Gabriel Killin lost his $20,000 vehicle in the Croft Auto blaze: he’ll never see that money again
An insurance grey area has left two motorists facing financial hardship after a fire ripped through a mechanic’s workshop destroying their vehicles. What car owners need to be aware of.
Cairns
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There was more than one victim of the Croft Auto fire that glowed in the Cairns dawn on May 31 this year.
About seven vehicles became ash in the blaze. Gabriel Killin’s Toyota LandCruiser, worth about $20,000, was among them.
After two years of tribulation – which included a rapid, debt-swelling evacuation from South America with his then six-year-old daughter during Covid-19 – his loss plunged him $20,000 further into the hole, and insurance won’t come to his rescue.
“I was always under the assumption that if you left your car at a mechanic, and the mechanic’s shop burnt down, that the car would be covered (by them),” Mr Killin said.
“(My vehicle) was in for a roadworthy.”
Mr Killin said he did not have a comprehensive car insurance policy for his vehicle.
“I managed to contact (owner) Graeme (Croft) by Facebook … over the course of a couple of days he said ‘my insurance has come back and said you parked there at your own risk, so you’re not covered’.
“He did say ‘you can try claiming under my insurance number’. I sent that paperwork off to the insurance company … but they won’t get back to me; it’s just gone nowhere.
“It wasn’t declared to me that my car wasn’t covered; they should tell you that at the beginning.
“I was hoping to get the replacement value of my car back from Graeme, but I don’t think that’s going to happen.”
Mr Killin, general manager of Cairns Student Lodge, has been without a personal vehicle since the inferno: he has had to use a work vehicle – a 12-seater bus – to transport his daughter, Gabriella, to school.
“I had to come back from Colombia at the beginning of the pandemic; I had hostels over there, but I lost everything including my business,” he said.
“But coming back here was still the better option. That car was the first thing I bought when we got back.
“I’m a single dad; we don’t have any family or friends up here. That was going to be our little vehicle to get around and have a life.
“It’s depressing. Ever since we got back there’s just been bad stuff happening to us. This was like the final nail in the coffin.”
Trinity Beach man Chris Laird also lost a vehicle, which didn’t have a comprehensive car insurance policy, in the Croft Auto fire.
“I had a Ford Fiesta stored there on the night of the fire. I had it in there for a roadworthy,” Mr Laird said.
“The thing’s gone up in smoke and I’ve been told by Graeme that cars are at customers’ own risk if they’re left there.
“It’s a financial burden. I’d like to be reimbursed … by either (Graeme Croft) or the insurance company he has public liability with. Somebody’s got to have a duty of care.”
Graeme Croft, who lost three of his own vehicles in the fire, said customers’ cars would have been covered if he or his business was discovered to be negligent.
“But because it was an accident, (the insurance company) is saying that it falls back on the customers’ insurance because it was an accident and could have happened anywhere,” Mr Croft said.
“All my vehicles are gone as well: I don’t get anything for them.
“As far as I knew we were insured for as much as we could be. No insurance company covers an accidental loss, which seems stupid to me as well.”
Fire investigators deemed the Croft Auto fire as “not suspicious”.
Mr Croft said he was engaged with customers who lost vehicles in the fire and tried to find a solution where one could exist.
“I’ve put them in touch with our insurance. That’s what our insurance broker said … put a claim through and try and get something for them; but, unfortunately, it doesn’t look real good.
“Our insurance broker said that if they don’t insure their car for an accidental loss it’s not up to us to insure it. We’re insured for any damage we cause to it.”
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Originally published as Gabriel Killin lost his $20,000 vehicle in the Croft Auto blaze: he’ll never see that money again
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