Student possessions insurance

Students and insurance are two words you do not often find together in the same sentence. Whether they have their own room in halls of residence or share a house with others, there’s a sense of their living a life that is different to many other people. Student possessions insurance takes into account some of those differences, reflecting both the risks and the financial needs and circumstances of students.

One thing remains the same, though. Even students are likely to have more possessions – and more valuable possessions – than they might initially realise. Laptops and computers, DVD collections, sound systems, textbooks, all can add up to a very tidy sum, that can represent a great deal of money if they need to be replaced after they have gone missing or been damaged. Although insurance is unlikely to be uppermost in many a young person’s mind when they set off for university or college, therefore, student possessions insurance can save a great deal of expensive heartache further into the term.

The most straight forward and probably the cheapest form of cover is likely to be offered when the possessions are kept all together in the student’s own room, such as the one in halls of residence. In this case the insurance usually covers just the possessions actually kept in the room and is likely to cost just a few pounds a month.

Many students, of course, do not live on campus, but share a house with fellow students or others. Cover here can be slightly more complicated or more difficult to arrange because of the assessed risks by certain insurers. If the house is shared, for example, there could be a greater risk of theft, not only by dishonest flat-mates but also by their many friends and visitors in turn. For this reason, some insurance policies will restrict cover for loss that occurs only in the event of a forced entry to the premises and would not cover theft that seems to have been committed by other housemates or their guests and visitors.

Since such students will probably be renting the house from a landlord, some might think that the landlord will take care of the insurance. Although the landlord is, indeed, likely to have landlord insurance that covers risks to the building itself from such things as floods and fire, it remains the tenants’ responsibility to insure their possessions against any damage caused in such emergencies. Student possessions insurance, therefore, should provide enough cover for the replacement of possessions in the event of damage by fire, flooding and other such perils.

Where accommodation is shared, therefore, a perfectly viable solution might lie in insuring valuable possessions separately, under their own policies. Thus, a computer or laptop, personal sound systems, books or a bike could all be insured entirely separately. One of the advantages to this approach to student possessions insurance is that items – such as laptops – taken away from the house, for use anywhere within the UK, will continue to be fully covered.