u/Similar_Room3204

Why is lying so prevalent in the civil service?

I'm fed up of the number of conversations I've had that go:

X: "Right, that's agreed. We'll do A and B and you'll do C and D."

Y: "Yes, we'll do C and D"

And then two weeks later:

Y: "Who's doing C?"

X: "You said you were."

Y: "I never said that. We don't have the resources to do C. I would never have agreed to it."

I've got a Teams video of you saying it. It's not a difference in interpretation, I've learnt to be absolutely bombproof explicit in these conversations.

I'm fine if someone comes back and says "I've had a talk with my manager and we can't do it, sorry". But they never do, they always flat out deny having said it.

In my career I've been lied to twice in the private sector. In the civil service it happens about once a month.

I will try to keep this simple.

Car was parked. Perfectly legally. X hits car. X leaves note and accepts blame. Car is dented but otherwise perfectly fine.

My insurance offers claim on my insurance or a third party claim management company (CMC) CMC wants to inflate the costs with a hire car. I say no. CMC gets repair quote. X's insurance write off car and send a cheque. I tell CMC I want nothing to do with them anymore.

Two weeks later my insurance company write to me telling me they cancelled my insurance when X's insurance wrote the car off. I've been driving uninsured for two weeks.

Complain to ombudsman. Ombudsman says it was disappointing of my insurance but ultimately legal.

Is this really how this is supposed to work? Can insurers really just cancel insurance without telling you?

The policy says they can only cancel due to fraud or a claim, and in this case this was neither but that argument didn't work on the ombudsman.