Who pays, installer or household insurance?

[ChrisR]

New heating system has been in a month and a pipe pops off a fitting.
Damaged ceiling and carpet, probably £500.

Plumber repairs pipe but says "consequential losses not covered".
Can he avoid liability that way?
Wouldn't the householder's insurance company be after the plumber?
Anyone with experience of this?

 

[Gas2Air]

Think it will come down to the installer either way "consequential losses not covered". Yeh right.

But the house insurer would cover expenses to repair reasonable damage. If the said plumber had liability cover then no problem?

 

[ollski]

Going to be household insurance isn't it Chris, then it's up to them to recoup monies from the original installer if it was faulty workmanship.

 

[ChrisR]

Dunno about this plumber's insurance, but my third party liability insurance excess is £500, so I wouldn't claim for that amount.

The last insurance repair work I did, the ins co didn't even inspect, though that would have come to about £350 with "discovery", repair and redecorating.

 

[JohnD]

Look at your houshold insurance policy and see if it has legal Expenses Cover. If so write to them and say you consider the plumber liable but he is denying it. they will want to handle any claim.

If not write to the plumber saying you hold him responsible for the damage and you are claiming £500 from him (be in a position to justify it with quotations from decorator and carpetlayer). Say he may wish to pass the letter to his insurers. Give it a few weeks and if he has not responded suitably say you regret that you consider it necessary to make a claim against him in the small claims court and would he like to settle please.

If you can be bothered, then proceed to small claims. Keep all your paperwork and copies of letters etc and installer's invoice for the installation. Do not part with originals.

I would strongly recommend using short, businesslike letters and keeping to the point rather than having acrimonious phone calls. Take notes of any meetings or phone calls at the time and put them in your file.

 

[Strachan]

The plumber should have public liability insurance to work in your home. If it`s like mine, the excess is £500, so he`d more than likely have to pay out of his own pocket for the damage to your property. Sounds like he`s trying to duck out of this one. Go with the advice above, he has a legal responsibilty for any damage caused by his work to your home.

 

[Softus]

JohnD's post is absolutely perfect - you should put a copy in a gilt frame and do exactly what he advocates.

 

[Alfredo]

Looking at time scales..if pipe had popped off and damage done whilst plumber was on the premises...no contest..he is liable.

If pipe pops off a month later..same, as any arbiter would decree this to be within any guarantee of workmanship period "fitness for purpose" is the popular jargon.

If it popped off after ten years...different story.

So you lodge a claim against the plumber, notify your own insurers what you are doing, and if you have legal expenses insurances, Use that to claim off the plumber. If you don't have legal expenses cover..then you instigate small claims, where you will 100% win if you follow the simple rules.

Alfredo

 

[ollski]

Surely it depends why 'the pipe jumped off the fitting'.

 

[Alfredo]

"Surely it depends why 'the pipe jumped off the fitting'."

Only if it can be clearly demonstrated that their idiot son had been using the pipes as a foothold to climb onto a window sill. Yes I've been to a house where I had to reinstall a rad twice on a stud wall (nowhere else to put it) "it just fell off" they said..until I caught idiot son monkey jumping off top of rad onto window ledge. No wonder it bloody well fell off!!

Alfredo

 

[JohnD]

JohnD's post is absolutely perfect - you should put a copy in a gilt frame and do exactly what he advocates.

(Blushes with quiet pride)

 

[ollski]

but what I mean is, if say a speedfit fitting lost its grip on the pipe and was forced off yet had been installed correctly that has nothing to do with the installer. Ok he can repair it for goodwill, but I can't see how that is not a house insurance claim for the damage and the maybe installers responsibility to repair the system defect

 

[dan21mag]

fitting pops off after a month??? my 1st thought would b it probably had a helping hand(or foot) to pop off!!

 

[Softus]

What was the fitting Chris?

 

[GrahamT]

I once had a speedfit endcap pop-off a mains cold pipe after 2 weeks. It had been put on properly but you could see from the grip marks where the cap had slowly worked it way off. My boss at the time put it down to a sudden surge in mains pressure.

Luckily it was on a building site and did v little damage. But I will now NEVER ever use a speedfit cap on anything other than a sealed system, even for one night