Special terms on contents insurance

Britannia12345

I've been looking online for home contents insurance and noticed at that at the end of the form on the comparison site it asks if I've ever had special terms put on our insurance.
About 10 or 11 years ago we had accidental damage cover refused by our insurance for 1 year as we had made several claims for broken items. Is this what they mean by special terms?
It says on the form that if you have had any special terms put on in the past then you have to get a specialist quote. Is there any time limit on this? Does it matter how long ago this restriction was put on and will it make a huge difference to the cost of our insurance?

Quentin

When they ask " have you ever ........" that does mean you must disclose for ever

Britannia12345

Ok so that means I'll need to click on the link for specialist insurers then.

davidwatts

No, it's not what they mean by "special terms", it's more relevant to being "refused insurance".

What do you mean by the cover being "refused for one year"? They invited renewal but said they'd no longer offer AD cover but then let you have it again a year later? Have you had the cover again after the one year hiatus? Any claims to disclose in the last 5 years? I assume you're still with the same insurer, otherwise you've already gone elsewhere and not worried about disclosing this incident?

I'm not sure I'd want to go down the specialist insurer route. I'd be more inclined to get quotes without the refusal being disclosed to arrive at a shortlist of chosen insurers. I'd then phone them and explain the circumstances and hope that they don't regard the "refusal" as material for the purposes of the question they ask.

As this is claims related, so long ago and only relates to an optional cover you'd hope that a reasonable insurer (in the absence of continued poor claims experience) would be willing to offer cover. However, in this age of "black and white" risk acceptance, you might be unlucky.

[Deleted User]

Quentin wrote: »

When they ask " have you ever ........" that does mean you must disclose for ever

Hasn't this type of question now been disallowed by some regulator or other? The data pertaining to such questions is, in any case, only held for five years on the central database (CUE).

Quentin

johnsmith1890 wrote: »

Hasn't this type of question now been disallowed by some regulator or other? The data pertaining to such questions is, in any case, only held for five years on the central database (CUE).

No

Where did you see that? In a forum?

[Deleted User]

Quentin wrote: »

No

Where did you see that? In a forum?

No, forums usually state that even after 60 years, or longer, you still have to declare a cancellation (a complete nonsense, of course). I can't recall for certain where I saw it, but it might have been The Telegraph reporting on some new FOS regulation. Regardless, given the ICO five-year restriction on CUE, de-facto that's the limit for disclosure when moving to a new provider.

Quentin

You are mistaken

Some insurers do only want to know about special terms/ refused/cancelled etc in the last X years, but its not "spent" after 5 years and many Insurers do ask if you "ever" had this.

Britannia12345

Yes, what David Watts says. I've had no more claims since so will run a regular quote check then contact them to see what difference it makes to the cover. Thankyou ☺