A claim or an estate is paying · 4
An insurer is paying
A whole category of removals work that almost no removals website mentions. Goods out of a damaged property into storage, a household into temporary accommodation, and everything back when the drying and the making good are finished.
We are a removals firm, not a loss assessor. We will not handle your claim and we will not advise you on it.
What an insurance move involves
Escape of water is most of it
A pipe, a leaking appliance or an overflow from a flat above, and suddenly a household has to live somewhere else while floors come up and driers run. In converted London flats it is the single commonest claim there is.
The removals part is unglamorous and it is the part that decides how bearable the next few months are: what goes into storage, what goes with you to the temporary accommodation, and how easily you can get at the things you did not expect to need.
Authorisation arrives in stages
Which is the part people find hardest. An adjuster authorises a scope, work proceeds, something else emerges, and a further authorisation is needed. It is how claims work and it is not something a removals firm can accelerate.
What we will do is work to what is authorised in writing and give you a note of what is not, so you can take it up with the adjuster. We will not start unauthorised work in the hope of later approval — on a claim that is frequently unrecoverable and it helps nobody.
Pack for a longer stay than you were told
The single most useful piece of practical advice on this page. Almost every household in temporary accommodation is told a shorter timescale than the one that actually happens, and the things they left in store turn out to matter.
So tell us before collection roughly what you might need back — documents, seasonal clothing, a child's things, work equipment — and the load is built with those reachable rather than buried.
What we are not
Not loss assessors, not claims handlers, not surveyors. We will supply inventories, photographs and written scopes that support your claim, and the claim itself is between you and your insurer.
Nothing on this page is insurance advice. If you are unhappy with how a claim is being handled, that is a conversation for your insurer, a regulated loss assessor, or the Financial Ombudsman Service.
An insurer is paying
Questions about an insurer is paying
- 01
What does an insurance move look like?
Goods out of the affected rooms or the whole property into storage while drying and making good take place, then back when the work finishes. Each stage is authorised separately.
- 02
Who authorises the work?
The insurer or the loss adjuster acting for them. We work to what is authorised in writing and give you a note of anything that is not.
- 03
Can you start before authorisation?
No. Unauthorised work on a claim is frequently unrecoverable, and starting it in the hope of approval helps nobody. Where something is genuinely urgent we say so to the adjuster in writing.
- 04
Will you handle the claim for us?
No. We are a removals firm, not a loss assessor or a claims handler, and nothing here is insurance advice. We will supply documentation that supports your claim.
- 05
Can we get at our things while they are stored?
With notice, and it works far better if you say beforehand what you might need. Almost everybody is out for longer than they were told, so name more than you think.
- 06
What happens to damaged items?
They are recorded separately rather than mixed in, at the adjuster's direction, so that what was damaged stays identifiable.
Who is paying for yours?
Both addresses, roughly what is going, and — the useful part — who is paying and who will be instructing us on the day. That last question saves more trouble than any other on the form.