Although the volumes of civil liability insurance have grown relatively fast in the past years, still only a third or 34% of real estate insurance policy owners have civil liability insurance, according to data compiled by BTA Baltic Insurance Company AAS (hereinafter – BTA). At the same time, the number of such accidents, which for the major part are flooding the downstairs neighbours, remains high, and the amount of caused losses can reach even a couple thousand euros.
According to what we at BTA have seen by now, customers, when considering home insurance options, often do not even thinking about civil liability insurance, or take it out just for the sake of it, as the relatively small insurance limits suggest.
“Flooding a downstairs neighbour can be very costly, unfortunately most often it is realized only after an accident. In this January, for instance, a flat owner had a water leak damaging the downstairs neighbour’s property – commercial premises – thus causing losses of 25,700 euros, but the limit of his purchased civil liability insurance policy was only 1,000 euros and covered but a tiny share of the costs. Unfortunately we come across such situations quite often, therefore we suggest to consider this very carefully, measuring the relatively small policy mark-up against the potential alternative costs,” says Raivis Štrauss, Civil Liability Insurance Product Manager at BTA Baltic Insurance Company AAS.
Civil liability insurance limits gradually growing
As BTA experts say, the highest civil liability insurance limits in Latvia do not come even close to those, for instance, in Western Europe, where even private individuals not unfrequently have a policy limit that is measured in millions of euros. Positive though that the limits size grows also in our country, and in 2016 some customers of BTA have selected civil liability insurance with a limit of 200,000 euros already. To compare, five years ago the highest limit was 30,000 euros.
Still the overwhelming majority of BTA customers choose civil liability insurance with a limit up to 5,000 euros, though the number of customers, who have obtained real estate insurance policies with a civil liability insurance limit ranging between five and ten thousand euros, has considerably grown during the year.
“Speaking of persons, who think of insurance in a longer term, they also tend to select a broader insurance cover as they are willing to have more solid protection against potential losses, and what’s interesting, the longer the insurance period, the more frequently a civil liability insurance cover is included in private property insurance policies,” says R.Štrauss. “It’s an indication of the growing awareness of the role of insurance in general, it gradually promotes the popularity of the voluntary insurance types, as it is cheaper to get yourself protected prior to accident and to count on the insurer, rather than handle the problem later on your own and at your own expense.”
According to BTA data, flooding the downstairs neighbours is the most frequent type of damage to other persons, experienced by homeowners – 94% of the reported claims are related to leaks of various liquids, damaging the underlying or adjacent property. The average civil liability insurance indemnity for such an insurance case paid by BTA is 800 euros. In winters the biggest headache to building owners is given by the snow or ice falling from building roofs and damaging cars. In such cases the average size of civil liability insurance indemnity is 1,183 euros.
About BTA
BTA Baltic Insurance Company (hereinafter – BTA) is one of the leading insurance companies in the Baltic States, providing all types of non-life insurance services in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. BTA is also one of the largest indemnity payers in the Baltics – in 2016, BTA disbursed an average of 300 thousand euros each business day in insurance indemnities in the Baltic States or approximately 38 thousand euros every business hour.
The largest shareholder of BTA is Vienna Insurance Group AG, one of the leading insurers in Europe. More than 50 companies in 25 countries constitute a group with a solid brand, with 190 year experience in the insurance field and close cooperation with customers. VIG employs 23,000 employees and is a clear leader in its core markets. VIG is a group with the best rating of all companies in the ATX, the leading index of the Vienna Stock Exchange, with a secondary listing on the Prague Stock Exchange.
More information:
Linda Upeniece
Marketing and Public Relations Department Director
BTA Baltic Insurance Company AAS
email: linda.upeniece@bta.lv
Phone: +371 67025676, mobile: +371 26756841
