Paramount Garments yet to get their insurance payout

….a year after their building was razed down by a fire

Management says the delay might force them to close shop as it is straining them financially

Paramount Garments, a 75 year old company in Zimbabwe, is still waiting on its insurance payout, a year after its factory in Harare was engulfed in a disastrous fire that cost them a three storey factory.

Speaking during a donation handover of 370 pairs of gloves to the City of Harare’s Fire department last week, company Finance Director, Jeremy Youmans, said the situation is straining them financially and needs a resolution as soon as yesterday.

“It is a stress on the company and I couldn’t guarantee that we can carry on surviving the way we are going at the moment without the payout. So hopefully we will get some resolution soon,” he said.

Paramount Garments factory in Harare, was engulfed in a fire in December 2023, which took firefighters 10 days to douse, but to date, an insurance payout due to them to replace the factory is yet to be disbursed.

In the mean time the company has had to continue with operations and have set up a temporary working space which is a third of the size of their destroyed factory.  

Because of limited space, the company now has to outsource services such as warehousing as they desperately wait on the payout.

“That wall was set up as a temporary measure to enable us to continue manufacturing, so until we get the full payout, we are having to go outside the premises to get warehouses and stuff and until we get our  seven and half thousand square meter, three storey building replaced ,” he said.

“So to not have any financial support whatsoever has been quite disastrous. Its been an ongoing process and there are a lot of stones being thrown both ways,” he added.

Paramount claims they have done all the paperwork, complied with th einsurer’s requests for documents, allowed them to audit, but a whole year later the money is yet to be paid out.

“As you saw in the process we tried everything we can , I think we have had a lot of conversations and meetings and supplying information but we are likely having to entre a legal process to get what’s due to us I think,” said Youmans.

The delays have pushed the company has to lodge a complaint with insurance regulators, Insurance and Pensions Commission for a resolution.

“We have complained to IPEC about it and put on a significant complaint, had a meeting with them and they have said that they will be seized by it and follow through. So we are hopeful that that some common sense and integrity will show through from their investigation,” said Youmans.

IPEC confirmed that they are seized with the matter.

“Paramount recently lodged s complaint over a delay in the settlement of their claim. The commission is currently engaging the policy holder and the insurer to assist in the resolution of the dispute,” IPEC’s Director of Insurance Supervision, Sibongile Siwela, confirmed to The NewsHawks.

If the regulator fails to make a resolution, Paramount will go the legal route.

“The only other way, the sad path is through an arbitration process which we have said that we have been prepared to enter but that is taking its time because we cannot even agree on who the arbitrator should be at the moment. And then just going through to the courts.

“It’s a shame that we need to use these paths to settle these things

“We should be able to do it ourselves , we had a very good relationship we have done lots of talking they spent months and months auditing the claims that we put in and all documentation we gave them and yet we haven’t gotten any reason or offer on the table or  any proof of how they will calculate what they have said they might pay us,” said Youmans.

In the ten day fight with the fire, Paramount Garments identified gaps within the Harare fire fighting department, and in commemorating one year of the fire, they donated gloves.

“These gloves that you see here in front of you which are made in Bulawayo from Zimbabwean leather and this shows that we can make a lot of these things here, they are heat resistant gloves and if you watch anybody fighting a fire you will see how important it is to have gloves because you need your hands and hands are often used to if you are a fire person to search or feel thwe way where you are going , youi often use your hands so to have them covered and protected from the fire is very impoortant,” said Youmans.