Home insurance customers offered total replacement for fire

For immediate release
11 February 2015

AMP offers home insurance customers total replacement for fire and 10% extra cover for natural disaster

Leading life insurer and retirement savings provider, AMP, has today announced it will be offering its home insurance customers full replacement value if their home is destroyed by fire (or other non-natural disasters) and in the event of a natural disaster up to an additional 10% cover is provided over and above their existing policy Sum Insured value if the Sum Insured value isn’t enough to pay for the repair or rebuild*. This new benefit called SumExtra comes into force for all new claims from today.

To take advantage of SumExtra’s free benefits, customers need to ensure that their Sum Insured is the same or higher than their home’s rebuild cost**. The figure can be obtained using the Cordell calculator on AMP’s website or using a qualified professional as outlined in the policy to estimate a home’s rebuild cost.

Jeff Ruscoe, Chief Customer Officer, at AMP New Zealand says: “Research suggests that around 50 percent of New Zealand homeowners have not yet taken the steps to measure the cost of rebuilding their home - something that is critical to ensuring they are not underinsured***. If a natural disaster occurred or fire gutted their house this could leave a significant number of people unable to afford to rebuild their property to its current standard.

“SumExtra is developed specifically to help address issues of under-insurance, help our customers understand the importance of getting their Sum Insured value correct and reward them with free additional cover for doing so. It also offers them peace of mind knowing their insurer will go above and beyond when required,” continues Ruscoe.

“We know that helping our customers to protect the things that are important to them, and potentially their most valuable asset, is the most important thing we can do as an insurance company,” concludes Ruscoe.

AMP and its home insurance underwriter, Vero, are delighted to offer customers SumExtra – one of the most comprehensive benefits in New Zealand.

ENDS

Notes to Editors

* This benefit is available to customers with AMP Home Plan – Maxi and Agriplan Home – Maxi policies. Natural Disaster means earthquake, natural landslip, volcanic eruption, hydrothermal activity, tsunami or fire resulting from any of these. Sum Insured means the maximum value an insurer will pay as outlined in your policy schedule should your home be deemed a total loss
** Your Sum Insured must be at least the value of this replacement cost estimate, which needs to be less than three years old when you set your Sum Insured
*** Research conducted by Vero in Q3 2014.

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