply for a duplicate licence.

 

The accident wasn't even my fault, a man in a van towing a large fast food trailer lost it's wheel on the motorway and I hit it head on but because the man has full MOT it is classed purely as an unforeseeable accident as he wasn't to know his wheel was defective, apparently.

 

Now I have this worry about the insurance.

 

Don't worry, if he does stay being my boyfriend (we haven't spoken in days) I will not have him back on my insurance and will be more careful in the future in situations such as this and not be so trusting!

 

Thanks again for your reply, nice to hear a positive view.

[advice]

it might not be your fault but if you dont disclose criminal conivtions your insurance is worthless but a catch 22 problem if you tell them about the convictions you wont get cover unless you find a specialist broker who caters for ex offenders

[gyzmo]

The insurance is not necessarily "worthless" due to non-disclosure. It depends whether it was innocent disclosure or not and relevant to the policy.

[pinkeclaire]

It was definately innocent, I wouldn't dare give any false information to anyoneon purpose. I only put him on my insurance for emergency purposes, he is away most of the time being in the Army but I thought it would be a wise thing to put him on just in case he ever needed to use the car in an emergency. I was trying to do things right, I didn't want him to ever have to use the car uninsured. I feel like a criminal now for being trusting. I just hope my insurers understand. Not heard from them yet. They should have received all the documents in the post this morning. No idea how long a claim takes as I've never made one!!

[gyzmo]

I wouldn't worry. The most that should happen is to keep the additional premium and remove BF from policy.

 

The nondisclosure does not even affect the claim or their payment so do not worry about that.

[patdavies]

it might not be your fault but if you dont disclose criminal conivtions your insurance is worthless but a catch 22 problem if you tell them about the convictions you wont get cover unless you find a specialist broker who caters for ex offenders

 

 

Not forgetting, of course, the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act. Insurance is not an exempt activity under the Act, so convictions over 5 years old (generally) do not need to be disclosed.