Not upheld: poor claims handling and misinformation complaint against Advantage Insurance Company Limited

Decision detail

Summary

Miss R complained about Advantage Insurance's poor handling of her car insurance claim following a third-party collision. An agent initially told her the claim would not be covered, but Advantage later confirmed coverage via email the same day. Miss R did not accept Advantage's offer and instead claimed directly with the third party insurer, whose settlement was completed within three weeks. Advantage upheld the complaint and paid £200 compensation, but Miss R disputed the adequacy of this amount. The ombudsman found that while Advantage's service was poor and it should have proactively confirmed coverage, the £200 compensation was within the appropriate range for such failings and declined to award additional compensation.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman acknowledged that Advantage's initial misinformation caused avoidable distress and that the service was poor. However, the ombudsman found that some inconvenience is reasonable when dealing with insurance claims. The ombudsman noted that Miss R's claim was settled quickly through the third party insurer and that the £200 compensation was within the range typically awarded for similar insurer failings. Therefore, no additional compensation was warranted.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website