Just kind of a funny story, but not really for the people that were involved. So, there’s actually a claim out there where a homeowner claimed damages from steam that escaped from a steam washing machine.
Guess you’ve all seen the new washers and dryers that are coming out with these steam functions, great product!
But steam is generally a product or a type of occurrence that is over a period of time or that it’s an accumulation and insurance policies aren’t all ready to handle these claims apparently, this specific policy contains an exclusion from damages by steam.
Now, there are exclusions in your homeowner’s policy for the value of steam. In other words, if you purchase steam to heat your house, a pipe breaks and that escapes, that steam is usually not covered.
And that’s basically the same as water breaking through a pipe and the value of the water that came through that pipe is not generally covered either under most scenarios.
Basically, they got a brand-new washer and dryer, they get a rupture and steam causes damage. And how the insurance company dealt with it is a little bit shocking.
So obviously, we got this great new item, it’s got to clean everything. It’s supposed to be really efficient. And it cleans with steam. But long story short, under this homeowner policy, because it’s not keeping up with the traditional language in policies.
These new modern appliances are kind of outliving the older policy language. Ultimately, they won.
So, they get in front of a judge and the judge says that “Hey, steam is water, and water damage would have been covered as an accidental discharge, it did come from a plumbing system.
But we can tell you, the definition of a plumbing system is changing. The definition of an appliance is changing.
Whether or not that steam escaped from the hose that was attached to the washing machine, or the washing machine itself, could have made a real difference, especially on a policy like Farmers, where it defines which items are plumbing, and which items are not.
But this is a tough case. And if it was you and it was thousands of dollars worth of damage, you may have had to end up in court as well.
So, the moral of history is don’t get steamed. When your claim is denied or when you feel you’re wronged by your insurance company, get represented, and let a PUBLIC ADJUSTER take a look at it.
In this case, most likely they had to hire an attorney and could have gone with the small claims.
But it ended up being a technical case based on the definition of water. And again, some policies actually redefine water in a manner that I’ve never even seen before. And they’re very, very specific.
So tough case, interesting, a washing machine that steam power gets denied because of basically new technology is ahead of the old policy language.
We hope that makes sense. It’s a little bit unusual. If you have any questions, you’d like to contact us Or if you would like a policy review, you can always email us directly at faqinfo@majoradjusters.com and we will be glad to use your tip on the air
