The best house and contents insurance company?

Loki0103

Dear all,

I would like to ask for your experience with house and contents insurance companies. I would like to take out insurance with a good company that is fair and reasonable if things go wrong. Can you recommend some?

Thank you

Sandtree

No such thing as a "best" home insurance provider otherwise there would almost certainly be only one.

Hiscox have (until this year at least) an exceptional record on claim settlement but they are aimed at the Mid-Net Worth and above market and so their premiums are very high if you don't fit in this bracket.

Personally been with M&S (Aviva underwritten) for a number of years because their bedroom rated policy suits our higher than average contents requirements and gives us a competitive price (Axa always being the other one). Thankfully cannot materially comment on their claims experience. 

It is very possible you can find a company with a cheaper price that has a good reputation but it will depend on meeting their target market in terms of ratios of basic contents -v- valuables, if you require matching sets cover etc etc etc

Neil49

I've just had a look on the Which magazine site and the top 3 which they recommend are.
NFU Mutual 
M&S Money 
LV
After those the next few are Aviva, John Lewis, Saga and Nationwide

Loki0103

Thank you. No Direct line then?

dunstonh

NFU and Hiscox tend to be up there with the quality providers.  Mainly as they will usually cover unusual things or allow a lot of extras to be included.     Comparison site providers tend to be more basic in their coverage but may be more than adequate for average properties.  

Sandtree

Loki0103 said:

Thank you. No Direct line then?

I've worked for them so slightly conflicted.

As others and I have said... "best" tends to mean top levels of cover and that normally comes at a price. Even Which? is targeted at people in the mass-affluent category and so its unsurprising that their list are skewed towards higher end providers (there was amusing press coverage from their best supermarket ratings earlier in the year when most who voted the worst supermarket admitted they hadn't been to it in over a year).

In my day the DL cover was mass market and reasonably priced. It doesn't have all the bells and whistles but not everyone needs them. Clearly I feel I was fair when handling claims (car not often home) but I did have customers complain about some of my decisions. Hiscox would be much more generous (the assumption is pretty much that everything is covered) but their minimum premium back in the day was 5x that of Direct Line's (cannot comment on eithers as at today). 

Loki0103

I think we an average household, the most valuable thing I own (except for my car and the house very soon) is my MacBook so I don't think I need special jewellery cover etc.

I think I am going to go with LV, I want a reputable insurer in case of genuine disasters, emergencies etc. Basically I wouldn't want to have to argue about the cover if there is a burst pipe or something and my ceiling etc is damaged. For example, we will have a water tank in the loft and if isn't already insulated and we insulate it ourselves to the best of our abilities, will that cause a problem if it freezes?  I don't (luckily) have experience in claiming but these are the things that worry me.

Thank you for your help

davidmcn

Sandtree said:

Hiscox have (until this year at least) an exceptional record on claim settlement but they are aimed at the Mid-Net Worth and above market and so their premiums are very high if you don't fit in this bracket.

Hiscox are the ones having trouble at the moment as they try to wriggle out of their COVID-related business interruption insurance claims - which may be completely irrelevant to their home insurance practices, but might be worth bearing in mind.

comeandgo

With any insurance read the documents.  The terms and conditions are there.  I need insurance that will cover for my house being empty for long periods.  You may not need that sort of cover so you look for an insurance that covers what you want.

Sandtree

davidmcn said:
Hiscox are the ones having trouble at the moment as they try to wriggle out of their COVID-related business interruption insurance claims - which may be completely irrelevant to their home insurance practices, but might be worth bearing in mind.

Hence the carve out of "until this year".

To carry on the tangent... there was a whole uproar about BI cover after the Westminster bridge attacks because policies traditionally required physical damage whereas the business near the bridge were closed for being in the police cordon and so weren't damaged and so couldn't claim. The result was a number of insurers looked at their BI terms in light of this

A former colleague was working at Hiscox around the time and there was a big thing made of them having the most comprehensive BI cover available and so the news that they are now trying to repudiate claims for Covid was amusing to us (clearly not those impacted).

dunstonh

I think I am going to go with LV, I want a reputable insurer in case of genuine disasters, emergencies etc.

LV's general insurance arm has recently been bought by Allianz (along with Legal & General's general insurance business).