Does this invalidate home insurance cover?

sarbaloosa

Hello,

If I purchase something brand new (contents I bought 1 month ago) and failed to declare these with my insurer, does this invalidate my entire insurance policy for any other contents?

For example, I have building and contents cover. There were no single items in my house worth over the limits set by my insurer. Therefore I was covered.

My policy states the following about single items cover:

If specified on your certificate of insurance, we will pay up to £15,000 for any individual item within the home. Where individual items within the home are not specified we will pay up to £5,000 unless it is a high risk valuable.

We consider valuables to be items composed of precious metal or precious stones, jewellery, watches, furs, curios and works of art, computer equipment, money or portable electrical equipment other than televisions or radios. The most we will pay for valuables within the home is £15,000. If they are not specified on your certificate of insurance we will pay up to £2,000 per item.


A month ago I purchased a radio for £4500.00.

Do I have to declare this item with my insurance company? And if I do not is my entire contents insurance (for all other items) invalidated?

If my item goes missing will I be paid £4500.00 or £2000.00?

Thank you.

p.s. no jokes about the hefty 4500 radio!! It is for a sound recording studio.

rudekid48

Why not just ask your Insurer? They are the only ones that can answer your question - anything from on here would just be an opinion....

sarbaloosa

I have and they have said, that I am entitled to £2000.00 for the item. However, it seems very clear to me that I should be paid the full value of the item based on their wording. The sad part is that I almost took the £2000 cash settlement only to be told by my father to phone them back and say no. After reading the wording, it seems clear but needed a second look over.

vaio

seems clear to me, radios aren't "valuables" so the £5k limit applies assuming the total sum insured is adequate.

One concern I might have is that you say the radio is for a "sound recording studio", I guess that is a business recording studio so do you have cover for business items?

rudekid48

sarbaloosa wrote: »

Hello,

If I purchase something brand new (contents I bought 1 month ago) and failed to declare these with my insurer, does this invalidate my entire insurance policy for any other contents?

For example, I have building and contents cover. There were no single items in my house worth over the limits set by my insurer. Therefore I was covered.

My policy states the following about single items cover:

If specified on your certificate of insurance, we will pay up to £15,000 for any individual item within the home. Where individual items within the home are not specified we will pay up to £5,000 unless it is a high risk valuable.

We consider valuables to be items composed of precious metal or precious stones, jewellery, watches, furs, curios and works of art, computer equipment, money or portable electrical equipment other than televisions or radios. The most we will pay for valuables within the home is £15,000. If they are not specified on your certificate of insurance we will pay up to £2,000 per item.


A month ago I purchased a radio for £4500.00.

Do I have to declare this item with my insurance company? And if I do not is my entire contents insurance (for all other items) invalidated?

If my item goes missing will I be paid £4500.00 or £2000.00?

Thank you.

p.s. no jokes about the hefty 4500 radio!! It is for a sound recording studio.

It's there in the terms, they don't class radios as "valuables" and so they cannot be specified, which means that the max value is £2000

CKhalvashi

vaio wrote: »

One concern I might have is that you say the radio is for a "sound recording studio", I guess that is a business recording studio so do you have cover for business items?

This is another concern of mine, as someone who works within the same industry.

It's well known in the office, that I don't leave cameras/sound equipment in my car overnight, but in the office, as it's not covered by either my car (business/public liability cover) or home (personal, with some declared office use) insurances.

You may need Public Liability and Business insurance, possibly plus the individual items to be insured. Speak to your insurer for more info.

CK

benjaminM

CKhalvashi wrote: »

This is another concern of mine, as someone who works within the same industry.

It's well known in the office, that I don't leave cameras/sound equipment in my car overnight, but in the office, as it's not covered by either my car (business/public liability cover) or home (personal, with some declared office use) insurances.

You may need Public Liability and Business insurance, possibly plus the individual items to be insured. Speak to your insurer for more info.

CK

^ I agree with the above 2 posters. Your main problem is the fact it appears the item you want covered is a business item and would normally not be covered anyway. If you are working from home you would need to contact your insurer to see if this acceptable to them as many dont allow it. Speak to your insurer and see what they say. Hopefully you can get a working from home extension on the policy and get the item covered correctly. If they wont cover it then I'd suggest you speak to a broker who should be able to find an insurer who can help. Off the top of my head I know Axa will cover items like this and possibly Aviva.

Let us know how you get on.

sarbaloosa

rudekid48 wrote: »

It's there in the terms, they don't class radios as "valuables" and so they cannot be specified, which means that the max value is £2000

Where individual items within the home are not specified we will pay up to £5,000 unless it is a high risk valuable

Doesn't that mean that any item that is NOT a high risk valuable is eligible for up to £5000.00 cover.

It then goes on to define valuables:

We consider valuables to be items composed of precious metal or precious stones, jewellery, watches, furs, curios and works of art, computer equipment, money or portable electrical equipment other than televisions or radios. The most we will pay for valuables within the home is £15,000. If they are not specified on your certificate of insurance we will pay up to £2,000 per item.

So in this paragraph it states that the television and radios are not not considered high risk valuables therefore the limit of £2000.00 doesn't apply to them. Instead they fall under the £5K bracket??

So which statement applies to the radio:

Where individual items within the home are not specified we will pay up to £5,000 unless it is a high risk valuable

or

The most we will pay for valuables within the home is £15,000. If they (presuming 'they' means valuables) are not specified on your certificate of insurance we will pay up to £2,000 per item.

The second statement seems to be in relation to valuables i.e. if you have any item that is considered a valuable and is worth over £2000 and you have not declared it, then we will pay you a max of £2000


Confused!

sarbaloosa

benjaminM wrote: »

^ I agree with the above 2 posters. Your main problem is the fact it appears the item you want covered is a business item and would normally not be covered anyway. If you are working from home you would need to contact your insurer to see if this acceptable to them as many dont allow it. Speak to your insurer and see what they say. Hopefully you can get a working from home extension on the policy and get the item covered correctly. If they wont cover it then I'd suggest you speak to a broker who should be able to find an insurer who can help. Off the top of my head I know Axa will cover items like this and possibly Aviva.

Let us know how you get on.

Thanks guys. The cover is fine and the insurance company has accepted the claim. The issue is over the £2000 limit they are trying to suggest, which Im not sure applies to the radio based on the points made in my last post.

rs65

sarbaloosa wrote: »

If I purchase something brand new (contents I bought 1 month ago) and failed to declare these with my insurer, does this invalidate my entire insurance policy for any other contents?

Your first post sounded like a general enquiry but later posts point to a claim. Presumably as you have been offered a settlement, you know it doesn't invalidate your entire policy?

A point that may be raised is the overall adequacy of your contents sum insured. Hopefully you had a generous sum insured.

Yorkie1

How big is this radio? The paragraph which refers to radios does so in the context of 'portable' equipment; if it's a sound recording machine then is it really portable?