Is Annual Service Required for Insurance?
With the talk of who can inspect a caravan gas service it set me thinking. I know that in the terms for my home insurance it states something to the effect that an annual heating boiler service/inspection is required. Particularly relevant as I store heating oil in an outside tank which is also inspected.
Never checked my caravan insurance and it is not to hand. Anybody know?
It does not affect me personally as the van is always serviced annually
Comments
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Thanks David I thought that might be the case. As I said it does not concern me but at one time I used to do my own servicing but had our central heating chap check the gas as he was registered for LPG installation as is our present one who services quite a few in mobile homes.
I thought that anybody not having such a service might need to be aware
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I'm sure it just says something along the lines of requireing your caravan to be in a roadworthy condition .... though I'm not digging my policy out to check. There were no receipts for my last caravan being serviced .... though it was.
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What I can see on the CC 5C's policy is this:
- Care of the Caravan
5. You must take all responsible steps to safeguard Your Caravan, Equipment, and Contents against loss or damage, maintain it in a sound and roadworthy condition, and take note of the terms of the Security Condition on page 8 of this booklet.
If anyone can see something I missed insisting on annual checks then please post it.
2 - Care of the Caravan
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That's all I can find as well. Although I suppose producing receipts for an annual service would help satisfy them that you had done your bit in complying with that clause, if there was any question re condition.
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Hmmm, interesting....I've just read my policy documents for my M/H insurance through the club.......
This is all I can find......
"5 Taking care of your Motorhome
You must:
• make sure your motorhome is roadworthy;
• take all reasonable steps to protect your
motorhome and its contents from loss or
damage; and
• allow us to examine your motorhome at any
reasonable time if we ask you."No specific mention of Hab or Cab servicing, although obvious negligence of either of those would breach the catch all nature of the above clauses......
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My present home insurance states
A boiler:
Located in Your Home (or connecting garage), and
Which is no more than 15 years old and has been serviced no more than 12 months prior to the date of Your Home
Emergency.Similar elsewhere in the policy
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ET - Do you have an extension under your household insurance covering breakdown to your boiler. This is offered by quite a few insurers now as an extra to the basic buildings and/or contents insurance. If so then this condition would make more sense.
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I still have the caravan policy booklet from the CC relating to 2015-2016 and it makes no mention in the conditions of having to have your van serviced annually. Of course it would be easier to prove it was in a roadworthy condition if you did but I cannot ever recall this as being an absolute.
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ET's quote mentions a "home emergency", so he may have taken the home emergency cover, or it may be standard in the policy.
For the boiler to be covered under this it looks like they require it to be under 15 and serviced annually.
This does not as far as I can see mean that, if there was some flood, fire, other incident at the house and the boiler had not been serviced , the whole policy would be void.
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If you have a newish van then you probably have an annual service (which would cover any gas equipment) as that would be required for the manufacturers water ingress warranty.
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Insurance is a contract between you (the insured) and the insurer. I won't go into the complexities of agents and intermediaries (such as the club who are not insurers) or the role of underwriters. There are other rules and duties which are implied by law but again I won't go into that.
So to understand the contract you need to read it, i.e. go through your policy document carefully. Some policies are written in a way which is, or at least tries to be, clear and some are arcane. Some years ago a M/H policy offered by the Club required personal possessions to be put in the glovebox ! The wording was car policy derived and entirely unsuitable but I only discovered that by reading it before placing the insurance or rather not placing it.
In the case of my policy arranged with Comfort (Aviva are the insurer) the requirement is :-
"6. You shall at all times take all reasonable steps to safeguard your motor caravan from loss or damage. You shall maintain your motor caravan in efficient condition and we shall have, at all times, free access to examine your motor caravan. "
This wording is also quoted in another post above and sounds pretty reasonable.
Personally I would not accept a policy which demands an annual service unless in the case of a caravan that is required either by law or is considered normal prudent practice.
In Germany leisure vehicles need a period (three yearly ?) gas safety check like an MOT so that seems like a reasonable time for the gas aspect.
So in summary.
You should check carefully your policy conditions. If you don't have a fully copy of the policy and its conditions (usually in booklet form) ask your insurer to give you one. A pdf may bea vailable online.
Of course you should carefully maintain your caravan/MH in the interests of safety and to maintain value but your insurer should not dictate unrealistic or artificial service intervals.
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Regarding CC 5C's insurance, I have looked at the
- Invitation to Renewal
- Statement of Fact
- Policy
- 5C's PDF booklet
and as I previously wrote, it does not state anything regarding an annual service requirement, only to "maintain it in a sound and roadworthy condition" which any sensible person would do anyway.
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Jean from The Club's Insurance team:
If you have a Super 5Cs caravan insurance policy, there is a requirement, once the van is 5 years old, to have it serviced annually by a competent caravan workshop. Failure to provide evidence of compliance with this requirement will result in any claim being settled on the basis of Market Value, rather than Replacement value,
This is because Under the Super 5Cs policy if your caravan is lost, stolen or destroyed within 15 years of the date it was purchased brand new, it will be replaced with a new. or similar model.
There is no requirement for servicing on the Standard 5Cs policy as the new for old cover is 5 years only from the date it is purchased.
I hope this clarifies the situation.
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Hi everyone,
I can confirm that this was Jean from our Insurance Team that posted this, looks like we've got a bit of a glitch on her account... looking into it now. I've edited the comment so you know who it's from.
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Thanks Jean.
Up until probably 15 years ago I did my own servicing and would have had no proof of that. It is also quite possible that those with caravans over 10 years old have there outfits serviced less frequently or indeed may do their own servicing. I felt that I had read something about this previously and it was probably with my previous caravan that was insured new for old from age 5
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