A new spring has sprung...

[NooNoo]

I was so proud of myself, I finally got the wherewithall together to get the kitchen floor repaired and new tiles laid. One week after, my hallway is bubbling up water next to the radiator. The pipes to the radiator come up from a concrete floor and go via the dining room into ... yes the kitchen.

This is going to be expensive
Insurance says it's probably wear and tear and therefore not covered

[Platypus]

Gurk! Crook in-floor pipes - that's a blow...

[confus-ed]

.. water pipes laid through concrete - shakes his head - how old is your house Noo ? An NBC guarantee or whatever might help you out, if your house is new enough, as there's been building regulation about this for a few years (pressuming they are copper ?)..

Another straw for you to clutch at could be if you can demonstrate that it mightn't be fair wear & tear at all, & by that I'm thinking if you have any exterior cracking to your property (settling &/or minor subsidence) & might maybe be able to tie that to an event, like a huge lorry coming down your drive etc (that perhaps you've suddenly remembered ) .. that then isn't fair wear & tear, but accidental damage & covered ..

[NooNoo]

.. water pipes laid through concrete - shakes his head - how old is your house Noo ? An NBC guarantee or whatever might help you out, if your house is new enough, as there's been building regulation about this for a few years (pressuming they are copper ?)..

Another straw for you to clutch at could be if you can demonstrate that it mightn't be fair wear & tear at all, & by that I'm thinking if you have any exterior cracking to your property (settling &/or minor subsidence) & might maybe be able to tie that to an event, like a huge lorry coming down your drive etc (that perhaps you've suddenly remembered ) .. that then isn't fair wear & tear, but accidental damage & covered ..

Rebuilt in 1984... so that's out.
Already discussed the fact that I regularly bash the pipe with the hoover... but they will decide when the assessor gets here - waiting on a phone call from "building services".

What are the regs about burying copper pipe in the screed now then? Every house I have been in has the radiator pipes on the ground floor in the screed.

[confus-ed]

Already discussed the fact that I regularly bash the pipe with the hoover..

At the risk of encouraging insurance fraud even more , I'd suggest you might have been really mad one day & belted it 'good' & then it leaked ?

As for laying concrete & water pipes, afaik originally the change said copper must be laid inside a liner to prevent external corrosion of the pipe , & I think there's a new code now about only using plastic in such circumstance (or at least polymer coated pipes) & it always being an 'isolatable circuit', my uncle the arichect (my font of all building expertise) suggested that if you ask the local council building officer very nicely, they will explain all the new regulations (he's retired now) ..

[Mags]

Already discussed the fact that I regularly bash the pipe with the hoover... .

Ah well that proves it! The pipe's in the wrong place or poorly protected, it's not the hoover's fault.

These things always happen after you've installed something new.

[Damned Angel]

you may still get lucky. I just had to have a hole made in the basement floor and tear out a finished wall so that a contractor could fix a leaking water main. As it turns out, the repair was not covered by insurance (maintenance costs are never covered) but the removal and replacement of the floor and wall were covered!

You'd be best to get an insurance adjuster out to assess weather or not the insurance company should cover the cost of replacing the floor as it has been damaged.

[NooNoo]

Well it looks like it wasn't the pipe in the floor at all. There is a minute leak in the radiator which invisibly drips and pools where the pipe goes down, the drips have cause a problem in that they have damaged the floor finish and removed the glue which holds the wood to the cement.... so I get a free repair and a refinished floor! Total cost £50 (and I was going to refinish the floor when I saved up for it!)

[amyb]

That's great news!