Is Emergency Home Insurance Worth It?

Whether it’s a burglary, a burst pipe or a broken-down boiler, home emergencies are a nuisance at best, and home-destroying at worst. Some of these issues are more common in a certain season, such as pipes bursting in winter, but others cannot be predicted, such as vermin infestations or smashed windows. If your home insurance includes home emergency cover, then you should be covered for these annoying, or tragic, events when they occur. However, if you do not have any form of home emergency insurance then you will have to make reparations out of your own pocket, which can be a lengthy and expensive process.

However, as these emergencies are such a rare occurrence for most homes, home emergency cover may be side-lined as an unnecessary expense. Some homeowners may opt to go for boiler cover comparison instead, just protecting their boiler. However, this can be more expensive than home emergency insurance so it’s important that you do a boiler cover comparison before choosing your plan.

Before making any decision to either pursue or discount the idea of home emergency cover, the first thing you should do is double check that it isn’t included in your existing home insurance. Unfortunately, this seems quite unlikely. In 2018, leading comparison site GoCompare looked at 449 home contents insurance policies listed by an independent financial researcher, Defaqto, to see whether they included emergency cover or not. Only 18% of policies they looked at included home emergency insurance as standard, whilst 49% of them offered it as an optional extra. The maximum limit for home emergencies ranged from £500 to £4,000 and over 300 of the policies did include a 24-hour claims notification helpline as standard.

If your insurance does include emergency cover, it is important that you also double check whether any restrictions are in place. Some policies only cover specific emergencies or seasons, so it may be worth investing in a more comprehensive emergency cover from a different company. If you’re after extra insurance to cover a specific part of your home, such as just your boiler, carry out a boiler cover comparison to find the most comprehensive cover for a price you’re comfortable with.

As for whether the cover is worth it, it really depends. If you feel like your home only needs emergency cover during certain times of the year, or you only want to insure your premises against certain incidents, then you may be able to get it quite cheaply. However, some companies will hike the prices of their more comprehensive plans up, and possibly monger fear by focusing on the worst-case scenarios that could possibly occur, causing people to spend extra to try and protect themselves against every eventuality; even the ones that have a miniscule chance of occurring.

If your current policy offers a reasonably comprehensive emergency cover as an add-on that isn’t ridiculously expensive, it should definitely be something you consider. Despite a lot of the situations being very improbable, they can be expensive to fix so knowing that you can be reimbursed and back on your feet quickly and without a large expense can provide you with a lot of peace of mind.