h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Makes you laugh doesn't it (not).
I had my house burgled a few times once. For daring to claim on the thing I was paying the insurance company for I got my premiun trebled with the added bonus of being uninsurable with anyone else.
Makes you wonder about punishment systems...

I'll speak to Nogbad later, he knows someone in the trade I'll also have a word with No.1 son

I'll text you tomorrow

I had a friend who refused to get house contents insurance Orcus - he'd worked out somehow (can't remember the exact equation) that the value of what was likely to be stolen, the premiums he'd have to pay each month, and the statistical likelihood of being burgled made it cheaper to actually *be* burgled than it was to be insured.

I don't think he'd taken into account what he'd have to pay if the house burnt down though.

I've never had contents insurance... until now - the company who run the apartment complex where I live have made it compulsory for everyone to get renters insurance on all new leases from the start of this year

Actually we had three burglaries and had yet to get insurance when we moved in.

I ditched insurance soon after they trebled it but you *do* have to think about - 100 CD's £1000 roughly, new carpets? possibly several thousand. new computer (done that), new Stereo (done that)
One can easily get to about £20000 worth of potential loss if one is a house owner *very* easily. Can you cover that?

House burning down involves both contents *and* buildings. The latter is more importat but conversely a *lot* cheaper.

Actually we had three burglaries and had yet to get insurance when we got done for the first time.

I ditched insurance soon after they trebled it but you *do* have to think about - 100 CD's £1000 roughly, new carpets? possibly several thousand. new computer (done that), new Stereo (done that)
One can easily get to about £20000 worth of potential loss if one is a house owner *very* easily. Can you cover that?

House burning down involves both contents *and* buildings. The latter is more importat but conversely a *lot* cheaper.

Darn that 'post message' button

BTW For you info I think we claimed around £6000 in losses over the two burglaries we were insured for (and this was genuine loss, not overclaiming). We hadn't paid anywhere near that in premiums and still haven't I wouldn have thought. Our last burglary was in 1999. At £210 a year (as it became) this still doesn't equal it even over a *long* time.

What annoyed me was the fact that we not only had the emotional shit to deal with but got financially penalise for something totally beyond our control. I moved house to get away from it and got ordered to buy a very expensive burglar alarm sytem by the insurance company (I 'negotiated' successfully on that one though ).

Thankfully they did catch them though eventually so that helps.

Sorry to hear thta Croz. I had my car stolen a couple of weeks ago. I finally got it back - well, it's sitting in a compound waiting for an estimate - but not before some THIEVING SCUMBAG rifled through it, scratched it, and kicked in the passenger door.

Hiya, I'm new to these boards, you sound nice...don't worry, I'm married and very old (my eldest son is 25 )
Anyhew, hubby had a simular situation with his car last year, we'd only had the car a short while, stupidly we contacted the insurance company (Norwich Union) and because we were third party fire and theft (we only like old cars because of things like this, hence the el cheapo insurance...we have since changed insurance companies and upgraded to fully comp...Fully comp is the only way if you need your car)they couldn't help us, police were useless too...it happened outside one of the building sites hubby manages at, 2 cut a long story short when we went to renew the insurance recently the bleeping insurance company raised our premiums considerably and put it down as a claim...SO DON'T CALL THE INSURANCE COMPANY .

Sorry to hear about the car...I was furious for days after our incident...so you are definetly not alone...Teresa

It's a bit late. The insurance company want me to take it to their approved garage on Monday. I'm making sure they don't start work on it until they give me a quote for the damage. I've already had an independent quote for the work coming in at around £350 (which is more or less my excess on the policy), so I'm expecting the approved place to take me for a ride. If that is the case the insurance company will be getting a pleasant phonecall on Monday telling them what I think of their service and to tell them that I no longer wish them to handle the problem.

The system really sucks Croz, no matter which way you turn now your insurance premiums are going to be high next year. Good news is that when they send you a higher bill next year shop around online and you'll probably get a better deal than they are giving you at the moment...fingers crossed

What really got me with our situation was my husband saw the truck pull in before the incident and the paint on our car matched the truck, but no one saw the incident, the truck driver refused to give his details over but hubby got the plate numbers, police ran a check to see if he had any previous things but nothing came of it. Surely forensics would have been able to establish if his truck had caused the damage. The police were keen to help but seemed to have their hands tied...they did say they'd keep note of the incident so if another case like ours came up it would work against him, that is all they could do.

These people that hit and run probably are not insured or have so many points that they are close to losing their driving licence, just remember Karma...they'll get theirs...one day...and hopefully soon!

Good luck with all this hassle

Teresa