Storm damage and your insurance: what is covered and how to claim

This is general information about how these claims usually work, not advice about your policy. Cityline is not an insurance adviser and cannot tell you what you are covered for — your insurer and your policy wording decide that.

Storm damage versus wear and tear

A policy typically pays for damage caused by a storm: tiles lifted off, a stack brought down, a tree through the roof. It typically does not pay to replace a covering that has reached the end of its life, even if the failure became obvious during bad weather.

That is why insurers ask whether the roof was in good repair beforehand, and why a claim on a roof that had been shedding slates for two years is often declined. It is also why maintenance records and earlier inspection reports are worth keeping.

What usually counts as a storm

Most policies define it, often by wind speed and sometimes by rainfall or snow loading. It is worth reading that definition before assuming, because a wet windy night is not always a storm in policy terms.

Your duty to limit the damage

Policies expect you to take reasonable steps to prevent further loss. Emergency make-safe work — sheeting a roof, stopping an active ingress — is exactly that, and the cost of it is often recoverable. Keep the invoice and the photographs.

The evidence that makes a claim easy

• Photographs taken before you clear up, showing water arriving and the extent of it.
• Photographs of the roof itself, including anything visible from the ground or a neighbouring window.
• The date and time, and what the weather was doing.
• The emergency contractor’s written note of what was found and what was done.
• Receipts for anything bought to limit the damage.
• Any earlier inspection report showing the roof was in reasonable condition.

The order to do things in

1. Make it safe and stop further damage.
2. Photograph everything.
3. Tell your insurer, within the timescale the policy requires.
4. Ask before committing to the permanent repair — many insurers want to inspect or to appoint their own contractor.
5. Keep every document.

On loss assessors and "no-win no-fee" roof claims

You will sometimes be approached, occasionally at the door, by someone offering to handle a claim for a percentage. Some are legitimate. What is worth knowing is that you can deal with your insurer directly at no cost, that you are never obliged to use a contractor introduced this way, and that signing anything at the door after a storm is the situation in which people most often regret signing something.

How to check a roofer is legitimate.