It’s important to double check that your cover still suits your needs, as a lot of things can change in a year, and you want to make sure you’re fully covered.
Also, when it comes to getting other insurance quotes – it’s also important to make sure that your renewal quote is like-for-like with the new quotes you’re getting. For example, one policy might have a higher excess than the other, if that’s important to you – you may consider paying a bit more for your insurance, to have a smaller excess.
Here are some of the important things to consider:
- Make sure you have an adequate amount insured
If you’ve purchased new items that might be more expensive than your old ones – e.g. sofas, TVs or other high value items – it’s important to make sure that your contents cover level is enough to cover these, otherwise you might not be covered for the full cost should you need to make a claim to replace them. The same goes for building work that may have increased the rebuild cost of your home. - Have you specified any items of value?
If you’d like any items covered that are high in value, e.g. jewellery, you can add these to your policy specifically – make sure any items you’ve added are still necessary to have insured. Also, please check the limit for how much these can cost hasn’t changed, or they might not be fully covered. - Property use
You should check that your property use is accurate, for example if you’ve told us you’d like it insured for business use, is this still required?
- Levels of cover
Make sure that you’ve added any additional cover that you’d like, such as accidental damage or cover for any high value items that you regularly carry with you that you’d like covered on your policy – but away from home.
- Number of rooms
Double check that the number of rooms stated on your renewal documents are correct, as this could also affect the cost of your quote.
- Occupation Have you changed jobs?
It’s important to keep your occupations status up to date. - Claims
You should double check that any claims listed on your documents are accurate, as these are usually the details that will be passed to other insurers if you choose to switch.
- Compulsory and Voluntary Excesses
You should always double check your excesses, as different underwriters may have different compulsory excesses. You shouldn’t assume it’ll be the same as last year, just in case. You should also be aware that there are different excesses for different types of claims. For example, there’s one for accidental damage, subsidence, escape of water and so on, each will usually be a different amount. Remember, any voluntary excess you choose will be on top of the compulsory excess.