I had a water leak in my house over a month ago now, my wife was home so the leak was identified quickly and the damaged very limited.

The main issues were a wet carpet, damaged bathroom laminate, damaged kitchen laminate and a small amount of electrical damage.

The insurance company - Sheila's Wheels - quickly instructed Cunningham Lindsey as my Claim Handlers and the visit was also scheduled quickly.

The loss adjuster that attended my property quickly measured up, discussed a few things with us, and told us he valued the claim at 1300 - but would offer us 1200 as a cash settlement, which would be 1000 pounds cash net after the deduction of the 200 excess.

I was told it would be best not to claim for the carpet as the excess on this is separate as this is content and not buildings, the rest of the claims was buildings.

On initial thoughts, this sounded reasonable enough, so we agreed that this was fair.

The claim handler from Cunningham Lindsey called me the next day to ask why I wasn't claiming for the carpet, I explained what the loss adjuster had said, and was told this was rubbish, there is only one excess to pay, and I should claim for the carpet also.

She instructed Home Flooring Solutions to come around to price up the carpet. Whilst they were there, I asked if they also did laminate and were able to give me a quote.

The looked at the floor and told me that as it went under the skirting boards and under the kitchen cupboards, this would involve building work and would come to way more than the offer that Cunningham Lindsey had made to me.

I phoned my claim handler and told her this, and she said that was fine, just get quotes for the required work. Which I did quickly from some randomly picked local companies.

The quotes, replacing like for like, came out around £3000 including all the work required to lay the flooring - I have submitted these quotes to Cunningham Lindsey and they are not happy with the quote and feel that the quotes I have received are too high.

After much discussion and many many phone calls over the past few weeks, they have upped there offer to just under £2100 including VAT which they will only pay on the production of the VAT registered VAT receipts for the work I have had done.

The flooring I have in my kitchen was purchased from B&Q, and they no longer stock this flooring. The nearest equivalent flooring that I can find does cost 18% more, which equates to £118 difference. I am willing to pay this extra, if they will pay for the rest of the claim price. However, they are refusing to increase above there offer, and will only pay out on receipt of me having paid for the work.

My wife is expecting our first child next month, we have just spent a fortune on baby stuff in the last month, we ended up buying our own carpet as we needed carpet on our stairs and couldn't wait for the insurance to agree if it was two excesses due or not (the carpet was only 200), and Christmas - so we really cant afford to fork out another 3k this month to cover this insurance claim, especially when we will only get 1800 pounds of that back.

Does anyone have any advice - the Loss Adjuster said he is unable to increase the price further as Sheila Wheels/Esure issue him with a scheduling tool with set prices in it per item, he apparently can not change those prices.

I really wish they could pay the contractors directly rather than pay me to pay them, or instruct there own company to come and sort my house out for me, but apparently that is not how Sheila Wheels work.

Please help guys!!

They really need to sort themselves out, your policy will offer to replace, repair or cash settle - the insurers get to decide.

They can't then tell you to get quotes and say they are too high - against what? a scoping guide is only a guide. If they can't agree the price they need to pull in a contractor to compare the estimate.

The VAt element is rubbish, you have not choosen to take the cash settlement, they have given it to you, on that basis they need to pay you full inc vat, not expect you to pay it and claim back later.

Make a complaint to the CEO of Esure direct, the adjusters are just being useless.

The VAT bit sounds very iffy!

What does your policy say they would do in this situation?

After reading the policy booklet again last night, there is very little in there about what happens in a buildings claim, however, there are two lines that state, in some cases they will appoint contractors to put it right, and in others, they will offer a cash settlement.

I discussed this with the loss adjusters and said I just want the contractors in to fix my property, I am not interested in any sort of cash settlement.

According to the loss adjusters Sheila Wheels (esure) do not have any contractors, they would, in very rare occasions use other insurance companies contractors, but this really was a rarity.

I emailed the loss adjuster directly, stating how un-happy I was with how this case had been handled, and also stated that unless this case was resolved in the next 24 hours, I would raise a formal complaint with there company and also seek advise from the Financial Ombudsman Service. I sent the email last last night, I got a response at just after midnight saying he would call me first thing. 9am I received a phone call offering me a full cash settlement figure of £2475, net of excess.

As this is only a few hundred short of covering my costs, I have agreed this in full and final settlement, and I will have my cheque in 7-10 days.

To achieve this figure, he ran my claim through another insurance companies loss calculation system and this is the figure it came out at... more then double Sheilas Wheels/esure... beware these cheap insurance companies that are happy to take your money, but when it comes to a time when you need them - don't want to pay out a sufficient amount to cover the damage.

I think the moral of the story too is to always question them and push for more and not to be fearful of confronting them with the prospect of a complaint.