Home insurance advice

aceades

Cant find a straight forward answer for this and not sure where i stand, so any advice appreciated.

When i came back from work the other day i found that two of my electrical items had packed up (one worth about 400 the other about 200, Hifi equipment). The devices still turn on but don't function correctly, they were both plugged in the same place and had both been in situ for over 4 years without issue.

it could coincidence they failed together or some issue with power perhaps, i spoke to insurance briefly and they said they cover power surge and 'one off' issues providing an electrical engineer can look at the items and confirm its not a 'wiring fault'.

They were going to call back as i was busy working but ive not had a call yet.


Does anyone has any experience with similar circumstances ? i have had home insurance for over 10 years but never used it so im not sure what kind of things are covered. I don't want to try and claim if its not the kind of thing that would be covered but i also really need replacement kit and unfortunately no way i can afford it : (

again any advice appreciated

lisyloo

Have you looked at whether the items can be repaired?
Did either have a 5 year warranty?

The problem with claiming is that you'll lose your 10 years no claims and you will also get loaded for making a claim. You will see an increase in premiums for the next few years and you may have an excess.
You'd need to do more maths and try virtual quotes (for the scenarios with the claim and without) to work out the cost, but it's not obvious it's worth claiming.

Surely you need to see if the items can be repaired.
It may be one component that needs replacement rather thna the whole item.
Why would you just replace something worth £400 without lokoing to see if it can be reapired first?

Unfortunately by ringing your insurer you have declared a "loss" which may now be registered against you in future and may be available to other insurers, so when you gets quotes in future you need to make sure you declare this. It might even be that when you try to claim and if you didn't declare it you could be accused of "non-disclosure" (basically lying) if it's redorded.
It was a bad idea to ring then IMO because if it turns out to be £5 to fix then you still have this black mark against you unnecessarily.
For this reason personally I'd start with queries (like reading the paperwork or looking a tt the website) without calling the insurer first.

kingstreet

Three years ago, I came home in the afternoon and found our neighbours milling around outside. It turned out lightning had struck one of their houses.

When I came in our house, our TV, Sky box, router and fax/printer were all, no longer working. The lightning had travelled around the area via the phone lines, frying everything connected.

If we hadn't heard it from the neighbours, we wouldn't have known and would have been in the same position. Having the problem investigated may yield something similar and hopefully, one for which you can claim.