|
Home insurance in Ireland
A recent survey took the most popular type of home in the UK, the
three-bed semi, and compared the quotes given by insurance companies
for different postcodes around the country. Northern Ireland came
in top for buildings cover with an average of £119.
The premiums are affected by such variables as the amount of subsidence
in the area, and the size and rebuild costs of the house. Some policies
were based on the number of bedrooms in the house, but there is
also the issue of the cost of rebuilding, which vary due to local
construction standards, the cost of labour and the availability
and cost of materials.
When buildings and contents cover are assed together for a three-bed
semi all over the UK, the cheapest average is in Lisnaskea in Northern
Ireland, which has an average premium of £223. Compare this
to the rather down-at-heel suburb of West Norwood in South-east
London, where the number of burglaries and the cost of rebuilding
adds up to combined buildings and content cover of £702, and
you see how cheap insurance is in Northern Ireland!
Another initiative which has helped people in Northern Ireland
insure their home has been the Northern Ireland Tenants Action Project
(NITAP), which aimed to make it more affordable and simple for housing
executive and housing association tenants to insure their personal
possessions.
|
|
This had been difficult before. Anyone who regularly gets home
insurance
in the UK will know that many insurance companies put a minimum
on the amount that you can insure with contents cover of, say £20,000.
This is strange, because not many people have contents worth that
amount. What this means is that you are insuring yourself for an
amount you don’t need to be covered for, which raises your
premiums.
The consequences of this are that many people on low incomes are
choosing not to insure their personal possessions and household
goods. Tenants claim that the minimum cover demanded by insurers
cause high premiums.
The scheme set up in Northern Ireland, means that those on low
and fixed incomes can insure their personal possessions for as little
as 80p a week, whether or not the total value of their possessions
falls below the typical requirements for these policies.
Tenants over 60 can insure their possessions for sums as low as
£6,000. For others, the minimum is £9,000. This means
that the average premium for tenants in Northern Ireland is £75
a year.
Also, instead of paying premiums in advance, Northern Ireland tenants
can pay fortnightly in many different ways. They can pay at any
post office, with a personalised swipe card through Girobank. Also,
monthly direct debit can be used, but you get a discount for annual
payments.
|
|
