Norwich Union won't insure us????

emeraldbugle

I am flabbergasted. We have had a policy for years and we have moved house, about half a mile down the road. Bigger house now.

But as we have 4 high value personal belongings, they won't cover us in this new postcode. It is a nice area too.

If they won't cover us, who will??

lisyloo

We too have found many standard policies won't cover our needs.
We use these brokers who check many different companies.

https://insurance.heathlambert.com/site/site_start.aspx

You can tailor your cover and add individual items on line.
I found it tailorable and competitive.

mattymoo

Could it be because you don't meet their security criteria in the new property.

Nice areas are all very well but the thieves also like to work in nice areas - the pickings are better. NU may have suffered a large number of losses in that postcode and so charge more and insist on higher security standards.

[Deleted User]

May i ask if you did the quote online or over the phone? (ie through NU Direct?) The reason I ask is that if your policy is anyway different from "the norm" then an NU Direct policy may not be able to be tailored as they are out of the box style policies where they just do simple things. As you have slightly differnet needs you may be better off talking to a broker.

HTH
Becca

lisyloo

Could it be because you don't meet their security criteria in the new property

I live in a nice area with 4 and 5 bed detached houses.

I have found that we are ruled out of a lot of on-line policies mostly because of limits. Occasionally it's something about the policy we can't comply with (for example we have an alarm but the model is not NACOSS approved).
Mostly it simply comes down to limits.

I appreciate that we could ring round but ringing round every single company just to see what their quotes are like is quite time consuming.

I don't have any connection to them but I found with heath lambert I could specify my own limits, add my own single items and choose what options I wanted e.g. cash, freezer contents etc.

With a lot of policies I find the personal possessions limit a problem.
If you have a decent camera, watches, jewelry, glasses etc. then that can be a problem.

FlameCloud

Those items would come under standard contents though if they were lost/damaged in the home.

There may be a high risk items limit but this is raised quite easily.

dunstonh

A lot of policies are "out of the box" as beccus says. This is to aid with the modern distribution channels of internet and phone. That is fine if you fit the criteria but if you dont then you need an old style specified policy.

Old style specified policies still exist and brokers have access to these. However, they are not common for internet/phone purchases.

Primrose

I think Norwich Union have a £70,000 contents limit for their standard insurance cover and if you don't have a NACOS approved burglar alarm this may be another reason for rejecting you if your new area has a history of high burglary incidences. Most online policies which we checked out recently when our policy was coming up for renewal didn't fit our criteria and had a £70,000 or lower contents limit, but a local broker has found us a better deal at a much cheaper rate. You could try asking your neighbours who they insure with or check with a local broker who may be familiar with your area and knows who best to approach to get you suitable cover.

lisyloo

Those items would come under standard contents though if they were lost/damaged in the home.

Agreed, but out of the home they are covered under personal possessions.
I think the standard limit is around £2500 which isn't much if you have 2 nice diamond rings on one finger.

There may be a high risk items limit but this is raised quite easily.

I don't agree.
The ones I have called that have standard "out of the box" policies have an upper limit and will not raise it to the level required.

I don't live in a mansion but I have £80K contents and £6K personal possessions cover.
As Primrose said NU stop at £70K so my requirement do tend to be outside of the range of the "out of the box" policies.

Don't want to overly push them but the thing I liked about the Heath Lambet site was that I could specify my own limits for the various cover options incuding individual items.

Sam_84

When we moved, we were OK with a 'standard' policy at the beginning but had a similar problem where the max coverage limit for contents became too low as we accumulated more stuff. So we had to shop around for another insurer.

We're with Hiscox - they have the policy docs and a quote engine on their website so you can have a look and see what you think of the coverage and see if it would suit your circumstances.

We've been lucky - no need to make any claims and, of course, the proof of the service is when you do need to claim.
Perhaps other moneysavers would like to comment on their claims handling?

No connection - just a satisfied customer.

Cheers

Sam

FlameCloud

lisyloo wrote: »

The ones I have called that have standard "out of the box" policies have an upper limit and will not raise it to the level required.

I don't live in a mansion but I have £80K contents and £6K personal possessions cover.
As Primrose said NU stop at £70K so my requirement do tend to be outside of the range of the "out of the box" policies.

What levels of cover do you want.

Taking for example a Halifax policy- there is unlimited standard contents, a standard £7500 high risk limit (upable to £15000) and PB (standard £5000, upable to £10000). All are easily selectable by drop down boxes.