Reply to New Paper: Claim by Anthony Ng

18 October 2006

Editor
New Paper

I refer to your report entitled "Court sets aside attempt to make him bankrupt" (New Paper, 16th Oct 2006).

I wish to explain how a theft claim is settled by NTUC Income, and the reasons for our approach.

During the past 12 months, we settled a total of 250 theft claims representing 96% of all theft claims received by us. The remaining 4% of the claims were withdrawn due to the recovery of the vehicle. On average, it takes about 3.5 months for a theft claim to be settled.

The market value of the stolen vehicle is establised in accordance with our practice note, which is given to all claimants. This has worked well and has resulted in obtaining a fair value that is accepted by the claimants.

This is how we handle a theft claim.

We require the policyholder to furnish us a police report and complete a theft claim form. We wait for the police to complete its investigation into the theft, to ensure that it is a genuine theft. The police investigation usually takes about 3 months. During this time, we interview the owner on the circumstances relating to the theft and agree with the owner on a fair market value for the vehicle.

Here are the facts relating to Anthony Ng's case:

Mr Ng reported to the police that the car was lost on 28 June 2005. He did not notify us about the theft until 6 September 2005, i.e. a delay of 8 weeks. He had actually breached the policy condition for failure to notify us of the theft immediately, but we did not hold this breach against him.

We contacted Mr Ng on three occasions to discuss the circumstances of the claim, but he did not turn up. Subsequently, he was not contactable. Up to now, we not been able to made any offer to Mr Ng on the settlement of the theft claim, due to his lack of cooperation.

About two years ago, Mr Ng had taken a loan from our loan department for the purchase of the car. He failed to pay the loan instalments on time. Mr Ng had actually defaulted on the loan repayment prior to the theft of the car. A total of 7 installments were outstanding by the time our loan department appointed our lawyer to take legal action on 1 November 2005.

My loan department decided to take legal action as they were not satisfied with the non-payment of the loan instalments and his lack of cooperation in expediting the settlement of the theft claim.

In making the case for bankrupcy, the lawyer acting for our loan department used a value for the car as being the sum that the financial institution can recover in the event that the theft claims is not successful. This value comprises the value of the road tax, COE and the PARF value.

I wish to confirm that the amount to be settled for the theft case will be in accordance with our practice note, and will be significantly higher than the sum reported by the New Paper.

Tan Kin Lian
Chief Executive Officer
NTUC Income