Home Emergency Cover

What is it?

You can have Home Emergency Cover as an optional extra with our home insurance policies, or on its own. It covers household emergencies, including blocked drains, electrical wiring problems and leaking roofs.

We've designed our cover to fill a gap in the market - home insurance usually covers the damage caused by these kinds of things, but not the initial problem itself.

Customers have access to a 24-hour helpline and if they need to make a claim, we'll send an approved tradesman to do the repairs.

Any homeowner can take out a policy - you don't have to be an existing home insurance customer.

What's covered

Here are a few examples of the kinds of emergencies we cover:

• Sudden, unexpected roofing problems, like leaks or tiles blown off during a storm or bad weather.
• Blocked waste pipes.
• Plumbing problems related to leaking pipes, blocked drains, water tanks or leaking radiators.
• Boiler or central heating breakdown.
• The home's gas or electricity going wrong.
• The hot-water system breaking down.
• Losing all keys needed to get into the home.
• Damage to doors and windows, creating a security risk.

Extra benefits

• Up to £500 for repairs and labour when the customer uses our approved tradesmen.
• Up to £100 for temporary accommodation, if the customer can't stay in their home overnight because of the emergency.
• No excess and no maximum number of claims.
• Emergency hotline available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

What services do we provide?

• If a customer has a home emergency, they can call our Home Emergency hotline on 0845 300 3346. We will arrange for an approved contractor to carry out an emergency repair (or a permanent repair if it's a similar price) up to a maximum of £500 - a tradesman will normally visit the customer's home on the same day.
• We pay the call-out charge, the cost of parts and labour, and VAT. There is no excess, but a customer can't claim for the first 28 days after setting up a policy.

How much does it cost?

• Stand-alone: £95.40 a year or £7.95 a month.
• Add-on to home insurance - £54.00 a year. £4.86 per month (£54 plus 8% admin charge) if paying for home insurance monthly. £14.31 (£54 plus 6% admin charge) if paying for home insurance with four consecutive monthly payments.

How is our Home Emergency Cover different from similar products?

• We offer £500 cover (many other policies only cover up to £300).
• Unlike some other policies, we cover parts as well as labour and call-out fees.
• If the problem isn't covered by the policy, customers can still use our approved repairer network so they know they can trust the person carrying out the work.

Buying Home Emergency Cover:

To get Home Emergency Cover as a stand-alone policy, call 0800 056 3392. If you have an existing home insurance policy, call 0870 5143 108 to add Home Emergency Cover.