boatmike
Well-Known Member
Thank you for that sensible summary.
In answer to some of the questions raised I would say the following.
The notice given by the insurer to the broker was clearly inadequate and a surprise to him causing considerable embarassment. There is no doubt that this caused considerable inconvenience to Prawn also. To recieve a notification from your broker that the insurance company terminated your policy summarily and without notice would be worrying and extremely annoying to say the least. My basic point was that the problem was not of the brokers making and as the contract was with the broker it was in fact he, not Prawn who was at risk in the intervening period between the insurer withdrawing cover and the agreed termination of contract. I have never disagreed with the statement that this was a major inconvenience to Prawn, but I believe the statement that implied that cover was withdrawn by the broker without telling P was technically wrong. It is my understanding that the risk passed from the primary insurer to the broker in the intervening period between the insurer withdrawing and the broker telling P and as I said, the broker admitted to me that if there had been a claim in that period he would have had to claim on his PI and settle it himself. I think P's lack of recognition of this fact is the basic cause of the heated exchange and it is not fair or reasonable to bite lumps out of the broker. It's called "shooting the messenger" where I come from!
However the rest of your post quite rightly addresses how we can avoid this in future. I believe the answer lies in your question regarding the agreed address for correspondence. In my case I have my daughter opening and dealing with my mail anyway so no problem. If I didn't have that facility I would instruct my broker to contact me either by e-mail or telephone as a primary point of contact. In fact, in my case, he not only has my e-mail address but uses it as a primary means of communication anyway so no problem there. More generally though, surely it is dangerous from many points of view to go abroad without informing anyone and not have anyone dealing with correspondence? Unless you are in mid Atlantic, in these days of electronic communication it is not difficult to arrange to be contacted. If one is not fortunate in having a friend or family member to re-direct mail to when abroad then every possible effort should be made to inform all interested parties that one can be contacted by e-mail or telephone at the very least. Not to do this would seem to be opening up many opportunities for administrative cock ups, from the sublime to the ridiculous. Last year I went off cruising just as the tax on my car ran out, not remembering that I was obliged to notify the authorities that it was off the road. Easy to overlook these things and frankly, while all our circumstances are different, I would not wish to be entirely incommunicado for more than a week.....
In answer to some of the questions raised I would say the following.
The notice given by the insurer to the broker was clearly inadequate and a surprise to him causing considerable embarassment. There is no doubt that this caused considerable inconvenience to Prawn also. To recieve a notification from your broker that the insurance company terminated your policy summarily and without notice would be worrying and extremely annoying to say the least. My basic point was that the problem was not of the brokers making and as the contract was with the broker it was in fact he, not Prawn who was at risk in the intervening period between the insurer withdrawing cover and the agreed termination of contract. I have never disagreed with the statement that this was a major inconvenience to Prawn, but I believe the statement that implied that cover was withdrawn by the broker without telling P was technically wrong. It is my understanding that the risk passed from the primary insurer to the broker in the intervening period between the insurer withdrawing and the broker telling P and as I said, the broker admitted to me that if there had been a claim in that period he would have had to claim on his PI and settle it himself. I think P's lack of recognition of this fact is the basic cause of the heated exchange and it is not fair or reasonable to bite lumps out of the broker. It's called "shooting the messenger" where I come from!
However the rest of your post quite rightly addresses how we can avoid this in future. I believe the answer lies in your question regarding the agreed address for correspondence. In my case I have my daughter opening and dealing with my mail anyway so no problem. If I didn't have that facility I would instruct my broker to contact me either by e-mail or telephone as a primary point of contact. In fact, in my case, he not only has my e-mail address but uses it as a primary means of communication anyway so no problem there. More generally though, surely it is dangerous from many points of view to go abroad without informing anyone and not have anyone dealing with correspondence? Unless you are in mid Atlantic, in these days of electronic communication it is not difficult to arrange to be contacted. If one is not fortunate in having a friend or family member to re-direct mail to when abroad then every possible effort should be made to inform all interested parties that one can be contacted by e-mail or telephone at the very least. Not to do this would seem to be opening up many opportunities for administrative cock ups, from the sublime to the ridiculous. Last year I went off cruising just as the tax on my car ran out, not remembering that I was obliged to notify the authorities that it was off the road. Easy to overlook these things and frankly, while all our circumstances are different, I would not wish to be entirely incommunicado for more than a week.....