Re: UK & Canadian electric plug query. Help ?
 

So, have you put this to the test, love to know the outcome :rofl:

Re: UK & Canadian electric plug query. Help ?
 

JOnboy, I've been working in insurance for over 10 years and have NEVER seen one claim rejected because someone had bodged their electrics or because something wasnt to code.
Canada isnt the only country with electrical regs- the UK has their own also, and I've never seen a claim rejected there either.

Doing maintenance on your own home is not causing wilful damage, nor is it negligent.

The exclusions you mentioned are allowed because they represent material changes in risk, and/or there are more suitable policies available. Those exclusions are written in to the Insurance Act, and apply in any homeowners policy from here to the UK.

I still maintain that there is no mention in any wording you'll find that excludes losses due to electrics that arent to code. Putting aside the illegalities, there are simply too many variables for such an exclusion/condition to work. For instance:
- Electrical codes vary by province. The insurance act applies to all of Canada (except Quebec in some instances). An insurance company isnt going to have different conditions, with different requirements, for each different province.
- What if the electrical work was done by a proper electrician, but still not to code? You think an insurer would refuse to pay for that?
- Insurers, nor the courts, expect the normal lay person to know the ins and outs of legistlation/statutes in relation to electrical standards. Most people do work on their home, in some form or other.


The ONLY time an insurer could potentially argue negligence is if you had a load of extension cables in one socket, with a serious overload on the system, and you were extremely wreckless. Even that would be very hard to prove.
However, remember that almost all fires are caused by electrical faults. You'd have to assume that a large portion of those had "substandard" electrical wiring/sockets etc etc. Claims still get paid.

All insurers can void a contract for misrepresentation. But doing a bit of DIY isnt misrepresentation, nor would an insurer try to suggest otherwise (different story if you're doing large renovations etc though).
The "wilful acts" you mention refers to deliberate damage- it doesnt refer to innocently doing some work which some time later causes a fire.
In order to prove misrepresentation, the insurer has to prove that the insured deliberately omitted facts that may have changed the insurers assessment of the risk. Insurers dont ask if all your work is to code, in the same way they dont ask if your house is built to code or your plumbing is to code.

As I've stated before, the whole issue is nothing but scaremongering by people jumping to far fetched conclusions that simply do not and are not allowed to work in the real world.

See what Nikki Dreaming has to say on the matter. She's an adjustor I believe for RSA and deals with claims first hand.

Re: UK & Canadian electric plug query. Help ?
 

So this is your personal guarantee is it? I am not sure working in insurance is anything I'd own up to.

Re: UK & Canadian electric plug query. Help ?
 

Dammit. I was doing so well at keeping it quiet. I'm a car salesman really, honest.
:lol:

Re: UK & Canadian electric plug query. Help ?
 

When you're already deep in a hole it's time to stop digging. :p;)

Re: UK & Canadian electric plug query. Help ?
 

Yeah, they would never think to send an inspector or claims adjuster to look into it after the fact to see how they can weasel out of a claim:rolleyes:


British electrical standards are there to protect at 230V, not 110, so marettes are not a problem here if used correctly. As with any electrical instalation, its the "if done correctly" thats the trick. You are supposed to twist them together with pliers first, not just put them into the marette side by side and trust it to twist them for you...

Double insulated products are made that way to offer an additional failsafe protection, if you remove that level of protection by using two 110s with no neutral to ground, then one layer of protection is removed. Its a personal choice I suppose, but I chose to not second guess the engineers who built it a certain way in the first place.

Re: UK & Canadian electric plug query. Help ?
 

I would use the appropriately rated transformer to get the conversion to 240V. Electric systems are normally designed with overload protection systems to prevent catching fire. The UK system should have a fuse in the live wire and Canada has MCB's rather than fuses in both hot wires for 220V and a GFC at the distribution board (or outdoor sockets for hot tubs etc.) Overloading is the normal cause of fires in electrical systems but be aware that using UK items with motors or frequency sensitive systems could be an issue in Canada due to the 60Hz rather than 50Hz UK frequency - especially power tools that may run 20% faster. BC seems to have more than their share of burnt down houses and I wonder how many of them are caused by electrical faults (usually by grow ops stealing power?) Interesting talking about grounding issues, most of the Substations I look after frequently have the grounding stolen which is the biggest risk to safety on the electrical system...! We spent nearly 4 million dollars putting in back last year!

Re: UK & Canadian electric plug query. Help ?
 

But how many of those years have been in the Canadian insurance industry?

As you know, I am frequently astounded by the attitudes of insurers in my dealings with them here in Alberta. They will deny claims and then leave it for their insured to sue them, knowing full well that they will have to pay out but knowing full well that, by contesting it, they will get the insured to settle for a much smaller sum than they should.

You have also quoted the Insurance Act of Alberta. While I am sure that there are similar provisions across the Insurance Acts of most of the Provinces, this may not be the case.

I can imagine a judge deciding it was unreasonable for an insured to hook up a foreign electrical device to their home system that was never designed to accomodate such a device, particularly if it then goes on to cause a fire.

As an insurer in the UK, would you have authorised a claim whereby somebody connected their industrial grade equipment to a home electrical system? I know bugger all about electrics so the example I have given may be tosh, but you get the idea:thumbup:

Re: UK & Canadian electric plug query. Help ?
 

My knowledge of electrics is limited to knowing that a plug goes in a socket.
:rofl:
On the claims front though, this thing with the foreign equipment etc would simply not fly. I've seen enough fire claims here in Canada- AB in particular, to know that very little goes unpaid. We're talking about damage to property that isnt scheduled, arguing about valuations, etc, but not denying fire claims. There's talk going on at the moment about whether or not Insurers are allowed to exclude Fire claims caused by Terrorism. All insurance policies exclude Terrorism damage, but the courts seem to think excluding Fire caused by a Terrorist act would go against the Insurance Act. Same debate going on with Earthquake in BC and Quebec (ie/ Fire caused by earthquake).
Fire insurance is just one of those things that insurers dont seem to be allowed to mess with.
Fire is fire. Unless you deliberately cause it, it's covered, subject to the exclusions allowed in the insurance act.