Gregory V

No companion and client care

I recently submitted a claim to my short term insurer Zenith for storm damages at my second home. I put in a claim for R27 000 worth of damages. I had moved house in December of last year 2022 in the midst of a divorce. I sent the request to change address to my broker but unfortunately he did not receive my email and thus the address was not changed. The house I moved to is in the same area as the old house and this the risk is similar and we had only lived there for just over a month before the storm damage was incurred and thus they had not lost out in possible additional premium for more than a month or two. Their response was that I had the wrong address on the policy and that when the assessor had finished his/her assessment that my new home was worth R7 000 000 and the old one was worth R3 000 000 and that they would be prepared to pay just over R10 000, after excess deduction, of my claim because technically my home was underinsured and insurance average was being app****. We then went to the trouble of providing proof to Zenith of the size of each property to prove that the previous property could not be worth (rebuild cost) so much less than the new one and thus that they were offering too little. The old house is in fact 78% the size of the new house and thus they should be offering us R21928.14 minus the excess.. My broker also sent proof of the email I sent (which I resent to him) instructing him to change the address and a letter explaining the situation to them and the fact that I had forgotten to follow up due to the divorce and the move. Zeniths response following all of this is that I should've followed up to make certain it was done and that they were not prepared to offer any more on my claim. I feel that this is not treating the customer fairly at all. The risk had not changed much as it was the same area and the rebuild cost of the new house is certain not almost 300% more than the old house. I feel they should have taken the additional premium that they would have charged for the new house which is minimal because it is not worth 300% more than the old house as the assessor alleged and we had only been in the new house for just over a month before the storm damages occurred and the risk factors are similar as the new house is in the same area as the old house and is built with similar materials (ie the new house is not a thatch or a log cabin), in which case they could've paid my claim in full. Due to the fact that this has been going on for quite some time and we need to complete the repairs to our home to avoid further damage, we were forced to sign the agreement of loss for R10 000 as we could not delay any further. I dont understand how a company can tell us the basis of their calculation and when we proved it was wrong they would not amend their offer. I have been a client with Zenith for quite some time now and in light of the above I feel that my claim was definitely not handled fairly. All of this to avoid the additional R17 000