Contents and Building Insurance

chirpchirp

Apologies to anyone who has seen most of this post in the mortgage free wannabies forum.

I thought I would post this here, firstly to warn people to check their policies against direct debit "loans". Secondly, to warn people to shop around ( as if we don't know that - or else we wouldn't be reading this thread) Thirdly, to ask advice.

I received a renewal quote for my buildings insurance in February and didn't look at it carefully. This month I realised I was being charged for a loan on it as I was paying by dd when I could have paid as a lump sum. The amount due was £374.6 and the interest was £50.98. When I realised I was being charged the interest I rang up and asked to cancel the loan. Although the policy only took affect on the 6th March and I was calling on the April 7th I was told that I would be charged for 56 days of the loan. Apparently although it is a daily interest amount the first 28 days interest is charged after 28 days of the policy running and the following 28 days is also charged at the same time. Hence I needed to pay them £387.82.

Reading this forum I realised this was rather a lot but it was only slightly more than I had paid them last year so I hadn't looked into changing it. Anyhow, I decided it was time to look properly into my contents insurance which is due in June. It cost me £233.57 last year. I found a contents only cover which was approx £115. Then I decided to see if I could find a buildings and contents cover and got a quote for £327.60.

I have rang contents insurers who haven't made it clear if a cancellation fee will be charged but only 19.45 left to pay on their policy. Buildings insurance have said if I cancelled now I would get about £311 back and in a month this would be reduced to £290 ish. Since this phone call I have rang back to ask about cancellation fees and have been told these can't be caluclated until I cancel the policy but could be upto £75.

What I can't work out is whether it is cheaper to buy just the contents cover at about £115 or to take both and take the hit of cancellation charges on the building insurance I have already paid. Anyone good with maths?

So first question was in previous paragraph, but I guess this can't be worked out till I know the exact cancellation charges but I was told they wouldn't know this until they had cancelled the policy. This seems strange to me and is surely a way to prevent people from moving their policies mid term. Can they refuse to give me this information before I cancel?

Thirdly, am i right in thinking that the formula to work this out is the buildings insurance £387 + contents insurance £115 - contents/building @ £327.60. If the refund is less than this amount it's not worth doing or have i got it the wrong way round, should it be, if the refund is more than this amount it is worth doing?

Any help to work the third question out in particular would be much appreciated.