Lease contract requires 'no excess' insurance

imoscarsmum

My partner recently entered into a lease from Rentsmart to rent an expensive laptop over 3 years. It is the second lease he has taken out and he was happy with the first.

He has now noticed some of the very fine print, which states that he must insure the laptop (fair enough) with a policy that must be 'fully comprehensive and free from restriction or excess'.
If this is not the case, Rentsmart can arrange insurance for him at his cost. This was certainly not the case with the first agreement but was not pointed out to him when he negotiated the new lease.

Our house insurance is fully comp and with a reputable firm and easily covers the laptop but it has an excess (no surprise there), which we are aware of.
Surprise surprise, info arrives this week saying Rentsmart have arranged insurance for him for £13.95 a month (gulp!) with no excess to pay.
We have searched online but cannot find any stand alone insurance with no excesses.

Do we have any rights here or will he just have to pay the £13.95 a month?! The best stand alone policy we have found gives cover for £5.99 a month with a £50 excess, which is perfectly fine in our opinion.
Help?!

kingfisherblue

Have you tried this company? not sure if they chanrge an excess, but might be worth a quick look:

http://uk.protectyourbubble.com/

imoscarsmum

Thanks for the company - it does charge an excess though. I was just hoping that Rentsmart's insistence on an excess free policy was unreasonable and not a fair contract term.

InsideInsurance

Why not either (a) pay to remove your excess on your Home, probably cheaper than what you have been quoted and would apply to all claims not just the laptop or (b) look into seeing if getting an excess insurance policy would meet the terms given the net result of the two policies is nothing being payable.

ValHaller

imoscarsmum wrote: »

Thanks for the company - it does charge an excess though. I was just hoping that Rentsmart's insistence on an excess free policy was unreasonable and not a fair contract term.

Hmm, I think you have a point here. I would be offering a bond to cover the excess and if that was rejected, I would say that it is not a fair contract term. But where you could take this off the back of that, I have no idea.

Did you actually have the opportunity to inspect the contract before you committed?

dalesrider

So for what their ins costs over 3 years you could by a decent laptop..... (just over £500)
Never mind what you are paying a month to rent one.