No one's going to go to bat for you at G.F.Brown.
I recently filed a claim with Safeco, our home insurance company for more than four years. This was due to a plumbing problem inside the wall behind the sink in our kitchen. The pipe in this part of the wall was literally the one piece of plumbing that we had not had replaced going all the way to the street a few years ago. It's difficult to get to; we did not know there was a weakness in it. We thought it was sound. The pipe finally broke a few weeks ago, and water was seeping up from under the kitchen floor. The contractors (recommended to us by Safeco) came over to do an inspection, and we were told that this was a pretty straightforward case. As the details were being relayed back to Safeco, the contractors told us that we would most likely see the water damage taken care of. I spoke to Melanie Saeyup, in the Seattle area office, who told me that although they would not cover the plumbing cost, they would cover the cost of replacing the kitchen floor and possibly even the bottom row of cabinets. I should have known this was too good to be true. A few days later, she called me and told me she that Safeco denied our claim. Because of some apparent clause in our contract, we are not covered for damages more than two weeks old. I explained to her that the damage did occur within two weeks, as there was a sudden flood of water from under the kitchen floor when the pipe broke. She then cited some photos that the assessor took, explaining that the water damage looked older than 2 weeks. There is no trust here, I really felt accused of gaming them, and I felt accused of neglecting the house. When I got off the phone with her, I called my broker at G.F. Brown insurance, who told me that I should wait for the official letter of denial and then he would negotiate with Safeco on our behalf. I stood down then, waiting to see what would happen. After he received the letter he told me that there was no way he could argue with them about the reason for denial. I still can't believe it. Both parties, GF Brown and Melanie Saeyup at Safeco, have really been disappointing. This kind of problem seems to be exactly the kind of thing that you're supposed to be insured against; the very reason you pay in to an insurance policy. If we would have just saved our money, and not insured ourselves, we would have probably had roughly the same amount of money set aside that it would take to fix the problem. I just want a new floor, because the humble linoleum floor tiles are completely ruined. I'm not asking for the world, here. I feel scammed. Just what have we been paying for the past 4 years? read more
