Bike Insurance – been stitched up by Direct Line, any recommendations for others??

I renewed the home and contents insurance recently. Thought I’d go with Direct Line so I filled out the online form, added in the details of “specified items” to cover my bikes in and out of the home. Put down their value etc etc. Now I find that they’re not actually covered!!

Seems that if you own a bike worth over £2k they don’t insure it outside of the home at all. Although they don’t tell you this during the application, and should you want to cancel the policy it costs you £40 for admin.

SO, can anybody recommend independent bike insurers? I’ve had a quick look via google and from what I can see a separate policy will be a similar cost to what my home insurance has just set me back!

Not pleased at all with Direct Line so I’m hoping it’s not going to cost me a load extra to get the bikes covered. Usually when renewing the home insurance I just check they’re covered out of home and pay a little bit extra on the premium.

Advice/help much appreciated. Cheers – Chris

i just fell out with them for changing the terms this year – but hiding it “we didnt think that was an important change” – well it is to me.

They used to treat an ajoined garage as part of your house – and thus the contents cover applied as much to the garage as it would to your living room.

i got this in writing last year.

this year – all garages regardless of where are treated as outbuildings and insured to 5k max.

should you want to cancel the policy it costs you £40 for admin.

I assume you’re now out of your first 14 days? Otherwise the cooling off period should mean no charge.

Might be worth speaking to them about upgrading to a Premier Select policy

I think it is a Premier Policy though? And I recall when I made thew original application (a while ago) that there was no mention of the bikes not being covered. I bought a new one last week so I found out about this after I phoned them pup to add the new one to my policy.

I spoke to them when taking out my policy and they stated bikes were covered up to £10k including away from home.

The paperwork is very obvious if you have the premier policy

I got a decent quote from Assetsure recently.

John Lewis insurance do listed bikes up to 5k individually with a total up to 15k. Half the price of my recent M&S renewal quote.

I also have Direct Line for contents insurance, but also use their dedicated bicycle cover.

To be fair, they’ve paid out before after I’ve had an accident, so I can’t complain My bikes come in at less than 2k though…

When you talk about being worth £2k do you mean £2k to replace as new or what it’s worth if you sold it?

My DL home plus insurance is due soon so I might have to shop around. My bike would cost about £3.5k to replace like for like new but is probably only worth £1.5k if sold.

Be wary of that, some insurers would say you’re underinsuring it, and you’d get less:

“You said it was £1500, it’s actually £3500, that’s £2k less, so we’re reducing your payout by £2k.’ Type thing…

If you’re outside the 14 days cooling off period I would be looking at a mis-selling claim through whichever body administers home insurance (FSA?). If you were clear on what you wanted at application time then it should be a formality.

Hmm, interesting. I have Nationwide buildings & contents and they are now underwritten by UK Insurance who are basically Direct Line.

Kind of tied to Nationwide or at least anyone who will cover a place considered at risk from flooding, even though it’s never been flooded but it’s got close.

As for under insurance, the policy needs to specify an averaging clause, plus it looks to me that it’s not a problem if it’s a full loss.

http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/publications/technical_notes/under-insurance-household.html

e.g. their formula is “(sum insured / true value) * loss = payout”

so (£1500 / £3500) * full loss of £3500 = £1500. So you get what you insured it for.

But if someone nicked just the forks at say £500 value…

(£1500 / £3500) * loss of £500 = £214 payout.

Anyway, the amount you are insuring for depends on whether they are asking for the full retail value or the current market value.

Sandwich – Member
If you’re outside the 14 days cooling off period I would be looking at a mis-selling claim through whichever body administers home insurance (FSA?). If you were clear on what you wanted at application time then it should be a formality.
POSTED 21 MINUTES AGO # REPORT-POST

Unlikely to win that one. The website doesn’t force you into reading every single policy detail before buying, but the insurer does give you 14 days to read over all the details then get the full refund if you don’t like the product – ample time tbh.

However, phoning for a moan at DL will probably get them waiving the fee anyway – just gotta stay polite

I would recommend….. The AA! Third year with them and still the best value insurance. And I have filled in quote forms for all the usual suspects and some during a mammoth form filling/phone yesterday.

The AA have changed my contents insurance from axa to the International insurance of Hannover!! It is specified at home and away…. And yes replacement is new for old.

Cheers

The only way to be absolutely certain is the read the policy docs in full.