22 May 2026
The year is moving far too fast for my liking, although there is little any of us can do to slow the passing of time. Tempus fugit — time flies — and it certainly does.
It has now been three years since that unforgettable journey through the Simpson Desert, where my vehicle suffered catastrophic damage after striking a severe washout between Camps 7 and 8 on the Madigan Line.
As many already know, what followed was not simply the aftermath of an outback accident, but a further fourteen months locked in a relentless battle with the insurer — an insurer I had trusted to support me and assess my claim with the honesty, fairness, and decency that every policyholder has a right to expect.
Instead, the handling of my claim became something I could never have imagined. Until that point in my life, I had never found myself in a position where I was forced to fight so hard simply for the truth to be acknowledged.
While I accept that I had placed myself in that environment, the incident itself was obviously unintentionally, I believe the insurer adopted an approach to my claim that was unnecessarily adversarial, dismissive, and at times fundamentally inconsistent with the obligations imposed under Australian insurance law.
Section 13 of the Insurance Contracts Act 1984 imposes a statutory duty of utmost good faith (uberrima fides) on both insurer and insured alike. It requires honesty, fairness, transparency, and reasonableness throughout the life of the policy and, most importantly, during the claims assessment process.
A failure to meet that obligation is not merely poor customer service; it can constitute a breach of both the insurance contract and the Act itself. Unfair claims handling may expose insurers to regulatory scrutiny, civil penalties, and compensatory outcomes.
Although my claim was ultimately accepted, I remain firmly of the view that this outcome only occurred following my decision to escalate the matter to AFCA — the Australian Financial Complaints Authority. While AFCA did not formally determine the dispute, their involvement appeared to bring a sudden and noticeable change to the insurer’s approach to the claim.
I often wonder how many other claimants experienced similar treatment but lacked the time, resources, or determination to continue pushing back.
My purpose in telling this story is not revenge or bitterness. It is accountability. Transparency within the insurance industry should never be reduced to a slogan or public relations exercise. It must remain a genuine obligation owed to every policyholder who places their trust in the system.
Sometimes persistence is not about confrontation. Sometimes it is simply about standing firm long enough for the truth to catch up.
I have now penned a book capturing the trip itself, the debacle of the claim and how it was mishandled, the ultimate and eventual successful outcome and what that looked like, and how I have moved on from that incident.
The book is titled 'The Long Road' for it certainly was indeed. It will be published shortly on my online bookstore at https://books.by/rickcanhan
