When my car was stolen and recovered by the police things got off to a good start insurance wise. An assessor visited the car in the impound and quickly declared the car a write off. As the car was an old run about - once the excess was taken from the cover outlined in my policy - I was told I could expect to have $700 paid into my account within a week or so. While this was far less than it would take to replace my car that was on me, in terms of not getting adequate insurance in the first place, so all good.
Later that week I received a call from an independent investigator. Apparently this was standard policy under Lumley. While this seemed a little odd I had nothing to hide and met the investigator later that afternoon. The investigator seemed happy with my statements and promptly filed a report.
A week later we had heard nothing back from Lumley and had to file an unrelated claim when someone backed into our other vehicle. I checked on the progress of the claim for the stolen vehicle and was told it should be resolved by the middle of the week.
Another week later and we had heard nothing back about either vehicle. I called again. The ball with the damaged vehicle got rolling while I was told that the stolen vehicle should be resolved by the middle of the following week.
1 month after making the initial claim and being told to expect a fast resolution Lumley had not paid out on the claim nor had anyone from Lumley attempted to contact us to explain the delay. I called again and was told that the claim was currently unresolved. The person on the phone said they would need to contact the person in charge of the claim and could call me back in 20 minutes.
After 1 month of apparent inaction 20 minutes was enough time to decide to decline the $700 claim. In addition to this I was also informed that I would now owe Lumley $300 to cover an excess related to damage that the thieves caused to another person's property.
While complaining to a supervisor did eventually see this decision reversed the damage to my trust in the company had already been done.
Important disclaimer:
The stolen vehicle was covered for 3rd party, fire and theft. The reason for the delay seemed to be a lack of conclusive evidence over whether the vehicle had been stolen or simply rolled through a neighbour's property in neutral. While this is understandable this lack of conclusive evidence should have been available to Lumley from the time that the investigator's report was submitted.
Key areas for improvement:
- Communication and accountability
Delays in processing claims are understandable, particularly when a non-standard element is involved. Ideally someone from Lumley should have contacted me with a revised deadline for the claim settlement/decision date and a reason for any changes. In addition to this when I was given timeframes by Lumley staff someone should have been accountable for meeting those deadlines.
- Claims as opportunities
Insurance companies sell trust. Claims provide an opportunity for an insurer to demonstrate their trustworthiness to individual clients. They potentially offer an opporunity to secure (or lose) a lifelong customer. In this case Lumley demonstrated a lack of trustworthiness. This then decreased confidence in the other policies we held with them (home, contents, another car). This lead to us (a young professional couple) changing insurance providers over a $700 claim.
