Try making a claim and it taking close to three years to sort even though i had 3 independent witnesses, photo evidence and a favourable police report, passed from one department to the next and ignored and fobbed off so much i had to get a solicitor to sort it all out for both me and my wife.

Whilst I can understand why you would not want to use this company again, many others use the same procedure (which is in my opinion wrong) - see Unsolicited Goods Act which nearly covers it. But as stated above - they instantly rectified the problem and waived their charges. I would think that this was a good reason to use them again. Other companies might not be so obliging.

So if you got burgled and the thieves, once caught, offered to return your property, you'd be entirely OK with that?

I had a row with an insurance company recently. Paid my deposit (a month's premium) and sent in proof of no claims but they rejected them - for no good reason I can see, as the company I'm now with accepted them no problem.

They wrote to advise they were adding £178 to the premium and charging a £55 admin fee and an immediate random £76.55 in additional cover for the privilege, and that they would take payment within a few days. I immediately cancelled the direct debit and instructed them to cancel the policy, but seeing as they'd taken so long to write to me in the first place I was outside the 14-day cooling off period. Never mind that this constituted a 'major change' to the policy, which should therefore allow me to cancel free of charge (according to their own Ts & Cs).

Anyway, I won the battle in the end by pointing out that they had only taken a deposit, and according to The Financial Services Authority a deposit is a one-off payment (defined by the term 'deposit'), not a recurring payment and therefore they were not entitled to use my card details to take additional monies, which in fact should not even be held on file. I requested that they delete all payment details with immediate effect.

Of course I told them the Financial Ombudsman and Citizen's Advice had also been giving me advice - not true, I'd simply read the small print and done a little research. That email was my final correspondence to them, I never heard a peep again.

Not a very good analogy Cod'ead as burglary is illegal, taking a legitimate payment for an agreed service isn't. Although you don't/won't accept it, Admiral have not committed a criminal offence.

But, if I was legally obliged to be burgled and I had a choice of burglar, of course I'd pick the one who would return my property over the one who wouldn't.

Not possible. Assuming - none having been mentioned - the person in question has no other nefarious intent apart from the removal of your goods, then he is not a burglar. He would only be a burglar if he intended to steal, if his intention was to bring the stuff back then there was no intention to permanently deprive. You'd be picking a non-burglar.

There are a few situations where it would be possible. For instance if the burglar only brought the goods back because he or she felt guilty about having stolen them or they were useless etc, in this case they would at the time of having taken the goods had the intention to permanently deprive the owner of them.

So there are situations when View from the fullback could get his goods back from a burglar.

All very interesting, but entirely off the point. In the example under discussion, the fact that the burglar WILL bring the goods back is a Rumsfeldesque "known known", otherwise if you didn't already know that, then obviously, you couldn't pick him. You need to read the case notes more carefully.

I'm with Ajw on this one. A bona fides burglary can take place and post crime circumstances could alter the offenders mindset in such a way that the property could be returned without negating the original intent to permanently deprive. An example of which could be where the offender is known to keep the goods secreted away say in a nearby wheelie bin for collection at a later date. If two separate burglars used that MO and it was known that, if arrested, one would own up to the crime and divulge the whereabouts of the property but the other would deny everything and allow the bin men to dispose of the property, then, again if I was obliged to be burgled, I would chose the former miscreant over the latter.

The case notes actually state " So if you got burgled and the thieves, once caught, offered to return your property, you'd be entirely OK with that " With the emphasis on once caught. In real time that is a future variable outcome which is usually unknown and therefore by definition not a "known known".

See those trees? That's a wood, that is. The last example was not on the original point, it was a subsequent (and different) hypothesis. You've now come up with a third hypothesis, which is attractive for being so barking, but is equally irrelevant. The only issue so far my post was concerned is the issue to which I was directly replying. Which said:


You seem to miss the obvious fact that you cannot pick "the one who would return your property" unless, before the fact, you KNOW who he is.

What you need to do to win this argument is to provide an example of how, in the absence of any other ulterior motive (as I also said), he can be a burglar, if he 100% definitely intends to return your property.