Mum living in ‘cramped’ top hotel gets 800k to repair flooded home
Ann Marie Glennon Cully indicated to the Commercial Court yesterday that she was prepared to accept a €645,000 offer from Axa Insurance Ltd, following earlier payments totalling €159,000, in settlement of injunction proceedings in her action against the insurer.
She and her children, Zane and Zara, had sued Axa alleging unacceptable delays by it in having their home — Victoria House, St John’s Rd, Sandymount, Dublin — reinstated so they could return to live in it.
Axa previously agreed to pay €514,000 for a first phase of repair works but disputed a claim for €256,000 for a second phase. While it paid €7,500 per month for the family’s Four Seasons accommodation from Oct 2011, it argued against continuing to pay that amount after Mar 2012, instead offering €5,000 per month until repairs were complete.
The house was damaged due to escaped water in late-2009 and, after further such damage in autumn 2011, the family claimed it was uninhabitable.
After late 2009, Zara Cully said she and her mother and brother were on constant duty, night and day, monitoring a water pump in their garden to ensure no further damage and suffered severe hardship, especially in winter 2010. Water saturated the ground floor rooms, there was no heating downstairs, and they often had no running water due to frozen pipes. In Sept 2011, escaped water again flooded the house and they had to leave, she said.
In Oct 2011, they moved into a one-bedroom apartment, plus a standard double room, at the Four Seasons.
Since Dec 2011, they have been living in the one-bedroom apartment which her mother described as “cramped”.
Ann Marie Glennon Cully said, while there were other houses similar to her home on Ailesbury, Shrewsbury and Simmonscourt roads at rents between €7,000 and €10,000 monthly, they were not available. They moved into the Four Seasons as it was near their home and the only nearby hotel that would take the children’s pets — four dogs and a parrot.
Axa argued she chose the “very expensive” Four Seasons and was intent on staying there “at all costs”.
In the action, Ms Glennon Cully said she discovered significant flooding under the floorboards when the heating system’s pipework was being replaced in Oct 2009. That flooding inflicted extensive damage and a claim was notified to Axa in Jan 2010.
Three years later, only emergency damage limitation work had been carried out and actual reinstatement works had not started, she alleged. She had builders who were ready to start last March but could not until Axa gave the go ahead, she claimed.
Among a series of claims, she also alleged Axa tried to change the terms of her insurance policy.
Axa denied the claims, denied responsibility for the delays, and argued it had tried to reach a fair and reasonable settlement. The matter was complicated because a “restoration” project was under way at Victoria House before the discovery of the escape of water and it had not obtained details of those works, it claimed.
The case was before Mr Justice Peter Kelly via an application by the family for orders, pending a full hearing, requiring Axa pay them sums of €75,000, plus €9,000 due to the Four Seasons and €7,500 per month for their accommodation for the next six months. They also sought orders requiring Axa engage in “bona fide” talks with them to ensure their home be speedily repaired.
Paul Fogarty, for Axa, said it was prepared to pay €645,000 for the works to the house — as previously offered — and was not raising arbitration issues. After consulting with Ms Glennon Cully and her daughter, Michael Forde indicated his clients were likely to accept that offer.
Mr Justice Kelly who said Axa appeared to have behaved “reasonably”, adjourned the matter for mention today to allow consultation with Zane on the offer.
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