Switching home/contents insurance for the first time

Staples929

I'm aiming to switch my home and contents insurance for the first time since i moved into my new house. I'm mortgaged with Nationwide and kind of realised i let the financial advisor i went with put me on an expensive building/contents insurance that was part of their parent company (i'm paying around £35 a month and i'm seeing average quotes of around £15 a month on all the comparison websites that i run my houses details through).

It's the type with automatic yearly renewal and no clear way to cancel so i can see them being difficult about cancelling when it comes to contacting them so i just wanted to check before i call them if there's anything oi need to be aware of when cancelling a policy with them.

Also is my mortgage provider likely to have any stipulations in regards to switching? I've gone through my documentation when i got the house but can't seem to find anything that would cover this. I know the mortgage requires me to have home and contents insurance but that's about it. Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

paddyandstumpy

Try and cancel from the renewal date to avoid cancellation fees. Check with the advisor who set the mortgage up what the conditions of the mortgage are, or contact the mortgage providers directly.

It's common for them to stipulate you must have buildings insurance, I don't think they can stipulate it must be theirs though.

rs65

Staples929 wrote: »

It's the type with automatic yearly renewal and no clear way to cancel so i can see them being difficult about cancelling when it comes to contacting them so i just wanted to check before i call them if there's anything oi need to be aware of when cancelling a policy with them.

The renewal letter will be clear about what you need to do if you don't want to renew.

Avoid using the word 'cancel'. Tell them you want it to lapse at renewal.

dacouch

If you like the Nationwide Insurer, their policy is underwritten by UK Insurance who are in effect part of Direct Line, Churchill and Privilege.

So if your especially scared of making the jump (There is no reason to be scared) you could always take a policy with them.

You may find the Nationwide Policy has marginally higher levels of cover to justify the inflated premiums they charge over the normal Direct Line etc policies.

I would recommend that you spend an hour or so reading any of the many guides on Home Insurance (MSE has a few), this will help you shop around this year. It will also mean you understand what you're covered for and importantly not. This will make it easier for you to shop around in the future so you make sure you get a good deal and benefit from the new customer discounts most Insurers (Currently) offer

csgohan4

Remember the cheapest is not always the best. The cheaper ones have a lot of caveats and get out clauses for them

FutureGirl

Nationwide home insurance is a decent product, it's better that the other UKI insurers (Churchill, Direct Line etc), however Nationwide are leaving UKI in early 2017.

The cheaper policies will have more exclusions. It's likely your nationwide policy covers matching items, something that isn't standard with other policies. Nationwide also has bigger claim limits than the cheaper ones.

paddyandstumpy

Further to the above, few policies cover matching sets, and they tend to be quite a bit more expensive. Understandably so, given the extra cover they offer.

However, a relatively little known fact is where a policy doesn't cover matching sets, the insurer should offer a 50% contribution towards undamaged items in the set.
There has been a FOS precedence on this, but some insurers still need reminding of it occasionally.