Home Insurance increased from £150 to over £2k

Creamegg79

I'm posting on behalf of an elderly family member - they have had buildings & contents for many years 1 x claim approx 15 years ago for a few £100.
They have paid approx £150 per year, however the new quote they received in Dec 24 had jumped massively to over £2k.
However...they had made 2 x claims last year - both for the same thing - loss of hearing aid- happened twice.
They claimed £600 each time, paying the first £300 themselves -hearing aid cost was £900.
Even with those claims I cannot believe the massive jump.  My insurance has gone up around 25% but to go up 170% is insane.
Due to this massive bill, he has decided to only get buildings insurance (£600) as when looking on comparison sites they are all crazy prices .  We've tried a broker - same again.
He's obviously seen as a liability to insurance companies and would never have made the claim had he know what his next premiums would be.  I would love some advise on how long these claims stay with him?  If he paid up the £2k or so in the first year, would the next year be similar or reduce?
I'm not comfortable him living without contents insurance, as it does make him rather anxious worrying about what might happen fire etc..
Would be grateful for any help on this.

DullGreyGuy

3-6 years but the impact of claims diminish as they become more historic. 

Claims have an exponential type impact, so its not that each one adds a fixed about (eg £300) or a compounding amount (eg 30%) but multiple claims in quick succession has much greater impact. 

In motor you can "buy back" a claim, ie refund your insurer and it switches to a non-fault claim, but not heard of the same being available in Home but then the idea of "fault" is much less in Home as virtually all are fault claims unlike Motor where its probably circa 1:2 ratio.

Have you looked at the levers to pull like the excess? Because of negative selection sometimes a lower excess is cheaper than a very large one. 

Flugelhorn

I decided a while back that home insurance was only for really really big things as the sort of things you describe are bound to put the premium up as they won't want to be losing money and see him as a risk of it happening again

Aretnap

How long the claims will have an impact for depends on the insurer. A lot of insurers will ask about claims in the last 5 years, but there are some which only ask for three years worth of claims (from memory Admiral and Direct Line are in the latter category).

In either case there impact will be biggest in the first year, and will drop gradually (assuming no more claims) until he doesn't have to declare them at all.

A couple of claims for the same thing in quick succession will lead to the worry that it's going to become a regular thing - if he loses five sets of hearing aids next year the insurer would be on the hook for all five of them, which goes some way towards explaining the increase. Another is that with two claims in quick succession many insurers won't quote at all, which reduces the number of options to choose from. 

Archergirl

Have you used a comparison site? That should be your first step.

Brie

I wonder if he could get cheaper insurance by somehow excluding hearing aids (spectacles, iphones, keys) from the policy?

Flugelhorn

Brie said:

I wonder if he could get cheaper insurance by somehow excluding hearing aids (spectacles, iphones, keys) from the policy?

or perhaps anything getting lost 

comeandgo

Remove the hearing aids from the contents insurance as they are obviously a high risk item.