Hello

I was recently broken into ( mid june 2011) i was on holiday at the time and didnt know anything untill i walked in the door,they had forced a window to gain entry, taken lots of stuff and all my jewelry which alone came to £11000, i had either recipts/remote controles or instruction manuels for everything,My jewelry had been valued as it was a condition of my insurance that any items over a value of £1000 i had to have on my insurance as a specific item and have valued by a jewelers which i did and paid for that service and to add the items on my insurance,

Anyway i met with the loss adjuster and was able to anwer all her questions with no problem,this was 3 weeks ago and since then i have heard nothing! i rang my insurance company (morethan) to ask for an update and was told my claim was with the "claims verification department" when i took out my insurance everything i was asked i answerd correctly such as Any previous claims in the last 5 years? NO as i have not so im sure that can easily check this, how long i have lived at my adress? 6 years..again checkable.

i just want to know is it normal to go to a claims verification department and what happens next ?

any comments would be much appreciated!

It can take quite a while I'm afraid, when I had a house fire I waited nearly four months for the insurance to be settled with CIS.

It usually takes atleast a month for the Insurers to conduct their initial investigations. Once they are complete they will be in contact with you about the options for settlement. The Insurers may want to replace items if they can. Have a read of the FOS info on settlements (link here)

Is there any reason for you wanting to hurry up the process ? Did the burglars take anything which you desparetely cannot do without ? Be careful about the impression you give to them. Remember that we are in tough economic times and Insurers are increasingly looking out for fraudulent claims, employing investigators if they become suspicious.

It can take quite a while I'm afraid, when I had a house fire I waited nearly four months for the insurance to be settled with CIS.

Thanks for your responce much appreciated !

Thanks for the advice Unclebulgaria,Im about to appoint a loss assessor to bet for me as that will be more clued up and i dont want to get taken advantage of

bat i meant not bet

One thing claimants fail to realise when the insurance company's loss adjuster assesses the claim is that they are working on behalf of the insurance company not the claimant & will try every trick in the book to minimize the payout.

As I said above, I had a fire and waited months until my claim was settled & even then that wasn't until I threatened to put the claim in the hands of a solicitor which would obviously include their costs in the original claim. I was told that it was unnecessary to which I responded if that was the fact why hadn't they settled? I received an offer of settlement within ten days.

Thanks for the advice Unclebulgaria,Im about to appoint a loss assessor to bet for me as that will be more clued up and i dont want to get taken advantage of

Just be careful about the terms the loss assessor has for dealing with claims on your behalf. I believe some charge based on the work they do and others a percentage of the claim. If you google loss assessors, you will find the instittute of public loss assessors, where you can find out more.

Couldn't agree more about a loss assesor, they are fine when it comes to large losses, fires, floods and drainage, but there's little they will be able to do in this claim that you can't do yourself, plus they won't do anything to speed it up, possibily slow it down when all correspondence then has to go through them before you. All for a cut of your claim, the insurer will not be liable for these costs.

Hi and thanks for the responce people its much appreciated,I did put my claim in the hands of a loss accessor as its a fair big claim and i dont want ripping off when they make any offers, The accessor works on a no win no fee basis so didnt even have to pay anything up front which is good also the fee is 5% of my total claim so all in all i thought that was quite good given that he knows the insurance buisness far better then i do and more then likely will negotiate a better settlement then i ever could!

I will keep this updated when i hear any news