On the morning of May 28 I woke up early to head to the gym, only to find my pride and joy, a Porsche 911 4S, had vanished from outside our suburban house in southwest London.

It was unnerving. I knew car theft in Britain was alive and well – up 75 per cent in the past decade – but thought that my silver-grey vehicle was safe, as it was first registered more than a decade ago, in 2015.

My first breathless call that morning was to the Metropolitan Police non-urgent number of 101. 

Predictably, there was a lengthy message telling me that the crime could be reported online. Otherwise, my call would be in a queue.

After ten minutes I was put through. My name and email address were taken (I subsequently learned that both were recorded wrongly) and details taken.

The police call was remarkable for its brevity, lack of empathy or any investigatory intent. 

A crime number was provided, for insurance purposes, and I was told an officer would be in touch in the next week.

My next call was to insurer Admiral with whom we have a multi-car policy also covering my son’s Peugeot run-around and a nearly new Alfa Romeo SUV. 

There was an option to do it online, but that doesn’t do it for many of us. 

Human contact, customer service, understanding and sympathy is what we crave.

Eventually a woman with a soft Welsh accent answered – Admiral is based in my wife’s native city of Cardiff. 

The details were recorded. I was told there was no right to a hire car because I hadn’t requested it when the policy – which it described as ‘Gold’ – was arranged. 

A claim number was given, and I was told an email requesting further information would be dispatched. But what has followed over the past four weeks has been an Orwellian farce.

The attitude of the insurer was to demand ever more information, much of it irrelevant. By the time Admiral declared itself satisfied, it felt like I was responsible for the theft.

The police have declared the case closed (more on that later) and only now has an offer of a payout been made as my hire car bills rise.

Among the information demanded by Admiral was the DVLA driving record code for each named driver.

This was puzzling, given it should have all those details on record from when the policy was taken out. I was also asked for registration documents, a bill of sale and evidence that the car had been paid for, and two sets of keys.

After seven years my own records were scant, so I contacted the car’s seller who is a friend and distinguished international human rights lawyer.

Fortunately, they use Britain’s historic private bank, C Hoare. In seconds it produced a bank statement and copies of my original cheques. 

But the fact that the seller had received and banked full payment, some £70,000, was not enough to satisfy the Admiral sleuths. They wanted copies of my bank account, too.

Fortunately – again – I had paper records for most of the payments from my Santander account, but I couldn’t find a £10,000 payment from a NatWest account. It required a request to my bank and took ten days or so to arrive.

The time-consuming admin left me feeling that Admiral, rather than being on my side, suspected a scam.

As for the Metropolitan Police, they clearly have decided car crime is not a priority. Four days after the theft I had a call from an officer.

I invited him to come and check the CCTV, and any footage my neighbours might have, but there was no interest.

But there followed a lecture on steps I should take to protect myself, including using a Faraday box (a container shielded from electromagnetic fields that protects remote key fobs) and trackers.

He then offered extraordinary advice. 

When and if the insurers make their first offer of a payout, don’t accept it – they will quote a price well below market value and I should challenge it. 

With that he signed off, telling me that a letter, saying the case had been closed, would follow.

I know resources are stretched and no one was hurt, but the level of disinterest in visiting the scene, examining CCTV footage or advising the neighbourhood of thieves

operating in the area seemed extraordinarily neglectful.

As for Admiral, I then received a call saying the claim was in the ‘validation’ phase. 

Then I received notification that ‘the underwriting team had completed their review’ and my claim passed to management ‘for final review’.

What I knew is my low mileage (just below 40,000) Porsche-serviced car (at great expense) had kept its value. The current market price is £55,000.

What a pleasant surprise, then, when Admiral came through on Friday with an offer of £61,209.50, after deducting a £750 excess on the policy.

I enjoyed seven years of fulfilling motoring and am sad about the theft. But I’ll keep all records of big purchases to hand in future – and suggest you do the same to cut down at least some of the nightmare admin you could face.

Have you struggled to sort out a car theft claim? Tell us what happened at [email protected]