CGU policy holder Graham Wyeth from Goodna protests outside the company's
offices at South Bank with other disgruntled policy holders. 

CGU customers have called on the insurance giant to provide emergency assistance to policy holders who lost property in last month's floods.

The two groups are set to meet today after the company stated it would not be paying claims brought forth by flooding.

The meeting comes a day after Suncorp chief executive Patrick Snowball said there was no excuse for insurers not to cover for floods.

Spokeswoman for the group Sally Doyle called on the company to apologise for their "appalling mismanagement of claims".

"A lot of people have had just one phone call, they haven't had an assessor come out, they haven't had any kind of comprehensive look at individual claims," she said

"We ask that happen right now."

Ms Doyle said CGU were hiding behind "technicalities' in the company's insurance policy in not providing coverage for flooding.

CGU's standard home and business insurance policies do not provide flood cover.

"Many of us were sold CGU policies as a comprehensive policy, certainly I was paying for full cover," she said.

"What we are also finding is with things that are covered, like storm water damage, CGU are covering themselves by saying everything is caused by floods – 'too bad so sad, even the stuff you are supposed to be covered for we don't believe it is storm water we believe it is flood'.

"We are going to ask CGU to do what other insurance companies have done and put aside substantial sums of money to help with the rebuilding that clients, who may find themselves outside the parameters of their policy, face."

In a statement this morning CGU Insurance general manager of claims Ben Bessell said he was open to hearing the views of customers.

But he said the company would not pay claims brought about by floods.

"CGU is paying many thousands of claims for Queensland customers for damage caused by the recent storms and Cyclone Yasi," he said.

"While we can't pay flood claims, we will look at what else we can do to support our customers during this challenging time and we are open to hearing suggestions."

The protesters brought "care packages" to give to CGU staff, who they said were not the target of their grievances.

The packages contained chocolate bars and recruitment forms for CGU rivals Suncorp and Westpac.

Ms Doyle's groups said they were more concerned with the corporation as a whole.

"These sorts of people spend tens of millions of dollars a year building a brand and in the space of four weeks CGU's brand is mud in Queensland," she said.

Meanwhile, National Australia Bank has provided $15 million in a flood-victim assistance fund to make ex-gratia payments to NAB customers who are not covered for flood under the NAB's home insurance policies.

The flood and cyclone assistance scheme applies to NAB customers who have NAB-branded home insurance schemes are have missed out on flood insurance after the January floods and Cyclone Yasi. Up to 500 people are believed to be covered by the policies.

However the assistance will help NAB customers who have taken out insurance with Allianz Insurance, the insurance company who underwrites all the NAB's insurance policies.

A NAB spokeswoman clarified this point this morning.

"If you have NAB-branded product, then you are eligible for this ex-gratia payment," the spokeswoman said.

"That is the first qualification, it needs to be a NAB-branded product. That is the first step.

"It is not for all Allianz customers. Some people will have bought an Allianz product, which is not a NAB product and this is not for that purpose."

She said the level of the ex-gratia payments depended on individual claims.

www.BrisbaneTimes.com.au


COMMENT:  Policy holders across Australia should boycott CGU for their attitude to the victims of the 2011 floods.
Suncorp appears to be the ONLY insurance company with an honest and honourable approach to flood victims' claims.