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Flood insurance for your home

Most people regard flood insurance as essential for their home.

Let’s consider some of the issues associated with that.

Floods and floods

Typically, people use the single term ‘flood’ to describe two very different scenarios:

  • flooding that has arisen for what we might call “internal” reasons. That might typically encompass things such as burst pipes, faulty appliance connections and so on;
  • natural or external flooding, that’s usually caused by heavy rain, overflowing rivers etc.

In terms of the impact on your home, sometimes the final result may seem close to identical but there may be some insurance differences.

Internal flooding

Covering these types of issues is rarely a problem on standard home cover policies.

Some might specify certain conditions relating to work being completed by fully qualified plumbers but this is rarely an area that’s cause for complexity or concern.

External flooding

Few areas of insurance have created such intense public debate over a decade or more, as has flood cover.

The reasons for that are simple. Flooding is becoming more commonplace across the UK and that has resulted in more numerous and more expensive claims.

While the scientific evidence is debated in terms of causes, it is now clear that the UK’s weather patterns over recent years have led to an increased occurrence of stormy and very wet weather. This means that some areas, including many town centres, now flood regularly as opposed to what once might have been a one in a lifetime event.

Insurers

That has caused some severe difficulties for insurance companies, largely related to the vast sums being paid out for flood claims.

In fact, the issue became so serious that some insurance providers chose not to offer home with flooding insurance as a standard integrated policy. Some continued to do so but with virtually prohibitive premiums if your property happened to be located in an area with a known history of or predisposition to, flood risk.

The result was that some homeowners found it difficult to obtain or afford flood insurance cover and this led to the government becoming involved and what we now know as the “FloodRe” scheme.

Today’s situation

If that’s the historical background, what does this mean for you today? Here is a quick summary:

  • if your property is in a known flood-risk area, some insurers might still decline to cover you or apply very heavy premiums for doing so;
  • fortunately, at GSI Insurance we can still typically offer home with flooding insurance combined and at a cost-effective price. We can, if you wish, also separate out our home and flooding insurance to offer greater choice;
  • you may be able to reduce your costs further by opting for specific flooding excesses, if your policy provider has such an option.

It’s still not unusual to hear people express sentiments such as “you can’t get flooding insurance today”. In our experience, that’s incorrect – providing you’re dealing with someone who understands the domain and who is able to facilitate solutions.

If you’d like to know more about home with flooding insurance, why not contact us without delay?

We’d welcome your call and will be able to offer more specific advice that’s relevant to your precise circumstances, as well as offer you a saving on flood insurance for your home.

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