March is Fraud Awareness Month, and SGI, the Crown insurance company, highlights some of their fraud insurance cases from the previous year during the month. This year, they highlight five instances where someone tried to defraud SGI.
The investigations are handled by the Special Investigations Unit, or SIU. Last year, they handled hundreds of cases and saved the Crown corporation around $6 million.
One of the cases involved a claim that a car was broadsided by a driver who drove through a stop sign. The two parties claimed they didn’t know each other, and the driver who ran the stop sign was initially charged by police. Further investigation, however, revealed the collision may have been staged. The SIU obtained video of the crash, showing the driver slowed to a stop, giving the driver who ran the stop sign enough time to speed up and crash into the side of the stopped vehicle. The investigation also revealed they knew each other.
Another case involved a person claiming their brand new 2021 Camaro had been stolen. Police worked with OnStar to locate the vehicle, which was found with a banged-up front end. A claim was filed, and it was learned the customer had both key fobs for the car. The vehicle couldn’t be started without them, so once the customer was told that SGI would be working on collecting technical information from OnStar, the claim was withdrawn.
In one instance, a woman claimed her daughter had borrowed her car. While driving in the rain, the daughter was said to have swerved to avoid a deer on a gravel road, into a ditch, and then a dugout. An investigator from the SIU went to the scene, and it turned out it wasn’t a gravel road, and the dugout was actually the town’s reservoir, hundreds of feet from the paved road, on the other side of a town park. It was also determined that the daughter had been drinking at the time of the incident.
A man had filed a claim stating that his classic car had been stolen, but was unable to provide any information related to the vehicle. He also didn’t have any photos of the vehicle, aside from a stock photo of a vehicle that was in the United States. Those who were said to have helped work on the vehicle, described as one you wouldn’t forget, had no recollection of the vehicle.
In a non-vehicle-related incident, a woman reported that her rental property had been robbed, and tens of thousands of dollars of property had been stolen. She had purchased the insurance two weeks prior to the theft and had no receipts or documents to prove she owned any of the items claimed to have been stolen. A financial assessment showed she didn’t have the income to support the purchases she was claiming, and a visit from an SIU investigator determined the house wasn’t big enough to house everything that was stolen. The claim was ultimately denied.
SGI relays five cases of insurance fraud last year - DiscoverWeyburn.com
Read More
No comments:
Post a Comment