Trace and Access: A Step by Step Guide to the Claim

What trace and access cover actually pays for

Trace and access is an extension to a buildings policy, not a policy in its own right. It pays for two things: the cost of finding the source of an escape of water, and the cost of the damage caused by getting to it and putting that damage right afterwards. It does not pay for the failed component, and it does not usually pay for the damage the water itself did, because that sits under the main escape of water section of the policy instead.

The distinction matters because it determines how the invoice has to be broken down. A single figure covering detection, repair and redecoration invites the adjuster to question all of it. Three separate lines allow the adjuster to allocate each one to the section of the policy that responds to it, which is the difference between a settlement and a query.

Limits vary by insurer and are generally stated as an inner limit within the buildings section, commonly somewhere between £5,000 and £10,000, occasionally lower on basic cover. Read the schedule rather than the brochure. Some policies also apply the standard buildings excess to the trace and access element and some do not, which changes the arithmetic on a small claim considerably.

What the extension does not pay for

Cost	Usually covered by trace and access	Where it normally sits instead
Leak detection survey and report	Yes	Trace and access inner limit
Lifting a floor or opening a wall to reach the pipe	Yes	Trace and access inner limit
Making good the floor or wall that was opened	Yes	Trace and access inner limit
Replacing the failed pipe, joint or seal	No	Policyholder, as a maintenance item
Drying, and repairing ceilings and plaster damaged by the water	No	Escape of water section of the buildings policy
Damaged carpets, furniture and belongings	No	Contents policy, if held
Water lost through the leak	No	Water company leak allowance, where one applies

The last line catches people out regularly. A supply pipe leak can waste a large volume of metered water, and no buildings policy pays for it. That is a separate conversation with the water company, and it runs on its own timetable.

Does the cover engage before there is damage?

This is the most commonly misunderstood point in the whole subject, and it is worth being blunt about it. Most trace and access wordings are triggered by damage caused by an escape of water, not by the suspicion of an escape of water. Where a boiler is losing pressure, or a meter is turning with everything off, but nothing in the building is visibly wet, there may be nothing for the extension to attach to yet.

The Financial Ombudsman Service has considered complaints turning on exactly this distinction, and the outcome has turned on the policy wording rather than on whether a leak existed. Where the wording pays for tracing the source of damage, and there is no damage, a declinature can be perfectly correct even though the leak is real.

That is not an argument for waiting until a ceiling comes down. It is an argument for reading the schedule before you assume the survey is funded, and for asking the insurer in writing whether it will authorise investigation on the facts you have. A short email creating a written record of that question is worth more than an hour of phone calls.

The claim in sequence: eight steps

Order matters more than speed. Costs incurred before the insurer was notified are the ones most often disputed, and an approval obtained after the work is the weakest position to argue from.

Step	What happens	What to keep
1. Stop the loss	Isolate the supply or the affected circuit and limit further damage	Time and date, photographs before anything is moved
2. Read the schedule	Confirm trace and access is included, the inner limit, and the excess	The schedule page, not the summary
3. Notify the insurer	Report the escape of water and the visible damage, in writing	Claim reference, date and time of notification
4. Ask the authorisation question	Ask whether an independent survey is authorised, or whether the insurer will appoint	The written answer
5. Survey	Two stage investigation: eliminate, then locate	The report, with readings and photographs
6. Repair	Fix the failed component, quoted separately from detection	Separate invoice line
7. Dry and reinstate	Drying to measured readings, then making good	Drying logs, moisture readings on completion
8. Submit	Report, invoices split by category, photographs, dates	A single indexed bundle

Two of those steps are frequently skipped. Step 4 is skipped because it feels like a delay when water is coming through a ceiling, and step 7 is skipped because the room looks dry. Both are the steps an adjuster looks for when a claim is queried.

• Notify first, instruct second. Even when the insurer has no panel requirement, the notification date anchors everything that follows.
• Ask whether the insurer requires its own contractor. Some policies reserve the right to appoint, and instructing independently can put the cost outside the cover.
• Photograph the damage before anyone moves furniture, lifts a carpet or opens a ceiling. Afterwards is not the same evidence.
• Keep a single dated log of every call, name and reference. Claims that run for months are won on that log.

What happens during a trace and access survey

A survey that an adjuster can rely on runs in two stages, and the first stage is the one that gives the second its credibility. Stage one eliminates. Stage two locates. A report that shows only the finding, with nothing ruled out, is asking to be taken on trust.

Stage one: eliminating the obvious candidates

Stage one is non-destructive and instrumental. The water meter is read over a fixed interval with every outlet closed, which establishes whether water is leaving the supply at all. The heating system is isolated and its pressure watched separately, because a falling boiler gauge is as often a failed expansion vessel or a weeping pressure relief valve as it is a pipe. Moisture readings are taken across the affected area, at the surface and, where the finish allows, at depth. Ambient temperature and relative humidity are recorded, because a cold wall in a poorly ventilated flat in February is a condensation candidate until it is proven otherwise.

Stage two: locating the source

Stage two applies whichever technique suits the construction and the type of leak. Acoustic listening and correlation work on pressurised pipework and need the pipe to be under pressure to make a noise. Thermal imaging needs a temperature difference between the escaping water and its surroundings. Tracer gas works where neither of those conditions holds, by depressurising the pipe, introducing a hydrogen and nitrogen mixture and detecting it where it surfaces. The trade offs between the three are set out in acoustic versus thermal versus tracer gas.

Method	What it detects	What it cannot do
Timed meter test	Whether the supply is losing water at all	Say where, or detect a leak on heating or waste pipework
Moisture meters and probes	Where moisture is present, and at what depth	Distinguish a leak from condensation or rising damp on its own
Acoustic and correlation	The position of a leak on a pressurised pipe run	Work on unpressurised, waste or gravity pipework; it also struggles on plastic pipe and in noisy environments
Thermal imaging	Temperature anomalies indicating water movement or saturation	See through walls, or find anything without a usable temperature differential
Tracer gas	The surfacing point of a leak on an isolated, drained pipe	Be used on a live system, or discriminate between two nearby breaches without careful isolation

Where trace and access claims go wrong

Most of the claims that stall are not declined on principle. They stall on evidence, and the failures repeat.

• Work done before notification. An emergency plumber attends, lifts a floor and fixes the pipe on the same day. The leak is gone and so is the evidence, and the insurer is being asked to fund access it never authorised.
• One undifferentiated invoice. Detection, repair and reinstatement on a single line means the adjuster cannot allocate any of it, so all of it is queried.
• A report with no readings. A page describing a conclusion, with no meter figures, no moisture values, no timestamps and no eliminations, is an opinion.
• Gradual deterioration. Buildings policies respond to sudden escapes of water and generally not to long term seepage or want of maintenance. Where a leak has plainly run for years, the cause finding decides the claim, which is why a cause and origin report is worth more than a location.
• Reinstatement without drying. Closing a floor over damp joists produces a second claim within a year, and the second one is much harder to argue.
• No access limitation stated. If a part of the property could not be inspected, the report has to say so. An unstated limitation surfaces later as a credibility problem.

There is also a category that is not an error at all. Sometimes the honest answer is that no leak exists, and the moisture is condensation, a failed seal around a shower tray or penetrating damp from outside. A survey that establishes that has done its job, even though it produces no trace and access claim. Telling the difference is covered in damp or leak: how to tell the difference.

Flats, blocks and whose policy responds

In a converted house or a purpose built block, the first question is not how the leak is found but whose policy funds the finding. Most blocks are insured under a single buildings policy held by the freeholder or the management company, and that policy frequently carries the trace and access extension. Individual leaseholders often hold contents cover only.

The practical sequence is therefore to notify the managing agent in writing the same day, ask whether the block policy includes trace and access and whether it will be used, and only then instruct anyone. Instructing privately and claiming afterwards is the route that most often ends with nobody paying.

Responsibility for the repair itself is a separate question decided by the lease, not by fault, and the boundary between demised pipework and retained parts is where most of the argument happens. That ground is covered in detail in who pays when a leak damages a neighbour's flat.

If the insurer declines: complaints and the ombudsman

A declinature is not the end of the process. The first step is the insurer's own complaints procedure, and under the Financial Conduct Authority's dispute resolution rules the firm generally has eight weeks to issue a final response.

The timings that matter

If the final response does not resolve it, or eight weeks pass without one, the complaint can be referred to the Financial Ombudsman Service. There is a six month window from the date of the final response in which to do that, and separately a limit of six years from the event complained about, or three years from when you knew or reasonably should have known you had cause to complain, whichever ends later. Missing the six month window is the most common reason a complaint is not considered, and it is entirely avoidable.

What strengthens a complaint

The ombudsman decides on the policy wording and the evidence, so the file matters. The schedule showing the extension and its limit, the written notification with its date, the written authorisation question and any answer, the survey report with readings and eliminations, and invoices split by category. A complaint built on that bundle is arguing about interpretation. A complaint built on recollection is arguing about facts, and losing.

Getting the paperwork right the first time

Ask to see a sample report before instructing anyone, and read it the way an adjuster will. Can you tell what was measured, when, with what instrument, and what was ruled out? Does it separate origin, meaning the physical point of escape, from cause, meaning the mechanism of failure? Are the photographs timestamped and cross referenced to a plan rather than appended as a folder at the back?

Three requests at the point of booking usually save a round of correspondence later. Ask for the eliminations to be stated explicitly and not just the finding. Ask for detection, repair and reinstatement to be costed as three separate lines. Ask for a sketch or location plan that the photographs reference. Our insurance leak claims page sets out the report format we work to, and the trace and access page covers the access and reinstatement side.

None of this makes a weak claim strong. What it does is stop a valid claim failing on procedure, which is how the large majority of trace and access disputes actually arise.