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leased car insurance

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hebnes | 08:58 Thu 22nd Dec 2011 | Insurance
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my son has recently written of a leased car due to bad weather conditions with no other vehicle involvement.
he has a fully comp insurance policy but inadvertantly stated on the insurance document that he was the registered keeper, which he expected to be.
however the leasing company have kept their name on the vehicle document as registered keeper.
could this technical cause the claim to be rejected ???
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Yes, the insurance will throw out the claim, they will do anything to get out of paying a claim. He will probably get prosecuted for no insurance as well .
It is not a 'technical clause' a leased car is never registered to the lessee as keeper it is the property of the company that owns it. Thet are the registered keepers your son is just the 'user'
He should have stated that on the insurance proposal , that would have increased the premium as someone driving a leased car is thought to be less careful as it is not their own property.
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They will not be “welching on paying”, ansteyg. They have a legitimate reason to repudiate liability on the basis that a false (and quite relevant) declaration was made at the time of the proposal. As Eddie says, the premium may well have been considerably increased had the correct information been made known to the insurers.

“...but very little will invalidate insurance that has his name and the Reg on the certificate so he'll probably be ok there.” Not quite correct. In this case the insurance will almost certainly be invalidated, and done so retrospectively. This means that not only will the claim not be met but, should the police become involved, a charge of No Insurance could follow. From what hebnes says, it seems unlikely that there will be any police involvement, but possession of an insurance certificate with “his name and the Reg on the certificate” does not prove insurance is valid if a false declaration has been made.

Finally, hebnes, I note that you blame the incident on bad weather conditions. Bad weather conditions do not cause road traffic incidents – driving inappropriately for those conditions does.
"You do have to be very careful when filling out the forms, even apparently silly things like the wrong house number or incorrect spelling of your name will result in them voiding the policy and you getting done for not having insurance at all"

What absolute cobblers - no insurance company would ever dare repudiate liability or void a policy for such trivial reasons. If they tried such a thing (which they wouldn't), the FSA would be all over them like a cheap suit.
flip_flop you have a very 'Rosy' view of insurance companies .
An incorrectly spelled name could be mistaken for another person with a similar name, wrong house number would definately invalidate a policy as the correct address is a vital piece of information.
Both of those mistake almost certainly would invalidate a claim and the insurance regulator would uphold the invalidation.
Motor insurance demands that the driver checks carefully that all details are correct before getting behine the wheel. Any mistake can and will invalidate a claim.
Eddie - in fact, I have a very realistic and practical view of insurance having been in international and national re-insurance for 20 odd years.

The situations mentioned by 2shortplanks just simply would not happen - they are against the FSAs Insurance: Conduct of Business Sourcebook (ICOBS), which all insurers must abide by.
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It is, of course, ultimately the insured's responsibility to check that their insurance documents are correct, but in the situation you describe (if my understanding is correct) your friend gave their correct date of birth but the insurance company keyed it into the documents incorrectly.

Regardless of what their insurance company told them, this would not result in the non-payment of a claim. There is no insurance company in the UK that could rely on a mistake they made to repudiate a claim. The FSA would crucify them.

I strongly suspect your friend spoke to a 'keyboard jockey' who, more often than not, doesn't understand the product they are selling, their responsibilities under ICOBS or the legal minutiae of insurance.

Had your friend given the wrong date of birth, and the insurance company charged a lesser premium as a result, then they could argue it was misrepresentation and void the policy. However, if it could be demonstrated it was an innocent misrepresentaion, then the proportionality procedure would apply whereby a claim payment is reduced in the proportionately based on what the insurance company would have charged had they been armed with the correct information (the proportionality procedure wouldn't apply to payments that must be made to a third party).

What you have is anecdotal evidence - which of course isn't a substitute actual evidence.

It never ceases to amaze me how much insurance is misunderstood - for example the number of times I have seen on this site people wrongly advising others that the absence of an MOT and/or Tax invalidates insurance.
I must say I’m with flip_flop on this one.

For a cover to be repudiated because of mistakes made in proposals there has to be a “material difference” in the risk borne by the company based on the wrong information provided. Clearly date of birth when applying for motor insurance could make such a difference. If a mistake with an address were made it is only likely to influence cover if the difference in address would make a material difference to the risk.

The notion that insurers will wriggle out of meeting a claim for the flimsiest of reasons is unfounded. The insurance market is extremely competitive and well regulated. It is not in a company’s interest to repudiate liability when they are not entitled to do so. But in the case of hebnes’s son the wrong information may well have a significant effect on the risk borne by the insurers and may well be perfectly entitled to refuse to pay out. This is not “welching”. That term is usually associated with gambling when the loser refuses to pay the winner his just reward. Insurance companies (and their customers) do not gamble when insurance policies are issued. They take part in a carefully calculated and controlled risk exercise and for it to work both parties must tell the truth and make sure all the details are properly recorded.
I am still a bit doughtfull about the incorrect address being a 'minor detail' that would not invalidate the insurance. If for example an insurance form was filled in as 121 High Street instead of 1 High Street , the correct address could be an an area reguarded as 'high risk' rather than 'low risk' which would make a diffrence to the premium. In my home town we have Green Street and Green Road , it causes a lot of confusion, one is a busy road leading to an industrial estate the other is a very quite residential area.
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Thanks to everyone for the comments.

One extra point, was the fact that the insurance company are apparently well aware that the vehicle was leased, and in fact contacted the leasing co. direct, after the reported incident, to discuss a valuation.
If they were well aware it was a leased car surely there was no " material difference" to the risk borne by the insurance company regarding who was the registered keeper, my son or the leasing co.
It is what is on the insurance policy that counts, the insurance company may well have contacted the lease company to get a valuation. If your son has insured the car with him as the registered keeper when the keeper should have been the leasing company you will be lucky if they pay out.

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