Travelling is back, bigger and better than ever. Well, the bills are bigger… better is all relative. Relative to not being able to travel at all it’s definitely better. Something nobody wants to think about when planning a big adventure is Travel Insurance… its expensive, and unless something actually goes wrong you never really know what you are getting.
Continuing on from my earlier post about my camera insurance claim on a damaged Phase One IR Filter.
After months of wrangling, writing letters and answering spurious nonsense created by the WFI legal team (and passed to me for comment by the ombudsman), WFI offered to pay half the amount of the camera insurance claim. I considered carefully… for about 2 seconds, then told them (via the ombudsman) to bugger off! It was long past being about the money, it was about them doing the right thing, the thing I had been paying large amounts of money for in good faith.
Several more weeks of fluff and noise ensued, before WFI finally capitulated and agreed to pay the full amount. (I think they just got sick of me)… This was 25th March 2019, the initial claim was lodged 23rd July 2018… For a $3,600 claim on an item insured for around $60,000. All up I would estimate that rejecting my claim and fighting it for months used up several hundred hours of somebodies expensive time at WFI, which cost a hell of a lot more than than my initial claim.
Of course WFI cancelled my insurance (but only on my camera gear), and sent me a nasty letter that was an official refusal to renew my contract. This plays havoc with any future insurance applications as I have to disclose this in full when applying for a policy. I countered by cancelling my car insurance and my house insurance, which were also with WFI. Small things, but it felt good. And of course I tell everybody about it.
The moral of this story? It could be “don’t trust insurance companies” Or perhaps “always read the fine print…” or maybe a combination of both… “when dealing with insurance companies always read the fine print (and don’t trust them, especially WFI)”. Are you sure your camera gear is really insured?
Camera Insurance, like all insurance is pretty uninspiring stuff and if you are like most people, it’s not something you want to think too much about. You pay your money and the job is done, right? Until you find out you are actually not insured, which always happens at the worst possible moment.
I have been insuring all my camera gear with WFI (Westfarmers Federated Insurance) for about 14 years now, in fact they have (had…) all my insurance. This included my Gallery insurance for fire, theft and damage, Public liability and workers compensation.
They also insure my car, my house and contents. It all adds up to rather a substantial amount of money each year, just my camera gear alone comes in at around $2,900 per year and has been over $4,000 per year at the peak of my gear addiction…
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