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After the horrible thread here today of a member's house being burgled it might be good to share some experiences with insurance of our gear.

 

I looked into contents insurance as a renter and it was quite expensive with the few companies I tried.

 

Please share if you know any good companies either with price, or good claim experiences or anything else.

 

Thank you

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I was knocked off in 2002.

 

I had the “expensive” Suncorp policy at the time.

 

I read the Product Disclosure Statement, and had new for old on everything that was less than 10 years old. 


I worked for an insurance company... most people had no idea what kind of coverage they had bought... and cheaper coverage is likely to be less coverage.
 

READ THE PRODUCT DISCLOSURE STATEMENTS PEOPLE.

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Cheaper Insurance doesn't necessarily mean worse cover use an insurance broker and be wary of companies that asks a bucket load of questions . Things like, is there someone home at all times ? Because if you answer yes and you get burgled whilst there wasn't someone there you probably won't be covered .

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6 minutes ago, furtherpale said:

I was knocked off in 2002.

 

I had the “expensive” Suncorp policy at the time.

 

I read the Product Disclosure Statement, and had new for old on everything that was less than 10 years old. 


I worked for an insurance company... most people had no idea what kind of coverage they had bought... and cheaper coverage is likely to be less coverage.
 

READ THE PRODUCT DISCLOSURE STATEMENTS PEOPLE.

Was there limits?

 

Did you have to specify items? From the insurers I have spoken to I have a few things that aren't covered by any standard policy. I am guessing this will apply to many here

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1 minute ago, Bunno77 said:

Was there limits?

 

Did you have to specify items? From the insurers I have spoken to I have a few things that aren't covered by any standard policy. I am guessing this will apply to many here

There were some individual item limits (above any individual item I had at the time) and I had to specify my CD collection... but I read the PDS to make sure.

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I remember several years ago l found out my Cds wheren't completely covered, because they said 1200 CDs were beyond the norn. I had to insure them separately from home contents. Worth checking on that aspect alone. I had to itemise each CD, which was a pain in the you know what. You should be ok on hifi components? But check your policy.

Keep receipts.

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3 minutes ago, needlerunner said:

I remember several years ago l found out my Cds wheren't completely covered, because they said 1200 CDs were beyond the norn. I had to insure them separately from home contents. Worth checking on that aspect alone. I had to itemise each CD, which was a pain in the you know what. You should be ok on hifi components? But check your policy.

Keep receipts.

That would be a nightmare.

 

I think based on individual cost of each component. My gear is not expensive compared to most but 3 are over the 10k limit most insurers I spoke with stated

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Our contents policy premiums keep increasing.  I haven't checked the terms of the policy for years, but with the increasing cost and stories about the insurance industry I'm feeling more convinced that I'm being ripped-off.  And really got the run-around when I claimed a few years ago on some kitchen damage.  It's easy to say look for a new policy, but with all the companies have similar attitudes I feel it would be hard to get a good deal. 

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19 hours ago, needlerunner said:

I remember several years ago l found out my Cds wheren't completely covered, because they said 1200 CDs were beyond the norn. I had to insure them separately from home contents. Worth checking on that aspect alone. I had to itemise each CD, which was a pain in the you know what. You should be ok on hifi components? But check your policy.

Keep receipts.

Yeah if you exceed a limit whether records or CD or other you will need to discuss with the insurer.

 

However in the case of CDs the value of the collection has probably gone down with the years, unless you have some rare stuff.

 

 

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20 hours ago, DEANO23 said:

Cheaper Insurance doesn't necessarily mean worse cover use an insurance broker and be wary of companies that asks a bucket load of questions . Things like, is there someone home at all times ? Because if you answer yes and you get burgled whilst there wasn't someone there you probably won't be covered .

That is total cobblers Dean - I too was a QPIB for over 30 years and if you were a Qualified Practicing Insurance Broker you would know that it is standard in the industry for domestic homeowners policies to have unoccupancy clauses of between 30 to 60 days (mine has 60)............depends on the insurance product and the company.

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I didn't mean unoccupied for that long I meant insurers that ask in their due diligence questions, a) is there someone home at all times, B) are there window locks on all window's c) deadlocks on the doors . I didn't mean where you have to declare unoccupancy for 30 days or more clause.

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21 minutes ago, Demondes said:

Yeah if you exceed a limit whether records or CD or other you will need to discuss with the insurer.

 

However in the case of CDs the value of the collection has probably gone down with the years, unless you have some rare stuff.

 

 

That's really not correct .................your cover will be based on relacement cost so you must maintain an allowance for that within your sum insured that - what it will cost to track down and replace all CDs immediately following the loss at today's prices otherwise you may find yourself underinsured. 

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29 minutes ago, Kaynin said:

I use a broker for all of my insurance, wouldnt go back to doing it myself again.

Damn straight.

 

As side benefit, other than them doing all the work each renewal, is that when you do make a claim that the insurance company deals with the broker, not you.  Sooo nice.  I recently cleaned up some roos and needed some work done on my ute.  Literally a 30 second phonecall to my broker and she arranged everything.  Took the vehicle to a single repairer and everything was locked in, and CGU have to talk to my broker, not me.  Woo hoo!

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5 minutes ago, DEANO23 said:

I didn't mean unoccupied for that long I meant insurers that ask in their due diligence questions, a) is there someone home at all times, B) are there window locks on all window's c) deadlocks on the doors . I didn't mean where you have to declare unoccupancy for 30 days or more clause.

This is really not the place to go into this...............but you didn't say that and no Underwriter would be allowed by the industry to use that as a reason to decline a claim - never seen an underwriting question like that in my experience, nevertheless with so many Underwiters it's probably possible  - the industry requires Underwriters to allow a fairly long unoccupancy of their homes these days - as someone said read your policy.

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20 hours ago, needlerunner said:

I remember several years ago l found out my Cds wheren't completely covered, because they said 1200 CDs were beyond the norn. I had to insure them separately from home contents. Worth checking on that aspect alone. I had to itemise each CD, which was a pain in the you know what. You should be ok on hifi components? But check your policy.

Keep receipts.

Hi needlerunner,

I remember those days when CDs initially came out (1982)............they were regarded as "collections" similar to coins and stamps etc which was handled in a rather old fashioned way by many Underwriters, where they had limits for "collections". Clearly this wasn't going to work long term, and unfair to the consumer. Hopefully you have found an Underwriter who just includes them as part of the general contents sum insured. With changing insurance legislation over the years things (somewhat contrary to popular belief) have become easier.

 

If you don't mind me recommending everyone will be better off useing a QUALIFIED COMPETENT broker as in all industries there are MANY woeful performers out there even if they are qualified.........and read your PDS (policy) so you can have an intelligent discussion with your broker prior to having to use it.

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Guest jakeyb77

I used to have my hifi and guitars documented on the file. Then I changed insurer. 
I have confirmed in the 3 phone calls that as long as I have evidence of what I own then I am covered up the the Amount I insured for. 
I keep my own list. Photos on the cloud also. I keep a copy of my discogs list. 
I also have $10,000 accidental damage. I have used this to get a new projector when I dropped mine and it was two phone calls and a repair bill easy. 
I also have $1,000 away from home coverage. 
I think we pay about $75 a month from memory. 
I think we also added up everything we owned and then added at least $50,000 to the cover. My friends house burned down and they only had $40,000 in contents for 6 people. Let me tell you that didn’t go far at all. 
Every now and then I video our home and save it to my cloud storage. 
I rent. Two windows didn’t have deadlock so I paid for them to be put in. I also installed my own wifi movement sensing cameras and pay about $9 a month in cloud storage for that. Cheap peace of mind really. 

 

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Recently I had a good read of the T&C of home contents insurance to make sure my audio system is covered, as replacement cost at retail pricing would be absurdly expensive just for things like the cables, let alone the actual components.

Surprisingly the T&C across many insurers is almost the same, probably because these guys are being re-insured by the same big companies. I found Budget Direct to have some of the best pricing, and no negatives I can see as far as exclusions that is any different to other insurers.

 

There are a series of limits they pay up to, for example...

 

limits.jpg.38db75563ad8cfe404be0de8267a9ef0.jpg

 

The actual worded T&C is the same. There is nothing in the policy that allows them to exclude an audio system from coverage, no matter its value. The limits cover only the exact things listed above, which is not an audio system.

 

Of course if you tried to make a claim for a 100k audio system (or even a 20k one) I would expect the insurer to reject it, as that's what they do.

But they will have no legal leg to stand on, and it will just be a matter of you taking the matter to the FICS insurance ombusdman and they will eventually rule in your favor and the insurer will have to pay up.

 

It would be a good idea to take many pictures of all your equipment, to prove you actually own the items.

Edited by agisthos
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with your computer, which you must have if you're posting here, it's no big trick to use a spreadsheet to list all your household items. Just do it one room at a time and allocate a realistic replacement figure. Some of you will be surprised to how much stuff you have. Sure, insurance can be expensive but if it all goes up in smoke wouldn't you rather have it all covered? You can't take it with you and maybe a large part is your attitude. Look upon insurance as part of the cost of this hobby (like petrol). If it's too expensive then may be it's time to prioritise and settle for something cheaper.

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Guest jakeyb77
3 minutes ago, wahoo said:

with your computer, which you must have if you're posting here, it's no big trick to use a spreadsheet to list all your household items. Just do it one room at a time and allocate a realistic replacement figure. Some of you will be surprised to how much stuff you have. Sure, insurance can be expensive but if it all goes up in smoke wouldn't you rather have it all covered? You can't take it with you and maybe a large part is your attitude. Look upon insurance as part of the cost of this hobby (like petrol). If it's too expensive then may be it's time to prioritise and settle for something cheaper.

Watch they don’t steal your computer ?

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