The Basement Flood That Insurance Wouldn't Cover | GetAHomePro
The Basement Flood That Insurance Wouldn't Cover
·10 min read
M
Mike RichardsonMaster Plumber
Published March 20, 2026
Key Takeaway
Linda paid $600 cash to a Kijiji handyman to fix her sump pump. When her basement flooded, Intact denied the $13,200 claim. Here's what happened.
I'm writing this on behalf of Linda, because she asked me to.
She's 63. Retired nurse. Spent 30 years walking the halls of Lakeridge Health on King Street — the same hospital you can see from the front window of her bungalow on Simcoe Street North. When Doug was alive, he used to joke that she could commute in her slippers.
Doug died four years ago. Linda lives alone now, in a house that's too big and too quiet, but hers.
She takes care of it the way she takes care of everything — methodically, practically. New shingles in 2021. Eavestroughs cleaned every fall. The furnace serviced every October without fail.
She thought she was doing the right thing.
February: The Grinding Sound
It started as a noise.
The sump pump in the basement had been running for 15 years without complaint — same unit, same pit, same corner of the utility room. Then sometime in early February, Linda noticed it was making a sound she'd never heard before. A low, grinding hum. Intermittent. Not constant, but wrong.
She googled it. Forums said it could be the impeller, could be the bearings, could mean the pump was nearing the end of its life. Linda decided not to wait to find out.
She called a few plumbers. The first one couldn't come for two weeks. The second quoted $900 just to diagnose. The third didn't call back.
So she did what a lot of people do. She went on Kijiji.
"I wasn't looking for a shortcut. I was looking for someone who could show up."
She found Greg. His listing said "Handyman — All Home Repairs, Fast and Affordable." Five-star reviews. Quick reply. He said he'd replaced sump pumps before, no problem. $600 cash. He could be there the next day.
He showed up in a Honda Civic at 10 a.m. No van. No logo. A toolbox in the back seat.
Linda made him coffee. He was friendly. Seemed confident. He was in and out of the basement for about two hours, came upstairs, said it was done. New pump, seated properly, should run fine.
Linda paid him $600 in cash.
She didn't ask for a receipt. He didn't offer one.
Licensed Master Plumber, 18+ years experience, Backflow Prevention Certified
Mike Richardson is a licensed master plumber with over 18 years of hands-on experience in residential and commercial plumbing. He specializes in water heater installations, drain systems, and emergency plumbing repairs across Ontario and the northeastern United States.
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That damp, mineral smell — cold water on concrete. She woke up at 4:11 a.m. on April 9th and lay still for a moment, listening. Nothing obvious. She got up anyway, walked to the basement door at the end of the hall, and opened it.
The bottom three steps were wet.
"The water was just sitting there. Still. Quiet. Like it had been there a while."
She stood at the top of the stairs and stared. Four inches of water across the entire basement floor. The washer and dryer — both sitting on the floor, not raised — were sitting in it. The hot water tank was in it. The finished section of the basement, where Doug's old woodworking bench was, where they'd kept the shelving unit with the bins — all of it, submerged.
The sump pump wasn't running.
She waded in with rubber boots to check it. The unit was plugged in. The motor hummed when she touched the switch manually. But the float — the mechanism that's supposed to sense rising water and trigger the pump — was sitting in the wrong position. Greg had installed it backwards. The float was calibrated to shut off when water rose, not turn on.
The pump had been broken since February.
She just hadn't had a flood until now.
The Adjuster
She called Intact at 6 a.m. They were professional. Calm. They sent an adjuster out within 48 hours.
He walked through the basement, took photos, asked questions. Standard procedure. Then he got to the sump pump.
"When was this last serviced?"
February, she said. She had it replaced.
"Who did the work?"
A handyman she found on Kijiji. Greg something. She didn't have his last name.
"Do you have a receipt? A work order? His contractor license number?"
She had none of it. No paper trail. No license. No permit. Nothing.
"He was polite about it, the adjuster. That almost made it worse."
The denial came by letter ten days later.
The relevant section read: "The loss resulted from improperly installed equipment by an unqualified tradesperson. Under the terms of your policy, homeowners are responsible for ensuring that all maintenance and repair work is performed by qualified, licensed professionals. Claims arising from substandard workmanship by unlicensed contractors are excluded from coverage."
$13,200 in damage.
Insurance paid: $0.
What the Water Took
The hot water tank was a write-off. Replacement: $2,800.
The washer and dryer — a Maytag set she and Doug had bought together at the Best Buy on Taunton Road the year they retired — were destroyed. Replacement: $1,900.
The basement remediation — drywall, flooring, mould testing, drying equipment — came in at $8,500.
Those are the numbers. Those are the things with dollar values.
Then there's the Rubbermaid bin.
It was a big one, grey lid, sitting on the floor in the corner of the finished room. Linda had put it there years ago because it was sturdy and waterproof — or so she'd assumed. When the water rose to four inches, it found the seam around the lid.
Inside the bin were photo albums.
Thirty-something years of them. Vacations she and Doug had taken before the kids were born — a road trip to Cape Breton in 1989, Niagara-on-the-Lake in a snowstorm, a cruise they'd saved two years to afford. Holiday photos. Birthday photos. The album from their 25th anniversary dinner at a restaurant in Whitby that doesn't exist anymore.
Doug has been gone four years. Linda doesn't have digital versions. The photos were the only printed copies.
When she opened the bin, the bottom third was wet. The water had wicked up through the albums. Some photos were stuck together. Some were gone. She spent an afternoon carefully separating pages, setting them to dry on towels across the kitchen table, trying to save whatever she could.
Some survived. Most didn't.
"I can replace a hot water tank," she told me. "I can't replace those photos."
Greg
She texted him.
"The pump failed. I have 4 inches of water in my basement. The float switch was put in backwards."
He replied six hours later.
"I installed it right. Must be a defective unit. Not my problem."
He didn't come back. He didn't offer a refund. He's still on Kijiji with five-star reviews.
What Linda Knows Now That She Wishes She'd Known Then
She's not angry, exactly. Or she is, but not at Greg specifically. She's angry at herself, and she doesn't want that anger to be wasted.
So here's what she'd tell you.
How to Protect Yourself
1. For plumbing work — including sump pumps — hire a licensed plumber, not a handyman.
In Ontario, replacing a sump pump may seem simple, but it involves plumbing connections and, depending on your municipality, may require a permit. A licensed plumber carries liability insurance. If they screw up, you have legal recourse. If a Kijiji handyman screws up, you have a text message.
2. Always get a written receipt with the contractor's full name, business name, and license number.
Before any tradesperson starts work, ask for their license number. In Ontario, you can verify plumbing licenses through the Ontario College of Trades. A legitimate pro won't hesitate. Anyone who hesitates is telling you something important.
3. Ask your insurance company what they require before you hire.
Call Intact — or whoever your insurer is — and ask: "If I have work done on my sump pump, what documentation do I need to keep my claim valid?" Get it in writing. Do this before any repair, not after.
4. Don't store irreplaceable items on a basement floor.
This one is hard to say, but it's true. Bins fail. Floors flood. If something cannot be replaced, it shouldn't be at ground level. Put it on shelving. Digitize your photos. Do it this week, before you need to.
5. Raise your appliances if you can.
A $40 set of appliance risers can keep your washer and dryer 6 inches above the floor. It won't stop a flood, but it buys you time and can mean the difference between a ruined machine and a salvageable one.
6. Test your sump pump every spring — before you need it.
Pour a bucket of water into the pit. Watch the float rise. Watch the pump kick on. If anything seems off, call a licensed plumber before the thaw, not after.
If you need a plumber or any home service professional in Ontario, GetAHomePro lists licensed, verified contractors. Every pro on the platform has gone through credential checks. Linda's situation didn't have to happen. Yours doesn't either.
Questions Readers Asked After This Story
Could Linda sue Greg?
Technically, yes — in Small Claims Court. But Greg has no business registration, no insurance, and his real last name is unclear. Even with a judgment in her favour, collecting it is another matter. Her lawyer told her the cost of pursuing it would likely exceed what she'd recover.
What if she'd paid by credit card instead of cash?
A credit card purchase could have given her a chargeback option and, crucially, a paper trail. Cash left her with nothing. Even e-transfer — which creates a transaction record — would have been marginally better. Always leave a paper trail.
Does insurance ever cover sump pump failure?
Many home insurance policies in Ontario offer an optional water damage endorsement that covers sump pump failure due to mechanical breakdown — but not if the failure resulted from improper installation. The coverage also typically requires documentation that the pump was professionally maintained. Read your policy. Call your broker. Do it now.
Would a permit have helped?
Possibly. If the work had required a permit, a municipal inspector would have signed off on the installation — including the float switch orientation. The permit process exists for exactly this reason. It's not bureaucracy. It's a second set of eyes.
Can she appeal the insurance denial?
She did. She wrote a formal appeal to Intact. They reviewed it and upheld the decision. Her next option would be the General Insurance OmbudService (GIO) — a free dispute resolution service. She's considering it, though her lawyer has been honest about her chances.
Why didn't Greg's Kijiji reviews warn her?
They didn't because most people don't know work was done wrong until months later, when something fails. By then, they've forgotten the listing, moved on, or just feel embarrassed. The review ecosystem for casual handyman services has a significant lag between work performed and outcome realized. It's a known problem with no easy fix.
Linda came back to me a few weeks after I first heard her story. She'd been going through the photos she managed to save — the ones that dried flat enough to keep.
She found one she didn't know she had. Doug at their kitchen table, maybe 15 years ago, reading the newspaper. No occasion. Nobody took it deliberately. Just a moment someone happened to catch.
She had it scanned and printed large. It's on the wall now, above the kitchen table where Doug used to sit.