When should a policyholder know?

[vusys1]

just a query

 

Ive seen some policys that we underwrite & when there has been a claim made, if the vehicle is found to have modifications we charge an AP for these mods & backdate the charge if applicable,this must then be paid before the claim is dealt with.

 

These AP's can be 100's & sometime 1000's of ££££s.

 

My Q is, if a customer purchased the vehicle as is, how are they expected to know if the alloy wheels or stainless steel exhaust are no standard.

 

I have seen claims comments where the customer says that this is how the car was he purchased and was unaware they were non std, but still has to pay the AP

[LemonTwist]

I suppose the only way of finding out if there are any modifications would be if the policyholder were to ask the existing owner of the car before they buy it (in the case of second-hand vehicles). However, if the car has had more than one previous owner, it would probably be harder to find out.

[gyzmo]

When I used to deal with these, it was a simple matter of asking the insured if they knew of the modification.

 

If it seemed reasonable that they should know, or did know and didn't bother advising, then the AP was added. However, we (well me anyway) never used to backdate more than 1 policy year unless the insured knew damned well there were modifications and didn't disclose.