Damage to Property Worked On

ABC Cleaning Contractors were asked to clean the inside and outside of 32 new houses on a new build estate for a building firm they'd had brief dealings with previously. Ten days later they received a call from the building firm to say that they were sueing ABC Cleaning Contractors for scratching the windows on 10 of the houses they had cleaned, a claim that ABC Cleaning Contractors strongly denied.

Worried about the costs of replacing all those windows ABC Cleaning Contractors rang their insurance broker to explain the situation and advise that they would need to submit a claim for around £30,000 for the damage that they were being accused of causing. Having looked through the policy that ABC Cleaning Contractors had bought the broker had to break the bad news, they didn't have cover for Damage to Property Being Worked On and therefore couldn't make a claim.

It gets worse

Having bought a standard liability policy, ABC Cleaning Contractors were uninsured for such damage and their insurer wouldn't therefore pay any legal costs to help them defend themsleves in their battle to clear their name. Whilst they were adamant they hadn't damaged the windows, to prove it they had to spend £5,000 on solicitors bills and a report from an expert glazier which determined how the scratches had been made (which was due to how they'd been stored)

The whole process took 6 months and in that time they didn't receive any payment for the work they had done and didn't receive any more work from the main contractor.

Had they bought a policy from GLEAMING INSURANCE that included Damage to Property Worked On they could have just passed everything to their insurer and let them deal with it. Do you have this cover? - probably not, yet you won't even realise.