By Cedric E. Stephens, Contributor Question: I met in an accident with a 'trailer head' in January of this year. A police officer who came on the scene shortly afterwards found that the truck driver was to blame.
I reported the accident to my insurers and then repaired my car at my expense. I gave the bill to my insurers and asked them to recover from the other company. Eight months have passed and I still have not received my money. I understand that the truck owner is disputing liability.
What have I done wrong? What can I do to recover my money? Why is the Insurance Superintendent not paying any attention to the hundreds of persons like myself who are being forced to pay for what they do not enjoy - speedy claims settlement.
K.P., Westmoreland.
Answer: There are two reasons why your letter is the subject of this article: the matters you raised fall in my area of competence I do not know if I can solve your problem but at least I can offer some ideas which may assist; secondly, in addition to being out of pocket for eight months, you have received a very poor quality of service.
EXPRESS SERVICE
This is not unlike the 'express service' that the Registrar General's Department promises - for which it charges an arm and a leg - and consistently fails to deliver. Of course, there are many other businesses that have fancy mission statements and catchy slogans but play the same 'hold down tek wey' game!
You have done nothing wrong. Your insurers or the insurers of the trailer head are telling you rubbish. If the head was properly insured, its owner would have absolutely nothing to investigate. Why do I say this? All the thousands of motor policies I have studied over the last three decades have one thing in common - they give insurers exclusive rights to deal with claims. Policyholders have no say on the subject.
SETTLEMENT
The claims condition in the truck owner's policy would read something like this: "No admission, offer, promise, or payment shall be made without the written consent of the company which, shall be entitled if it so desires, to take over and conduct in its name, the defence or settlement of any claim -- and shall have full discretion in the conduct of any proceedings and in the settlement of any claim..."
I do not know of a single case where an insurer has ever given its claims settlement powers to a policyholder. The persons who dealt with you either at your insurer's office or that of the third party are ignorant of this fact or, there is something very fishy going on.
Section 8 (1) of The Motor the Motor Vehicles Insurance (Third-Party Risks) Act 1989, gives insurers the right to settle claims even where its policyholder failed to report an accident.
In other words, even if the truck driver forgot to report the mishap to his insurers, they would be obliged under the law, to settle your claim. Surprisingly, very few persons in the insurance industry are familiar with this 14-year-old amendment to the law.
Like you, I have a serious problem with the new insurance regulators. The Financial Services Commission is a new organisation with a very wide and complex brief.
SLOW PACE
I agree that it takes time to change things. However, given the number of complaints about the slow pace settlement of motor insurance claims over the years, the size of the motor insurance market and the many consumers involved, the FSC ought to have developed some approaches by now to reform the way claims are handled in the industry.
After all, to repeat a quotation the Minister of Finance is fond of saying, 'it is not rocket science.'
Here is what I suggest you should do to solve the problem. Find out the name and address of the top person in the company that covers the trailer. Write a registered letter to that person. Set out in detail all that has happened and file a complaint.
Send a copy to the letter to the complaints co-ordinator of the FSC by e-mail. There is nothing on its website that deals with complaints. I guess that if you send the mail to insurance@fscjamaica.org <mailto:insurance@fscjamaica.org> it should reach the co-ordinator. Also send a copy of your letter to the editor and my comments. If the matter is not resolved in 10 working days, I suggest that you turn it over to your lawyer. Good luck.
Cedric E. Stephens provides advice on risks and insurance. If you need free information or advice to solve a problem, write to The Financial Editor or, contact Mr. Stephens directly at aegis@cwjamaica.com.
