Watching the Welsh news this morning they had an item about a mini tornado which struck a village whose name escapes me. One guy being interviewed said the families cars had suffered about £15000 worth of damage between them, but the insurance company was already starting to mutter about Acts of God, which are excluded from cover.
So is it possible to actually insure your car against natural disasters, storms, floods etc, and how do you go about adding it to your policy? It seems a bit of a cop out by the insurance companies that they can get away with this sort of thing, my SiL lost out years ago when her car was in a car park and the adjacent river burst it's banks.
--
|
">Acts of God<"
Which God? Will LJK ever be a god? I declared myself as Jedi at the last census (as did many others).
"> .... adding it to your policy<" Think of it as a contract. Somewhere (Lloyds?) there is someone who will enter into a contract with you to provide recompense if you should suffer loss as a result of natural disaster.
|
>> I declared myselfas Jedi at the last census >>
Why aren't I surprised? ;-)
|
|
|
|
I'd always understood that the phrase (misnomer, IMO: it's nature, not God) was used to protect insurers from going bankrupt when such things occurred, since they were events that no-one could predict and therefore couldn't reasonably be insured against. I'm not sure that a mini-tornado falls into that category, though.
--
Stevie
Lakland 44-02 Sunburst
Yamaha YTS-23
|
When our street was struck by lightning a few months ago some cheerful souls banged on about not being covered by acts of God.
Utter tosh! Everyones claims were met promptly. The same will apply to car insurance if you are comprehensively covered.
--
I wasna fu but just had plenty.
|
|
You can insure for just about every eventuality if you're prepared to pay for the pleasure.
|
You can insure for just about every eventuality if you're prepared to pay for the pleasure.
Except nuclear risks. No insurer that I have heard of will touch that one with a bargepole.
|
Except nuclear risks. No insurer that I have heard of will touch that one with a bargepole.
First hit on google ;)
"NRI is a FSA authorised insurance intermediary that acts as the UK insurance market's underwriting agent for all matters of nuclear insurance. It operates as a limited company and has a membership consisting of over 20 leading UK market property & casualty insurers from both Lloyd's and the general market, who pool their insurance capacity for nuclear risks into NRI; it is therefore commonly known as the British nuclear insurance pool. NRI then uses this capacity both to insure the nuclear sites in the UK and reciprocally to reinsure other nuclear sites around the world in association with similar entities internationally."
|
|
|
|
According to SWMBO (Self proclaimed Wales/Welsh expert) the place is called Borth not far from Daffydd's place in Llanddewi Brefi. I don't know !
|
Manchester (and no doubt some other towns and cities) used to have Nuclear Free Zone...:-)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
What\'s for you won\'t pass you by
|
|
Er... do you mean atheists? Just wondered....
|
|
|
Except nuclear risks. No insurer that I have heard of will touch that one with a bargepole.
in reply to now-wheeels:
i am unable to provide a link to the relevant statute, but in case now-wheels is not aware, iirc, since the early days of nuclear power development, producers of nuclear materials are statutorily required to provide off-site third party liability insurance.
as the same risk need not be insured twice, this why you will find exclusion clauses on all non-life insurance policies (eg motor or home owners insurance).
the requirement is agreed by international conventions - the 1960 paris convention and the 1963 vienna convention, as amended in 1997.
|
.. i am unable to provide a link to the relevant statute
but this is near enough:
www.iaea.org/Publications/Documents/Conventions/li...l
|
I think most policies also exclude cover for damage resulting from acts of war or civil unrest.
A common occurence is trees falling onto cars during storms, would they qualify as acts of nature and prevent a claim?
|
Whenever a tornado occurs in this country it seems that the the insurance companies try to claim that it is not a natural weather feature in the UK, and therefore try on the Act of God bit.
It was exactly the same when a major tornado struck Newmarket in the 70s and caused major damage. They had to pay out though as there is good meteorolgical evidence that tornados occur regularly every year. It is just rare that they cause significant damage.
Many will recall that a big one hit Birmingham only a couple of years ago.
Tornados are storms and normal house insurance covers you against storm damage, so should be end of story, but insurers do so like to try and wriggle out of any claim if they can!!
|
General Observation:
In which case, would it not be impossible to insure any Hindu? If I'm correct (and I'm speaking as a non believer in any form of religious mumbo jumbo here) don't they have a belief that everything is pre-ordained? Therefore every event in life is an act of God! Besides which, if god is omnipresent there must surely be a crime of culpability for any untoward event. Or at least negligence. Failure to render assistance is a crime in France you know! I think the French should mount a test case!
|
|
Hasn't the phrase "Act of God" been left out nowadays ? I haven't seen him mentioned on my insurance for years. Does the Ecclesiastical Insurance company keep him on ?
|
All this brings to mind Billy Connoly's excellent "The Man Who Sued God". Any insurance company who would ask you to pay out for cover for the unexpected and then not pay out when the unexpected occurs due to a so-called Act Of God should be sued for fraud IMO. Surely the whole point of insurance is to cover for the unexpected?
To go off on a silly tangent, what if I was a member of a religion who believed insurance companies are the corporate incarnation of God? (They often seem to believe they have God-like powers...) Surely, then the insurance company would have to be directly liable for an Act of God? Or do Insurance Companies only hire assessors who have traditional monotheistic beliefs? That would have to count as religious discrimination by an employer? :)
Car link...erm, is it an Act of God if my car gets submerged in a flood or is it simply the fault of the council for allowing building on flood plains, or all of us for causing global warming (disclaimer: I know some of us deny it...)? Why drag poor old God into it, eh?
|
|
Can I recommend Richard Dawkins' excellent book "The God Delusion" for anyone having 'God' problems.
|
Why does God seem to specialise in unexpected natural disasters? I thought he was supposed to be a good bloke? Why isn't it "Acts of Satan"?
--
Phil
|
I'm an Agnostic.....................................................Thank God.
MD
|
"I'm an Agnostic"
Are you sure about that?
--
Phil
|
|
|
|
|
|
