Insurance jargon

[Bobdude]

Good Morning Everyone,

I wonder whether any of you kind people could help me out figuring what I have to do about an email received from my house insurer please?

We have ongoing issues over rainwater seeping into our house from underground, after very heavy, prolonged rain. It happens VERY infrequently. I filed an insurance claim back in May 2016, after a particularly bad episode of flooding. We have had experts sent by our insurer, an expert from the insurance company for the Commune, and an expert sent by our legal insurer, all of whom have been unable to find a definite cause for the flooding.

Our house insurer says that until the cause is found, they cannot pay out for the damage caused by the flooding.

I have just received this email from my insurer, Insurance jargon is definitely not my strong subject (whether in French or in English)  Are they saying that when the two years from the date of the flooding is up, in May 2018, they will no longer pay for the damage? And can I do something about this by sending them a registered letter? I have no idea what I need to write in such a letter.

Many thanks for taking the time to read this, and for any input.

''Bonjour,

 

J’ai

repris ce jour votre dossier de sinistre pour lequel la cause du

sinistre dégât des eaux demeure toujours inconnue à ce jour, à ma

connaissance.

 

Je tiens à vous informer d’un point très important (voir ci-dessous).

 

Pour votre information, les sinistres matériels sont prescrits par 2 ans à compter du jour de leur survenance en

application de l’article L114-1 du Code des Assurances. L’article

L114-2 du Code des Assurances énonce que « l’interruption de la

prescription peut résulter (outre les causes ordinaires d’interruption)

de l’envoi d’une lettre recommandée avec accusé réception adressée par

l’assuré à l’assureur en ce qui concerne le règlement de l’indemnité. »

 

Cordialement.''

[idun]

Well I read it like that too only two years.

What I don't get is where on earth they think that the flooding damage has come from if they cannot actually see or work it out, because it has not just 'materialised'. Actually seeing where it comes from seems a very rum do.

I think I would be changing companies to be honest.

[JohnFB]

I read it that a lettre recommandee on the claim sent by the assured can interrupt / extend the 2 year limit. Perhaps a phone call would clarify.

JFB

[Bobdude]

The surveyor who was called by our home insurance co. did actually come back the next time we had water coming in, and has seen it flowing, but still can't pinpoint the source. We also took videos during the really bad flooding, when three of us could not keep up with sweeping the water out of the front door for 5 days! We have the commune involved, as well as owners of neighbouring properties which are on a higher level than us. Our insurer says that they cannot pay out for the damage until the source of the flooding is found and stopped, which does make sense. We can go for more than a year without having sufficient rain.

[Bobdude]

Thank you John FB, that is what I was hoping for. It's just that I am not that competent in French when it comes to insurance jargon, and I presume I will need to state why I want the two year deadline extending. I will see whether my legal assistance cover people can help with the correct wording. Thankfully, it's a different company to our home insurer!

[Chancer]

Only in France could 3 experts not know what could possibly cause flooding during heavy rainfall [:D]

 

That said, if its not a failure of a drain, someone elses new construction diverting water or preventing it from soaking away, if your property is effectively a natural spring under heavy rain conditions then they are going to drop your cover if they pay out the first time.

[Bobdude]

I know LoL!

To be fair, it's very complicated. We bought the house back in 2006, and never had this problem until 2013/14 which incidentally was when the Commune laid new rainwater drains throughout the village. At more or less the same time, EDF also dug everything up at the front of the house to lay underground wiring. Then a neighbour two houses up excavated the rainwater drains at the back of his house, because he was forever having drainage problems. Where he dug is about 15 metres away from where the rainwater comes in our house. All three of these insist that the flooding is nothing to do with them. You see the dilemma? Thank heavens I have legal insurance cover! At the moment, my veranda consists of a metre deep hole and piles of mud and rock, as they wanted to see where the underground water might be sitting. The trench has water in the bottom, about 10cms deep, which does dry out after a couple of weeks or so of dry weather, then fills up again during heavy rain. It has to be exceptionally heavy rain, and for a few days on the trot, before it starts seeping in the house.

[suein56]

Bobdude wrote : Then a neighbour two houses up excavated the rainwater drains at the back of his house, because he was forever having drainage problems. Where he dug is about 15 metres away from where the rainwater comes in our house. All three of these insist that the flooding is nothing to do with them.

It seems as though your neighbour, in solving his own drainage problem, might have passed it onto you. With drainage works at 15 metres proximity and with you having had no previous problems, it might seem that the neighbour might well be the culprit.

The other works might have had an effect too but I would think the close neighbour's actions would be the major part of your problem.

LOL I am no expert ... but that does seem to be the logical conclusion.

Sue

[Bobdude]

Yes, it's proving it that seems to be the difficulty LoL X

[woolybanana]

Slip some coloured dye into the land drains of the property above and see if water enters your property coloured?

[pip24]

Good idea. Someone once told me to use tincture of peppermint to trace water courses. No good to me though, not much sense of smell !

[idun]

Something like that sounds like a very very good idea. wooly is a clever cookie![:D] Just becareful of the colour you use, as it could be flooding your home.[Www]

[Bobdude]

Yes, good idea, but it's on our neighbours land and I can hardly see him agreeing to it unless forced. Thank goodness I have legal assistance insurance - and it's not with the same company as our home insurance! Not only that, but the quantities of rainwater necessary before we get any rainwater coming in are enormous.

[Chancer]

They build on flood plains around here with a great fall of the land to the dwelling and then the floor of the dwelling is on a level some 20-50cm beneath that, naturally when it floods after heavy rainfall the soi disant "experts" dont know where the water could be coming from [:'(]

 

What your neighbours has done may have exacerbated a potential problem into a real one but their works could well be to normes and proving that they arent and/or proving their liability is yet another thing.

 

You say a hole has been dug outside and you can see the level of the ground water, how does the height of your floor slab compare to this?

 

You are not talking about a sous sol flooding are you? Editted, my apologies, just read about you sweeping water out of the front door, does the ground slope up to the rear of your property?

[Bobdude]

We have a trench dug out about one metre deep right by the back wall of our house. After recent rain there is water in the bottom of this trench. We have deliberately left the trench open for the time being, to try to ascertain at least which direction it's filling from. Our rainwater drain at the back of the house is just the opposite side of the back door to the trench. We have videod the drain during very heavy rain, and as far as we can see the water does not back up and flows very fast into the drain, which goes right underneath the house from the back door to the drain by the front door, and flows at the same fast level through the drain at the front. The expert says the water seeping into the house could be from this drain by the back door, although the regard is only about half of the depth of the trench we have dug, and for the trench to fill it seems to us that the water would need to flow upwards. We have agreed to get a firm in to do a video of the drain. In the meantime I need to know how to reply to the home insurance company to extend the time limit of two years for the indemnity. When the really heavy flood hit us, in May 2016, we were sweeping the water out through the front door, as that was the direction it was seeping in from the wall by the back door, if you see what I mean. Our elderly neighbours tell us that our house has never flooded in the 40+ years they have lived here. In 2013 all the rainwater drains in the village were replaced with new. That was when the problem began. The land at our front boundary is communal.

[idun]

I reckon it would be a very good idea if those elderly neighbours could write a letter to that effect too, just more ammunition for you to use.