A victim of the Croydon New Year's Eve self-storage fire who lost £15,000 worth of belongings says the company is ignoring her compensation claims. 

Patricia Farrell, 71, shared a unit with her son Curtis, 50, which they used to store his collection of DJ equipment and her collection of Egyptian books and statues.

After fire completely destroyed the building, Ms Farrell, who lives in Addiscombe, sought compensation from Shurgard, having taken out a policy covering £2000 loss when she first began using the facility in 2013.

She has been unable to speak to a company representative since January 1st, as her attempts to claim compensation are repeatedly ignored.

"It's scary that big companies can be so irresponsible and just walk away," she said.

"It was compulsory to take out insurance, even though the amount I have doesn't even cover my loss.

"Morally they owe something to their customers. I've paid them monthly on time for six years, around £100 each time.

"I call everyday and it just rings and rings with no answer. They must have shut down their communications.

"I've worked for big companies before, and we deal with and help customers. They just don't seem to care."

Earlier this month police closed their investigation into the fire, concluding that the extent of damage made it impossible to establish a cause.

All customers were obliged to take out insurance policies worth a minimum of £2000 from Shurgard itself or an external provider when signing up to use the facility.

The company need only compensate customers for the amount covered by their insurance policy, despite many storing possessions worth far more.

For Ms Farrell, who is retired, any amount would go some way to helping her replace what has been lost.

"Ever the minimum £2000 would help," she said.

"How can they be so rude and just ignore us?"

Other victim's have accused the company of misleading customers and hiding behind policies since the incident.

The company's website suggests storage units could be "very useful" in a "period of mourning", while the terms and conditions of customer contracts state it is "strictly forbidden" to store "irreplaceable objects" or "objects with an emotional value."

Victims argue this is misleading, since the belongings of deceased relatives are more than likely to have special sentimental value.

In response, Shurgard has emphasised the terms and conditions expressly forbid the storage of such items.

Speaking on the Victoria Derbyshire show, Duncan Bell, vice president of operations, said: "In the terms and conditions it does mention that customers are not to store items of emotional or sentimental value.

"There's no value of misleading people to our business. The contract that's signed confirms that the customer has read the terms and conditions."