Dear Sir / Madam

I wish to bring to your notice a very sorry tale of a nationalised Insurance company, of which I am the sufferer.

I had a car registered in my wife's name from Delhi, however I stay in Noida.

In May 2009 my car was stolen from outside my residence with all the papers in it. Incidentally, I was not in the country at that time, as had gone to UK on an official visit. My father and family had to undergo a lot of hardships to lodge a FIR and pursue the same. The surveyor from the insurance company came and did all the necessary investigations and advised us about the next procedures required involving the final respot from the court,etc.

After I came back, after a lot of hassles and troubles,dealing with the police and the court, we managed to get the final report around end of Feb’2010. During this time I did not receive any call or letter from the insurance company.

Then began my real ordeal with the insurance company. I thought that dealing with the police and court was the hardest part and half my job was done and I would get my claim amount easily now. I was proved totally wrong.

The main office of the insurance company is in Karol Bagh which is around 55-60 kms from my residence. I submitted all my papers to the insurance company around March’2010. (Sorry but its been so long that I have lost track of the exact dates.)
When I reached there they said that: ‘We are sorry but your file is closed now, you did not contact us and did not reply to any of our letters sent to you and hence your file has been closed now.’ I literally begged to them that I had not received any letter from them and requested the person to get the file reopened.

The reason we did not get any letter from them was because they have got my address updated incorrectly, due to not fault of mine.

Ultimately he agreed to it. The file was reopened after about 1 and a half month. The reason being they all were busy and the lady who would do it was on leave for 15 days. The process has since been ongoing. Everytime we call, we are advised that it is being done and will take time.

In the meantime, I visited the office a couple of times. Now, they have come with something which I am unable to understand. A couple of months back they said that they needed a bill of the gear lock that was installed in my car. It was already more than 2 years not and hence we had misplaced the invoice. We somehow managed to get it from my records and provided the same to them. After that there was not contact from them for the next month and when we called them up and they said there would be a survey and verification of the authenticity of the bill. I said fine. The survey did not happen for another month and when after one month when I called they said that the bill was fake and my claim will be rejected.

We were in a terrible shock. I said if I had to do something fake I would not have advised about the gear lock. After my own investigation we found that the shop from where I had purchased the lock, had shifted from Delhi to Noida market. This is not our fault. They said that we will need to get it confirmed somehow from the shop owners. I provided them with the new address and requested them to redo the survey at the new address.

After receiving no response from them for 2-3 weeks, I went to the shop to inquire if any survey had been done. He said that yes a lady same a week ago and confirmed everything and went back. She asked the shopkeeper to provide a copy of the bill, which he did not have as he had all records from his old shop removed. She also asked him to give it in written. He refused to it also.

When we contacted the insurance company, we got to hear a completely opposite and new version. They said that their surveyor had gone to the new shop and the shop owner had refused to acknowledge the invoice as theirs. I said that was not possible. I doubt the authenticity of the surveyor. After a lot of argument and requests, I said that please do a re survey and I will be there in the shop when it is done. They did not agree to it and insisted that their surveyor was right and instead asked me to get it in written from the shop keeper.

Then after 3-4 visits to the shop and repeated requests, the shopkeeper gave me in written confirming that the bill was theirs. When we went to submit the bill, now they tell me that its nothing they can do now as claim cannot be passed now and the matter is with some committee within the company and they will decide about the same.

Its been more than 30-40 days now since the committee was formed. I am still running here and there and calling them without any results. I asked them to provide me with the number for someone from the committe, I was straightaway told that : "they will not talk to you and they will get back to me by call or letter."

They never call back with any information and are simply irritating and troubling us. This is a real harrassment for me and my family. Being a women I am not in a condition to travel to the office again and again.

It going to be 2 years now and I am nowhere close to getting my insurance claim. I have done no illegal thing and I don’t understand why it is taking such a long time. They are just harassing us for no fault of ours.

Desperately seeking some advise on the above..

G.Khajuria