Wedding Insurance - Covid19

hannahauty

Hi,
I was wondering if anyone could offer any help or guidance on the below. 
We took out wedding insurance back in 2018, when we first booked our wedding. 

Our wedding was due to take place in June 2020, but the venue contacted us at the back end of March to inform us that the venue was closing until July due to concerns around Covid-19. 

My wedding insurance policy, that we’ve had since 2018 states that the insurer will pay out for venue costs and supplier costs should we have to cancel or rearrange due to ‘an outbreak of infectious or contagious disease’.

As we have had to rearrange our entire wedding, I’ve submitted a claim form to claim back deposits lost and additional costs incurred. The insurer is now saying the below...

“We will not pay for the following in connection with claims made under this section: 4) Any claim arising directly or indirectly from:

b) government regulation or act

And, under General Exclusions Applicable to all Sections of your policy:

The Insurance does not cover:

14) losses arising from prohibitive regulations by the government of any country. 

 The Corona Virus Act 2020 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that grants the government emergency powers to handle the 2020 coronavirus pandemic. The Act allows the government the discretionary power to limit or suspend public gatherings, including

 Weddings. Therefore, if your claim is for cancellation or rearrangement of your wedding, then the above exclusions apply and we cannot accept your claim under this policy.”

Where do I stand with this? 

Thanks in advance.

Hannah 

huckster

I think your Insurers are correct, that as the Government have passed legislation to restrict gatherings such as Weddings, that this is a prohibitive action which is an exclusion under the policy.
You still have deposits paid to those companies you have contracts with, it is just that at the moment the wedding is unable to take place. So you either maintain the contracts for a replacement date or your look to obtain a refund from the venue, if the contract enables this. You may wish to obtain advice about the contracts from someone legally qualified.

Mrsn

Sadly I think the insurance company are correct, there are certainly others that have posted on here stating their insurance now doesn’t cover the current situation. Sorry I appreciate that’s not what you wanted to hear.

hannahauty

The Coronavirus Act 2020 was not in place until 25th March. My venue notified me that they were closing on 22nd March. So my wedding was rearranged before the government act was in place. 

Also, the government lockdown does not extend into June at the moment, so technically my wedding hasn’t been rearranged due to government restrictions. The venue has decided to close until the end of June because they are worried about the spread of Covid19.

Where do we stand here? 

Browntoa

Where you stood when you first asked the question , the answers above still apply.

Your insurance company has said they are not paying out on covid 19 claims , your only avenue is to make a complaint to the ombudsman but this is likely to take some time