COLLECTIBLES INSURANCE
Homeprotect does not provide standalone collectibles insurance. Rather collectibles can typically be covered under home contents insurance – both inside and away from the home. Read more about our contents insurance.
What you need to know about collector insurance
It’s really important that you get your items valued before taking out a policy so you can avoid being underinsured. A professional appraiser can determine the value of your collection. This, in turn, will allow your insurer to underwrite your collection accurately.
As the value of a collection can change over time – as you add to it, and as market prices vary – you should also get it re-appraised every 1-2 years. If your collection increases in value but you don’t update your cover level then you could be underinsured, leaving you out of pocket if you need to claim.
Homeprotect insurance for collectibles can cover a broad range of risks and mishaps including theft, fire, smoke, and accidental damage. And there’s no need to arrange separate insurance protection for your collection because it can be incorporated in your home contents policy. Read more about our contents insurance.
covering collectibles as part of your contents
Under a Homeprotect contents insurance policy, you are covered up to a maximum of £5,000 or 20% of the contents sum insured, whichever is lower, for high risk items worth less than £1,500 or as part of a collection.
If your collection contains any high risk items, you need to specify on your policy that the collection as a whole is worth more than £1,500. High risk collections include watch collections, coin collections, medal collections, and stamp collections as well as collections of gold, silver and other precious metals, or guns.
Collections of antiques, glass, china or porcelain (including porcelain dolls), comics, sporting, TV, film or music memorabilia, vinyl records or CDs, or other items that we don’t classify as high risk, don’t need to be specified on your policy, even if they are valuable, but it’s still important to have an up-to-date estimate of what your collection is worth so that you can include its value in your general household content sum insured.
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What’s covered by contents insurance?
Having contents insurance means you won’t be out of pocket if you need to repair or replace your belongings after they’ve been stolen, damaged or destroyed.
What we offer
Quick fix for uncontrollable leaks
Have a home emergency, such as electricity failure, faulty locks or vermin infestation? With the 24/7 Home Emergency cover, which we provide as standard, you can typically get an engineer at your home within four hours. And if you’re worried about an uncontrollable leak in your home, we aim to have an emergency plumber to you within two hours.
Extreme weather conditions may extend response time. Policy terms and claim limits apply.
New for old
Where we replace an item, we will do our best to meet the original specification on a ‘new for old’ basis. If we can’t find an exact replacement, we’ll offer you a suitable alternative, or a full cash settlement.
Legal advice
We provide Legal Protection cover as standard, giving you access to telephone legal advice on any personal legal issue, under the laws of the UK, any European Union country, the Isle of Man, Channel Islands, Switzerland and Norway.
What isn’t included?
Lost items.
Items stolen from unoccupied vehicles.
Damage caused by pets.
The cost of repairing or replacing items following a mechanical or electrical fault.
Contents Insurance Cover Levels
Our contents insurance is designed to protect your belongings against insured events such as fire, storm, flood, escape of water, theft, malicious damage, subsidence, landslip or heave.
Contents cover
Covering the value of all your possessions in the home, on a new for old basis.
from £25,000
Alternative accommodation
For you and your pets, in case you can’t live at your home while it’s being repaired after an insured event.
up to £10,000
Home emergency
Covers emergencies that occur in your home like uncontrollable water leaks, electricity failure, faulty locks and vermin infestation. Two levels of cover are available.
up to £500
Family legal protection
Provides a 24/7 legal advice helpline and up to £25,000 cover for claims involving contract disputes and property damage. For a claim to be successful, there must be reasonable prospects (more than a 50% chance) of winning the legal case. Two levels of cover are available.
up to £25,000
Liability cover
Liability cover involving accidental death, bodily injury or illness or property damage that you are legally liable to pay.
up to £5 million
Personal possessions
Cover for portable items that you take out of your home, like bags, clothes and sports equipment
Optional
Gadgets, bikes and valuables away from the home
Cover for electronic gadgets (e.g. mobile phones, laptops, tablets etc), bikes (including electrically assisted bikes) and valuables (e.g. watches and jewellery) that you take out of your home.
Optional
Accidental damage
Covers situations when unexpected accidents happen, such as spillages on the carpet, breakages around the house or drilling through hidden pipes. Two levels of cover are available.
Optional
Your Questions Answered
Yes, you can insure your collectibles as part of your home insurance. If any individual item, or a set of items,falls under our definition of high risk item and is worth £1,500 or more it should be individually specified on your policy. Please note that you should store your collectibles in the main home building (rather than a detached garage or outbuilding) to be covered for theft or damage.
The cost of contents insurance depends on a range of factors including the total sum insured, and the location and security of your property.
In most cases, they are covered up to a certain maximum per claim if you make sure the value of these items are included in the value of contents to be insured. You can find out more about our garage insurance here, and our shed insurance. Please note that there are some items that we can’t insure such as boats and water skis, please refer to the policy booklets for full details.
Not unless you have taken out our personal possessions cover. This cover is an optional extra that you can purchase with your policy. Under our Homeprotect policy, the personal possessions option covers your personal belongings against theft or physical damage anywhere in the world.
If you are taking these possessions overseas, cover is included for up to 90 days each year. Any individual items worth £1,500 or more and any bike, electronic gadget or high risk item will need to be specified on the policy.
We exclude cover from unoccupied vehicles.
Compulsory and voluntary excesses are the amount you pay towards a successful claim.
Compulsory excesses vary depending on the section of cover you’re claiming under and the type of claim you’re making. If you make a claim under both buildings cover and contents cover, both sections will apply.
If you chose to include voluntary excesses when buying your policy, they are paid together with any compulsory excesses for the section of cover you’re claiming under.
You can find your excess amounts in your policy documents.
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