ICICI Lombard to pay Rs 5.13L towards repair of damaged truck

New Delhi: ICICI Lombard General Insurance Co Ltd has been directed by a consumer forum here to pay Rs 5.13 lakh to a policy holder for rejecting his claim against repair charges for his truck damaged in an accident.

The New Delhi District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum held that the insurance company had relied on the "fabricated" story of its surveyor to reject the policy holder's claim for reimbursement of repair charges for his damaged truck.

"Opposite party (ICICI Lombard) deliberately avoided to make the payment to the workshop owner when insurance was cashless except for the cost of plastic parts which would be borne by complainant (policy holder).

"Further it has been also noticed that opposite party arbitrarily denied the claim under the shelter of fabricated story of surveyor that the driver was different which is totally unlawful, deficiency of service and breach of contract.

"Opposite party is directed to pay Rs 4,63,814. We also award Rs 50,000 as compensation for harassment and litigation expenses to complainant," said the bench of C K Chaturvedi.

The complaint against ICICI Lombard had been filed by Delhi resident Lekh Raj who had said his Tata Truck was insured with the insurance company for the period from March 29, 2008 to March 28, 2009.

His truck was damaged in an accident in May 2008 and when he had sent the invoice of repair charges to the insurance

company, it had rejected his claim and he had to pay for the repairs from his pocket, Raj had said.

ICICI Lombard had contended in its defence that the claim was rejected because its surveyor had told it that the truck

was being driven by someone else and not the person whose license was submitted by Raj in his claim

.