UK Holiday Insurance Company loses licence

https://murciatoday.com/uk-holiday-s..._123932-a.html

UK holiday sickness insurance firm loses its licence after false claims hurt Spanish hotels.

False insurance claims have cost Benidorm hotels up to 15 million euros.

Hotels in Benidorm, the rest of the Costa Blanca and other leading holiday destinations in Spain have been up in arms in recent times after a sharp increase in the number of false sickness compensation claims filed by visitors from the UK, and this week it appears that their cause is at last being backed by the Claims Management Regulator in the UK.

Earlier this year the hotel owners of Benidorm and other beach resorts in the province of Alicante joined forces with their counterparts in other major tourist destinations in Spain to combat the huge losses resulting from such claims, after it was estimated that hotels in this country, Spain, were liable to payments of as much as 60 million euros to visitors. This amount corresponds to visitors from the UK who have been encouraged to make fake insurance claims on the grounds of food poisoning during their stays, and it was stated in May that part of the blame lay with the fact that there was a lack of any effective legislation to combat the craze, other than what was perceived as woefully insufficient steps taken in the UK.

The number of claims made by British hotel guests in Benidorm was seven times higher in 2016 than the year before, and this resulted in a cost to the hotels affected of between 13 and 15 million euros, the resort was particularly hard hit due to its reliance on guests from the UK.

The root of the problem lies in a change to customer rights laws in the UK in 2013, by which members of the public are allowed to register claims without providing any clear proof that they are justified in doing so. This has led to the appearance of "claim farms" or "claim clinics", which consist of unscrupulous lawyers offering to process claims regarding holidays with the aim of getting money back on "unsatisfactory" package holidays.

Taking advantage of this, some lawyers openly tout for clients in Benidorm, and their strategies include combing social network sites for anyone who has posted a photo of their holidays in Spain or the Caribbean. They actively encourage hotel guests to feign an illness such as gastro-enteritis in order to allege sub-standard catering, and then register a claim for the legal limit of 6,000 euros supported by a receipt from a local pharmacy for the relevant treatment, although the average British tourist in Benidorm spends just a sixth of the claim amount on their Spanish holiday.

And then, in around 80% of cases, the claim is successful.

In response the hoteliers of Benidorm have fmade efforts to encourage tour operators such as Tui, Jet2, Thomas Cook and Monarch to put pressure on the British government to modify the consumer protection laws, and at the same time other, more direct tactics have been designed to tackle the problem at source.

Camerass exist in most hotels which allow them to keep a record of when guests enter and leave their rooms, and in some cases cleaning staff are obliged to report any cases of vomit or blood on towels. Measurements are even being taken to establish when the aount of toilet paper used is higher than normal, and these steps have been successful in preventing payouts to guests who can be shown to have been drinking large amounts of alcohol which would explain any stomach upset, or not to have indulged in unusual toilet paper usage!

In addition, some hotels have been obliging guests to sign a statement when they leave to the effect that they have not been ill during their stays, and are reminding them that to register a false claim is a punishable offence in Spain.

But now it appears that the legislators in the UK are taking action, and it was announced last week that one firm responsible for pressuring people into making holiday-sickness claims has had its licence stripped by the Claims Management Regulator.

Investigations revealed that Preston-based Allsure Ltd had encouraged holidaymakers to "fabricate or embellish symptoms of gastric illness" in order to be paid compensation, and that the firm had even used deceptive sales publicity in which anticipated compensation payments were overstated in an attempt to attract consumers.

In consequence the licence of Allsure Ltd has now been revoked, and Kevin Rousell, the Head of the Claims Management Regulator, comments that "We will take firm action against claims businesses which engage in serious misconduct", and that "seeking to encourage false claims will not be tolerated".

This follows a change in the UK legislation in July which reduced the cost to tour operators of disputing sickness insurance claims, news which was welcomed not only by the hoteliers of Benidorm and other Spanish resorts but also by the vast majority of honest British holidaymakers, as the increase in insurance payouts was threatening to force operators to raise the prices of package holidays on the Costas!

ends.......

(sorry I couldn´t just post the link, but it´s one of those news letters that doesn´t allow copy/pasting).

Re: UK Holiday Insurance Company loses licence

Don't get it.

Why do British insurance taken out by Brits even if they are fake have to be payed by Spanish Hotels?????

Re: UK Holiday Insurance Company loses licence

I'm no expert but I presume the insurance companies reclaim money from the hotels.

Re: UK Holiday Insurance Company loses licence

here you go...it seems they encouraged false claims.

https://www.ttgmedia.com/news/news/s...-licence-11379

Re: UK Holiday Insurance Company loses licence

Thank you Cass. It's incredible the lengths some people will go to with fraudulent claims.

There was a woman here a couple of years ago who claimed she had E3,000 and a bag containing 8 thousand pounds worth of gold jewellery stolen from her handbag whilst she was on the beach. Strangely enough the police didn't believe her, I wonder why ?