Upheld: irresponsible claims handling, wrongful claim repudiation, evidential prejudice complaint against INTACT INSURANCE UK LIMITED
Financial Ombudsman decision DRN-6372654 of 2026-05-20T00:00:00+00:00. irresponsible claims handling, wrongful claim repudiation, evidential prejudice complaint against INTACT INSURANCE UK LIMITED. Outcome: Upheld.
Decision detail
| Reference | DRN-6372654 |
|---|---|
| Decision date | 2026-05-20T00:00:00+00:00 |
| Firm | INTACT INSURANCE UK LIMITED |
| Product | home insurance |
| Claim type | irresponsible claims handling, wrongful claim repudiation, evidential prejudice |
| Outcome | Upheld |
| Remedy | 1. INTACT must appoint and pay for an independent expert with specific qualifications and experience in subsidence (selected from options proposed by Mr and Mrs S) to: review all prior reports; conduct a comprehensive inspection of the full property for subsidence-related damage; assess whether external wall foundations were likely damaged at the same time and by the same cause as the floor slab damage; and determine whether garage damage is linked to the original claim or separate. 2. INTACT must pay an additional £1,500 compensation for distress and inconvenience caused by the claim mishandling and delays. |
Summary
Mr and Mrs S claimed for subsidence damage to their property in October 2022, with INTACT's loss adjuster accepting the claim in February 2023 based on crack patterns indicative of subsidence. However, in May 2024, INTACT's senior engineer reversed this decision, repudiating the claim as mere floor slab settlement without external wall damage. The 15-month delay in repudiation prevented Mr and Mrs S from obtaining contemporaneous evidence of the full extent of damage. When Mr and Mrs S later discovered garage cracking, INTACT treated it as a separate claim. The ombudsman found INTACT's handling deficient because it failed to comprehensively assess external walls and provided conflicting expert opinions. The ombudsman upheld the complaint and required INTACT to appoint an independent subsidence expert to conduct a full assessment and pay additional compensation of £1,500 for distress and inconvenience caused by the mishandling and delays.
The Ombudsman's reasoning
The ombudsman found that INTACT's reversal of its initial claim acceptance was problematic because: (1) the loss adjuster had explicitly stated the crack patterns were indicative of subsidence when accepting the claim; (2) INTACT failed to provide robust evidence that subsidence had not occurred to external walls; (3) the delay in repudiation (15 months) caused significant prejudice to Mr and Mrs S by preventing them from obtaining contemporaneous evidence of the full extent of damage; (4) the inspections conducted were not comprehensive enough to definitively rule out subsidence to external walls; (5) conflicting assessments between INTACT's own loss adjusters created uncertainty that could not be resolved without independent expert assessment. The ombudsman determined that neither party had provided compelling evidence on the core issue, necessitating independent expert determination.
How this compares
| Group | Decisions | Uphold rate |
|---|---|---|
| INTACT INSURANCE UK LIMITED, all decisions | 201 | 38% |
Source
Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website