To think this is just stealing.

[Parrotmore]

A couple I know have be redecorating their front room and have been looking at new furniture so the husband purposely knocked paint off the top of his ladder splashing over the sofa, the tv, carpet and some oft he units.
They have claimed and been given Harvey's vouchers to use to replace it all.
Plus the company replaced the tv but as theirs wasn't like for like (old model) they got the newer model.
This is just fraud right??
I'm really disgusted by this and now my opinion of them is that they are just liars.
They think everybody does it and I'm sensitive but I don't think I am.
So Ainu to feel this way. I now wouldn't trust them at all.

[Parrotmore]

Apparently it's all done and dusted now, they've got the money so I don't think I can retrospectively do it, who would I report it too anyway??

[Parrotmore]

By money I meant the vouchers/ new tv

[unlucky83]

I had a flat mate years ago who genuinely had her expensive camera stolen on holiday and was furious that her insurance company refused to pay out ...
Turned out that she had claimed for something on her holiday insurance every time she had been away, falsely reporting thefts, even a fake mugging to the police so she had crime numbers...usually the day before she was due to fly back, to 'get her money back'. I don't know how they got out of paying for the real theft but I was secretly pleased! She also said 'well everyone does it, don't they...'
Six months later I got my pocket picket/purse stolen in the US - the day before I was due to fly back and I had just been 'cashing' my travellers cheques as it was more expensive to exchange those than currency. (I think someone had been watching me, I used them to pay for small amounts in several shops) I did report, had to cancel my cards etc and I could only have claimed some of the cash I had lost back anyway (there was a limit) - but actually I was too embarrassed to, cos I thought they'd think I was scamming ...

[Buckinbronco]

Yesterday 20:25 Pipbin

It's part and parcel of their business and they accept that. Don't get too worked up

Just like large shops include the cost of shoplifting into their businesses and pricing. Doesn't make shoplifting ok though does it.


It doesn't. It makes it... Completely unrelated, lol

[RJnomore1]

Oh god I'm sure our insurance company must think we are at it - we've had four claims for flooding, one was dd leaving a tap running but the rest were dodgy plumbing under the kitchen sink coming loose - they didn't sort it properly first two times and it kept happening. But it totally genuine - people like this annoy the life out of me. Before the last few years our only claim was on contents when someone broke into the shed and took dh bike and that was 16 years ago.

[hefzi]

I know the thread's moved on a bit in general- but if OP or anyone else whose posted here wants to report insurance fraudsters, follow this link:
www.insurancefraudbureau.org/cheatline/

[Parrotmore]

Sadly this couple wouldn't give a shit and would likely get out of it, they are the same people who take each other's speeding points and know every trick in the book to get away with this sort of shit!

[Mumoftwoyoungkids]

Garlic But as you said yourself General Insurers are trying to get Claims + Expenses = Premiums with the investment of the cash being the profit.

So if everyone makes false claims then premiums will go up.

For those who are implying that shareholders are evil fat cats whilst the policyholders are poor little innocents - a reasonable proportion of shareholders in insurance companies are pension schemes - if they don't receive dividends expected then 86 year old Doris (whose late husband Jim worked and paid into his pension scheme for 45 years) may not get her pension.

Finally - for those wondering why having an accident that really wasn't your fault still puts your premiums up, it is because of the information that the insurance company is getting about you. For example - my Dh is a really really excellent driver. He is an ex-international at a ball sport and has the speed of reaction that goes with it. There was one occasion when we were driving along quite happily and another car did something ridiculously stupid. That would cause an accident. A very very bad accident. Absolutely not our fault but we would still have been badly injured or killed. Except we weren't because freaky Dh was driving with his freaky reactions and he managed to avoid the accident. If I had been driving, if anyone else had been driving, we would have crashed. So when you have an accident that is not your fault it tells the insurance company that you are not freaky Dh with his freaky reactions and they adjust accordingly.

In the same way, if your car is broken into your premiums go up because it tells the insurance company that you sometimes park your car in an area where people break into cars.

Interestingly , since December 2012 the opening that insurance companies can no longer use is sex. Hence the decline of the rather brilliant Sheila's Wheels. (Of the "Women make the safer drivers, you can save a bunch of fivers" fame. I loved them! So cheesy!)

[LurkingHusband]

Funnily enough, this popped into my inbox just now ...

youtalk-insurance.com/broker-news/insurance-fraudster-jailed-after-lying-about-mother%E2%80%99s-stroke

A 38-year-old woman who falsely claimed her mother suffered a stroke in order to pocket £30,000 in income protection payments has been jailed for 16 months.

(contd)

[GarlicShake]

Mum & others - When investment returns (and interest rates) are high, insurance premiums go down. This doesn't indicate a fall in claims. It's so the insurers can pull in more premiums faster, investing them on rapidly-moving markets.

And the inverse. If premiums are high and/or claims harder to make, it might mean there's been an unexpected spike in claims. But insurers are in the business of risk assessment; it would have to be something extraordinary to have escaped their notice. Much more likely their finance is under-performing and they're trying to milk the policies.

Other things come into play, too, obviously, such as competition for market share and tweaking the rates for specialist insurance.

What I've been trying to do is break the perception of insurance as a communal piggy-bank. Hardly any business is a simple money in, money out equation. Where the business involves vast quantities of customers making regular payments to an organisation, it's a fair bet that organisation's main business is working the money markets.

I'm not saying it's a bad thing ... actually, I would if we look even further up the chain to the market-makers, but that isn't my point here! It's just the way things work under present-day capitalism. Jim & Jane faking domestic accidents has no material effect on your premiums.

Millions of 'em doing it, however, would - because the company has to keep enough money in its coffers to play with. Insurance would become a non-viable business. But a few dozen chancers? No. I wouldn't fake it - for one thing, it's criminal fraud. And if Jim & Jane do it too often, they'll find they can't get reasonably-priced insurance.

I have known a very few people whose strategy was to make sure the value of their claims, over time, equalled the premiums they'd paid. While they were committing fraud, I don't see them as terribly immoral. The insurers had the use of their money all that time, and had no doubt profited.

[GarlicShake]

What a horrible thing to do, Lurking!

[Roussette]

I get what you're saying Garlic but your post intimates defrauders are small fry (a few dozen chancers you say) yet the .gov.uk website says that insurance fraud counts for £3 billion - hardly just a few chancers!

As for your last para - we are poles apart. totally and utterly immoral to make sure your claims equal your premiums. It's just stealing to do that and as bad as the OP and if I took that way of doing it I'm owed thousands and thousands because I am honest and use insurance like it should be used. Call me a mug maybe... but if we all took your stance I am not sure where the insurance industry would stand TBH.

[Pipbin]

It is the same as shoplifting.
You are getting something that you are not entitled to have.

When you are shoplifting then you are taking something without paying for it, you haven't paid therefore you are not entitled to it.

When you make a fraudulent insurance claim to are taking money that you are entitled to because you haven't actually lost/broken/received the injury that you have claimed you have.

In both cases the companies know that this happens and account for it.

[GarlicShake]

I realised my last paragraph made it sound like I condone fraud. I really don't. I think I meant something like "I understand their logic, even though I don't agree with it." Should really have left that whole part out

[GarlicShake]

if we all took your stance

• It's not my stance. Hope I've clarified.
  

I am not sure where the insurance industry would stand

• Very interesting question: how would/will everyday business work once we've broken the hold of high finance? Not really a subject for this thread, though

[Roussette]

Not really a subject for this thread, though Agreed!

A whole other thread!

[LurkingHusband]

I am not sure where the insurance industry would stand

Insurance is already in flux. Private motor insurance is starting to look like an endangered species. Meanwhile, now it has a name, and with prices of some technology falling year on year (think TVs), self-insurance has become a thing.

[clam]

Wait, hang on... so, if you've been on a Speed Awareness course, you have to declare it???? I was told quite specifically on the course itself that you don't!

[madamginger]

A couple of years ago someone reversed into me on a car park, it was the other drivers fault but my premium went up which I was annoyed about but not as much as Halifax insurance selling my details on to what feels like hundreds of accident management companies
2 years later I am still getting calls, it was a very slow moving accident at less than 10mph, definitely no injuries on either side.

[MrsHathaway]

clam - I think only a couple of insurance companies are asking. Off the top of my head, Admiral.

Why the fuck would anyone take a course and probably slow down but have their premiums go up by maybe £100 a year, rather than take the points and fine and not lose a day's pay for the course?! No wonder the police (etc) want to keep the courses off the insurance companies' records.

[Woodhill]

Really dishonest, I've known friends do this but I would not.

[unlucky83]

I have a friend who was accused of insurance fraud for not declaring an accident. They have quite a posh car (older model but new parts are expensive) , it was parked on a carpark and she came back to find someone had smashed the glass in the wing mirror, no note or anything. Friend phoned her insurance company to see if it was worth claiming through them or not - how much, if anything, it would put her premium up etc and decided it wasn't (just stuck one of those new mirrors over the top of the broken glass).
That was her 'failure to disclose an accident' on renewing with a different company, they let her off the fraud claim but tried to bump her premium instead...she cancelled the policy and went with her previous insurers instead.
Similar happened to my mum - she has never had an accident, has one previous claim from maybe 30yrs ago - her original mini was written off when someone had a heart attack at the wheel and ploughed into a bunch of parked cars. The most recent one she was in the car, parked up when someone bumped into her. The other drivers insurance company took full responsibility, arranged the repairs etc -on renewable her premium shot up but she went to another company who said basically it was no fault so they didn't care...

[JaceLancs]

I don't agree with fraud at all but I do think that it makes insurance companies even more cautious and that we all pay for that
I have been put off claiming at all, when a few years ago made a perfectly legitimate claim for a fairly valuable piece of photographic equipment I dropped whilst on holiday
They paid out minus the excess in form of a voucher for an appropriate shop, as I had full accidental damage cover, however the following year declined to renew my cover, now I always have to declare that as well as the claim and have paid very higher premiums since for all types of insurance

[Isthiscorrect]

Hands up who has had an insurance policy go down, as per garlicshake earlier mentioned?