Household policy conditions
The full text a claim is assessed against, for home, contents, everyday risks and travel.
Document
Household conditions HV-2026.1
Applies to policies taken out or renewed from January 2026. A claim is read against the version that applied on the day of the damage, and the previous version stays published for a year.
The two documents
A policy is two documents. The policy schedule is the personal one: the address, the sections chosen, the sums insured, the excess and the dates. This document is the general one, and it is the same for every household policy of the same version.
Where the two disagree about an amount, a date or a section, the schedule is the one that decides. Where this document names a situation the schedule is silent about, this document decides.
A claim is assessed against these two documents and nothing else. Anything written elsewhere by Kustwal, on this website included, is a summary of them.
What the policy insures
A household policy insures sudden and unforeseen damage under the sections named on the schedule. A section that is not on the schedule does not answer, however the damage happened.
- Fire, smoke, soot and scorching, and the damage done putting a fire out.
- Storm, hail and heavy rainfall, and damage from a tree or a branch coming down.
- Water escaping from pipes, tanks and appliances inside the building.
- Theft, and the damage done forcing a door, a window or a lock.
- Glass in windows and doors that is part of the building.
- Damage caused by a vehicle or an aircraft striking the building.
- The work needed to reach damage, and putting back what was opened to reach it.
- Reasonable costs of limiting damage in the first hours after it starts.
What the policy does not insure
- Wear, ageing, rot, rust and slow deterioration, which are maintenance.
- Damage that follows from maintenance that was put off.
- Damage that was already there when the policy started.
- Damage caused on purpose, by you or by somebody there with your permission.
- Groundwater rising through a floor, and flooding from a large body of water.
- Damage during building work that was not notified beforehand.
- Damage in a building left unheated through a frost with the water still in the system.
- Damage you cause to somebody else or to their property, which is a different policy.
- Money, jewellery and valuables above the amounts the schedule names for them.
A situation on this list is outside the policy whichever section it might otherwise have fallen under. A situation that appears on neither list is read against the section it belongs to.
Reporting damage
- Report damage as soon as you reasonably can. A report made in the same week is in time; a report made a season later leaves nothing to look at.
- Do what is reasonable to stop the damage getting worse, and keep the invoices for whatever that took.
- Photograph the damage before it is cleared or repaired, and keep the damaged parts where that is possible.
- Keep proof of what was damaged: a receipt, an invoice, a bank line or a dated photograph.
- Report theft, break in and vandalism to the police as well, and keep the record of that report.
A repair that cannot wait does not have to wait for anybody here. Photograph it first, keep the invoice, and report it afterwards.
How a claim is settled
Every section carries an excess, which is the first part of a claim the policyholder pays. It is set per section rather than per claim, it is on the schedule, and it is taken off what is paid rather than asked for up front.
Damage to the building is settled on the cost of putting it right. Where a thing cannot be repaired, it is settled on what a comparable thing costs today, unless the schedule names a basis that takes age and wear off first.
The sum insured on the schedule is the most that section pays. Where a sum insured is lower than what replacing everything would cost, a settlement is reduced in the same proportion as the shortfall.
Damage that was allowed to get worse when it could have been limited is settled on what it would have cost at the point it was first noticed.
A payment is made to the policyholder or, where a repair was arranged through Kustwal, to the firm that carried it out. The outcome of a claim is confirmed in writing either way.
The policy itself
- The policy runs from the date on the schedule and renews on the renewal date named there. The notice period for ending it is on the schedule as well.
- Sums insured are adjusted each year by the published building cost index, and the premium follows the sum insured. A reissued schedule shows both.
- Tell us before a change that alters what is insured: a move, building work, a change of use, or a home that will stand empty for longer than the schedule allows.
- Everything about a policy is done in writing, and a reissued schedule follows any change that alters it.
If you do not agree with a decision
A decision on a claim names the part of these conditions it rests on. Where you read that part differently, or where the handling of the claim was not right, the complaints page sets out where a complaint goes and what happens after it.