We just closed on a new house last Friday. I had called and set up my homeowner's insurance a couple of weeks before the closing. All was good...or at least I thought so. While setting up the insurance the lady out our agent's office called because of a theft report that turned up when they searched. Well this theft report was my Father-In-Law's because he had lost his wallet and had to report the credit cards to protect himself. There were no claims paid but it was a CYA to protect him from charges that may pop up on those cards. The lady was happy with the answer and we paid the insurance company around $1,500 at closing for the year.

Well Tuesday I get a call from the lady at our agent's office because we are getting a letter cancelling our insurance because of this theft report!! The underwriters will not cancel if we get a letter from Father-In-Laws insurance company stating it is not our claim. This confusion keeps happening because DH & FIL have similar names - same first, different middles but both start with A, same last.

What really makes me mad is I've had auto insurance with these folks for 20 years and either renters or homeowners with them for 12 years. I've had two small fender benders and no claims on the renters/homeowners side.

I'm so frustrated that I'm tempted to find a whole new company but then I'll have to pay them in advance for a year, get everything changed with the mortgage company and then wait for first company to reimburse me most of the $1,500. I just know something will get messed up in doing all of that this early in the game with the mortgage company.

Just having to vent - this is not the first thing in 12 years of marriage to get tangled up because of this name similarity - credit reports, federal tax refunds, etc. If they really used Social Security Numbers on this stuff like they say they do this would never happen.

Quick question - are you saying your FIL reported lost credit cards to his insurance company? And not just to the credit card companies themselves?

Do you and FIL have the same insurance company??? It's odd that this would be on your insurance history. Any chance it's State Farm??? We were with them since 1989, and finally dumped them last March after yet another screw up on their part. It was easy as pie with the bank to switch insurance companies on our mortgage. If you do decide to got that route, ask your new insurance company if they can wait until you get the refund from your old insurance company.

what a mess.

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Doing the right thing isn't always the same as doing the easy thing.

The way I understand my FIL's theft report is that it is reporting where the insurance companies can see it. He cancelled the cards and filed a police report to cover any chance that someone did use them. We do not use the same insurance company as in-laws because of the name issue. The same with banks -I would love to use the bank they use but after I received their estimated tax payments in my tax return(we do live in a different town) we do everything possible to keep our stuff seperate.

AllinAugust - we do not use State Farm.... We live on the NC coast and I guess the insurance companies are not that anxious to insure us (even though we are 15-20 miles inland).

If I were you, I would call back the insurance company and tell them to straighten it out for you or you will go to another company. Tell them that the theft report is not yours, but belongs to someone with a similar name as your DH. It shouldn't matter whose it is if it's not yours. If it didn't happen to be a relative, there is no way that you could contact the person and ask for some kind of written verification.

My DH is a 'jr'. Somewher along the line DH & his dad's SSN#s got mixed up (DH was listed with his dad's number and Dad was listed with DH's number). Fortunately, both DH & his dad have great credit, so it's never been a problem, but I know it can cause a lot of trouble to get things straightened out.

I find it interesting that your insurance company is declining coverage because of a report of theft. If I were you, I would check and see what else has been mixed up between your DH and his dad. I had my wallet stolen a few years ago and filed a police report. It did not impact us at all when we moved last year and got a new home owners policy. In fact, our policy went down almost $200/year because I guess we moved to a safer zip code.

Sarah.....mom to Jason & Devin